Sports : Love of coaching brings retired superintendent Healy to V-S BB program

Vikette BB Coach Mike Healy works with seniors Brea Burroughs and Chelsea Mier on a 1-on-1 drill.

Mike Healy says that in his retirement, he is only going to do “things that I love.”

And among the things he loves most is something he did when he began his career in education more than 40 years ago – coaching basketball.

Healy retired from his position as superintendent of the Bellevue school district at the end of the 2013-14 school year.

He had begun teaching and coaching in the 1970s, but like most coaches who become principals, he had to give up coaching when he became a principal in Wisconsin in 2000. For the first 25 years of his career, he had coached girls and boys basketball teams, as well as cross country and track.

Giving up coaching was a very hard decision, said Healy, who is now the Vinton-Shellsburg varsity girls basketball coach.

“My wife and I debated it a lot,” Healy recalled on Wednesday, as he sat in the commons sketching out practice routines and play while waiting for the players to get out of their final class. “She wanted to make sure I would be happy if I gave it up.”

While Healy said he found contentment in the changes and challenges of being a principal and later a superintendent, he always kept his love of coaching. He maintained his coaching credentials, and as soon as he retired, he began looking for a coaching opportunity.

“I have always known about Vinton, and Coach Shepherd was a contemporary of mine when I started coaching,” said Healy, referring to long-time Hall of Famer Harold Shepherd, who coached at Vinton and VS for more than 30 years.

Healy's teams never played against the Vikettes, because of the geography and differences in school sizes. But when he heard about the opening, he applied. He and his wife are in the process of relocating from Bellevue to the Iowa City area, and the V-S job fit into those changes.

Coaching as teaching

When asked what he loves most about coaching, Healy says, “Coaching, at its best, is pure teaching. You are helping them learn the game in a way that makes them successful, and that is a lot of fun.”

One of the first lessons Healy is teaching the current Vikettes is how to overcome an opponent's height advantage.

“Our tallest players is 5'9” and three of the Beckman starters were taller than that,” said the coach of the Vikettes' opponent on Tuesday.

The way to overcome that disadvantage, he says, is to play an up-tempo game and bring lots of pressure on defense. The Vikettes have begun working on those strategies in practices.

“We are 0-2 now and I would certainly prefer to be 2-0,” he said of the early losses. “But we were better in the second game than we were in our first, and we will be better on Friday.” The Vikettes host West Delaware and Coach Shepherd in their third game of the season.

“It will be a tough game,” said Healy. “They have been mentioned among some of the pre-season rankings.”

While the Vikettes are a young, small team with few players (21 total in grades 9-12) there is “a lot to be happy about,” says the new coach.

“Macy Griffith has some great skills and Chelsea Mier is one of the hardest-playing girls I have coached,” he said.

Griffith and Mier have each led the Vikettes in scoring in the first two games. Both are also among team leaders in rebounds and assists. Mier and Brea Burroughs provide strong senior leadership, Healy adds.

With their up-tempo offense and high-pressure defense, the Vikettes will be “fun to watch,” says the coach.

One of the changes Healy has seen over the past four decades is that while there are fewer girls interested in basketball – mostly because schools have added other sports – those who do chose basketball have more passion for that sport.

“We are playing a numbers game,” he said, referring to the challenge of finding enough players to fill the roster for each team. “And many other schools are playing that numbers game, too.”

Over the years, says Healy, basketball skills have improved. The game has become even more physical, and players handle the ball and shoot better, he says.

Healy led one of his teams to the State Tournament, where they lost in the semi-final round. Several other teams “knocked on the door,” he adds.

In addition to coaching, Healy says he will do some part-time educational consulting for school districts. And, he says, he played more golf in the fall than he has in many years.

“All I plan to do are the things that I love doing,” he says.