The winds of change are blowing through the South Valley.  

Boys volleyball is a relatively new sanctioned high school sport in Utah. For the Bingham Miners athletics department, they hired Ben Chamberlain.  

Formerly an assistant coach at 2023 state champions Olympus High under the American Coaches Volleyball Association, Best Thirty Under-30 award winner Brett Peterson, Chamberlain takes on his first varsity head boys volleyball coaching job at Bingham. He was also head coach at Highland High when the sport had not yet been sanctioned.  

 The Titans were ranked No. 25 in the USA Today/AVCA boys volleyball rankings according to a 2023 report from City Journals’ own Catherine Garrett.  

 Chamberlain will undoubtedly hope he can repeat some of that success here in South Jordan, where the Miners finished 3-7 and 12-13 overall but reached the 6A state quarterfinals.  

 That Bingham team didn’t have any boys make the 6A All-State last year, but two were named to the All-Tournament Team at the 5A/6A Challenge.  

 Under the new coach, this Miners squad for 2024-25 won their first two games —before they lost the next three.  

 Since then, Bingham [4-3] has opened its Region 2 slate with a big win over Mountain Ridge, 25-21, 25-17, 17-25 and 25-19.  

 The new coach has already tipped off with a Boys Volleyball Jr. High Clinic that was held March 10-11 inside Bingham High’s Main Gym, AKA The Pit, so that prospective Miners could get a feel for the school and the program.  

 The Miners will continue their region schedule through the rest of April, and into the first week of May.  

 They are currently ranked No. 7 in the Class 6A RPI that determines seeding for the upcoming 6A state boys volleyball tournament that is set to begin in mid-May.  

 Bingham boys soccer also hired a new head coach in Chad Pierson. 

 Pierson arrives at BHS, having coached at the club level at Sparta United for several years, and replaces longtime head coach Leo Gonzalez 

 Last year was one of Bingham’s best years in recent memory. The Miners reached the 6A state semifinals for the first time in eight years under the likeable Gonzalez, who departed the school with arguably his most talented roster comprised of 12 seniors that graduated, finishing with a 61-33 overall record at the school.  

 Pierson may have a difficult task ahead having lost so many seniors to graduation and much of the backbone of that title-contending team that was one penalty kick from reaching the 6A state championship game in 2024.   

 Pierson, who has no high school varsity head coaching experience, does have a background as a head coach in club soccer with Sparta United and with the Olympic Development Program, over the past five years. He inherits three-time All-State goalkeeper selection Riley Whicker, a four-year starter named to the 6A First Team as recently as the 2023-24 season.  

 Whicker has now grown to 6- feet-2-inches and 230 pounds, an absolute specimen compared to what he arrived at Bingham as, four years ago. He is now a senior, and so with many of his old teammates gone, it will be up to Whicker and the other 12 seniors that worked their way into the 40-man roster.  

Thus far, the Miners have a 4-4 overall record, 3-3 in Region 2. They had one non-league game on March 5, a 4-2 win over 5A Olympus, before entering region play.  

 On March 14, Bingham won its Region 2 opener against Mountain Ridge at Ron Thorne Stadium 2-0 and then lost a heartbreaker in overtime to Salt Lake Academy on March 18 by the score of 3-2.  

The Miners then lost three of their next five games, closing out the month of March with a 3-1 win at Copper Hills, followed by a 1-0 loss at Herriman on April 9.  

The new coach and his Bingham boys will continue their Region 2 schedule through April. The Miners are currently ranked No. 13 in the 6A RPI that determines seeding for the upcoming 6A state tournament.