We talked to the new head boy's basketball coach and asked him a few questions about this season and this is what he had to say.
The first thing we asked him was if he was excited about transitioning from an assistant coach to a head coach, he said “I’m very excited to be the leader of the group and to be the one making the decisions. I have all these ideas and thoughts from my time as an assistant for many years that I can now implement into my own program and I hope it brings us success.” We followed up by asking him what he thought would be the most challenging part of being a new head coach, he said “I think one of the biggest challenges I am going to have is being a varsity head coach that has that added level of responsibility and decision-making that will surely challenge me. Luckily I have Coach Scholten still on staff who has coached many games and will be a helping hand on the sideline for me.” Included in that question we asked if it would be hard to transition from girls' high school basketball to boys' high school basketball. He said “I won’t have much trouble switching from the girl's side to the boy's. I coached college men’s basketball before moving back to Battle Lake so that experience will help me a lot.”
We then asked him if he and his team had any set goals for this season, and his response was “For me personally I want to make sure the guys have a positive experience. I have high expectations for this team and I think we can win a lot of games and have a very successful season if we play the right way.” We then asked him about his coaching style and if he had any values to coaching, he answered “Being it’s my first year as a head coach I have an idea of a style of how I want to coach but it’s going to be a learning year. If they aren’t responding to my style I will have to change it up. My values as a coach is to do things the right way. That means playing the right way on the court and carrying ourselves the right way off the court. I also value trust. As a 1st year coach with these guys, I need to develop that trusting relationship with them. They need to trust in me that I am doing what is best for them and the team, and I need to trust them that they are going to make the right decisions on and off the court that will benefit the team.” He then informed us that before he came to coach at Battle Lake that he was a college basketball coach. He said “I originally got my start in coaching as a student assistant at the University of Jamestown while I was getting my Bachelor’s degree. After I graduated I stayed on staff for a year as the college's JV head coach and a varsity assistant coach. After that year my wife and I moved to Spearfish, SD where I became the Graduate Assistant at Black Hills State University for 2 years while I pursued my Master’s degree. After those 2 years and graduating with my Master’s I accepted a position as the assistant coach at Presentation College in Aberdeen, SD. I coached at PC for 2 years before my wife and I decided it was time to be closer to home and we moved back to Battle Lake. I then took the position of Junior High boys and girls coach then took the role of Head JV coach and Assistant Varsity coach for the girls.”
He finished up by sharing his favorite memories from coaching. “I’ve been a part of a lot of game-winning shots, conference championships, and national tournament teams. One of the best basketball memories was my last year at Presentation College when we won the 1st conference championship in school history with a group of guys from across the country. My all-time favorite memory of basketball though is watching the players grow as humans and become better people through the process of sports. Watching them walk across that stage on graduation day with their diplomas is right up there as well.”
