After two seasons at the helm, Tim Sparks has decided to step down as the Head Boys Basketball Coach at Princess Anne High School in Virginia Beach.

"It was so extremely hard telling my players last night," Sparks told VirginiaPreps.com. "I just moved to Newport News and am getting married in three weeks. I love my players dearly at Princess Anne, but traveling from the Peninsula to Virginia Beach every day would've been really tough to do. I had to make a tough decision that was in the best interest of me and my family at this point."

Sparks will be a full-time teacher at Lafayette High School in Williamsburg. He's not ruling out a return to coaching at some point, most likely somewhere in the Peninsula or Bay Rivers District.

With the Cavaliers, Sparks went 21-23 overall, including a 14-8 mark this past year that was the program's first winning season since finishing 15-11 overall under Craig Doreen back in 2002-03. That team won the Beach District Tournament before seeing their season end in a loss to Hampton in the opening round of the Eastern Region playoffs.

"I'm very proud of the guys for what they achieved this past season. Our team goal was to have a winning season. I knew we weren't ready to win a State Championship, especially playing in a conference with the likes of Green Run, Maury, Norview and Salem. But to have a winning record playing in that conference is a big accomplishment," Sparks stated.

"We lost to Salem by one point in double-overtime and if we had won that game we would've made the playoffs. For us to beat Maury twice this past year after they slaughtered us by 40 in a televised game my first year, that was huge. The guys really worked hard and made a lot of improvement."

Prior to arriving at Princess Anne, Sparks served as an assistant coach on the collegiate scene at both Louisburg (NC) and Virginia Wesleyan. He also previously was an assistant in the Beach at both Green Run and Salem.

The Cavaliers are slated to return three starters - senior forward Michael Barfield-Owens, senior wing Brandon Porter and sophomore guard Tim Montgomery - for the upcoming 2016-17 campaign. Porter recently picked up an offer from Hampton University and Barfield-Owens, who averaged just under 21 points per game, picked up a D-2 offer from Virginia State.

Princess Anne's next hire will be their sixth Head Boys Basketball Coach in 12 seasons.

Matthew Hatfield serves as State Basketball Analyst for VirginiaPreps.com, part of the Rivals.com Network, and is a staff writer for Tar Heel Illustrated. Check out Hatfield’s Twitter page for more sports related updates, and you can also read his work in the Suffolk News Herald. To contact Matthew, please e-mail hatfieldsports2k4@yahoo.com, and don’t forget to listen to him every Saturday at 10 AM on ESPN Radio 94.1, plus watch him on the Cox 11 Sports Report.