A Couple Of Hoops Newsmakers

A couple of former Dartmouth basketball coaches are in the news ...

First, Mike Maker, a longtime Dartmouth assistant who helped West Virginia into the NCAA's and most recently was at Creighton, is the new head basketball coach at Williams. He'll do a terrific job there. I couldn't be happier for him ;-)

Also, Makes' former head coach at Dartmouth, Dave Faucher, gets a nod in this Sports Illustrated story for helping discover Andrew Wheating, the Olympics-bound 800-meter runner from nearby Norwich. From the story:

Dave Faucher, the former men's basketball coach at Dartmouth and director of alumni relations at KUA, reached out to an old friend named Jeff Johnson. KUA had no track team, but Faucher wanted Wheating to have some coaching and some direction and Johnson had plenty of connections and background. He had been a runner at Stanford and one of the founding employees at Nike in the 1970s. He knew running. (He also knew Prefontaine). Faucher suggested to Johnson that there was a raw, possibly talented young runner at his school.

Johnson, who is retired and was coaching part-time a local high school agreed to have dinner with Wheating at Molly's Restaurant in Hanover, N.H., in late January of Wheating's senior year. This was just two years ago and Wheating had never run a track race in his life. Johnson brought up Oregon (he was close friends with incoming Oregon coach Vin Lanana, who had previously coached at Dartmouth). He asked if Wheating might be interested in attending college and running for Oregon.
"Sure," said Wheating.

Johnson recalls, "I don't think Andy even knew that Oregon was in North America."

Faucher, a marathon runner himself, knew a good thing when he saw it. Jeff Johnson, the coach Faucher brought Wheating to the attention of, is that certain Hanover High distance runner's coach. And Vin Lananna, of course, is the former Dartmouth distance and cross country coach. Wheating has an astounding story, well worth reading.