That revolving door at Buckeye Local is revolving once again and this time the folks in Panther country are looking for a couple hoop coaches.

It just seems that Buckeye has had a hard time holding onto varsity coaches and at the most recent Board of Education meeting, the board accepted two resignations at once.

Both head basketball coaching spots were opened up with the resignation of Joel Nau as the Panther head boys basketball coach and Brian Best as the school’s head girls basketball coach.

Since the school opened with the merger of Buckeye SouthWest and Buckeye North for the 1990-91 school year, Buckeye Local has gone through its share of coaches in all the major sports.

When the school board hires new head coaches in both boys and girls basketball, it will mark the seventh coaching change in EACH of those sports since the school got its start in the 90s. Both Nau and Best were the sixth coaches to head their respective sports at the school.

Not only on the courts have the Panthers struggled with instability in keeping coaches long-term. Football has gone through five coaches, albeit current head coach Ron Pobolish is in the midst of his second go-around at the Connorville school. Baseball is starting the spring sport with its sixth head coach. Wrestling just finished its season with a first-year coach for the fourth time and volleyball has also had four different coaches.

There was a day when coaches remained at schools for long tenures, that unfortunately, is becoming a thing of the past.

Some coaches just can’t put up with the daily grind that comes with being a head high school coach in this day and age and are just not cut out to be a head coach in a high school. Others are looking to move, either out of the area or out of the teaching profession. There are those that struggle with losing when their coaching career starts off slow and others that are happy with that one good year and are happy to leave on top. And there are a lot of coaches that do so without being an employee at the school, work another job and leave those jobs daily to coach at a high school. The latter run into changing work schedules and job transfers.

Then again, there are impatient school boards, parents, administrators, fans and players that think high school coaches are miracle workers and expect winning to come to the programs immediately.

In business, it is the norm to turn a profit in the third or fourth year. In high school sports, too often it is win now.

Building programs takes time especially those on the down swing or that have been down for some time. They don’t come back overnight.

Once, I heard that a good coach can take a bad team and make them average and they can take an average team and make them good. But good coaches need time and need to be willing to put in the time. Both elements seem to be lost today. A great deal of the coaches don’t have enough patience and don’t want to give it time and a great deal of administrators, fans, parents and school boards don’t have the patience or want to allow the time to let a program grow.

Throughout the Ohio Valley, there are a lot of great programs in each sport and with those programs are coaches and school officials and boosters that have given time to building a great program.

With all that said, this is not to pass judgment on Buckeye Local, its coaches, administration, school board or fans. It takes time to build a successful program and each and every one of them need patience and the willingness to give time. Being happy with just an opportunity to get on the field or the court isn’t enough. That young player has to be taught that he or she needs to get better everytime they step on the field and that takes time. Buckeye has had its share of success in the past and certainly will again in the future.

NAU AND BEST came to Buckeye Local with hopes of building successful programs on the courts. Although the records might not indicate success, there was plenty under both tenures.

Nau came to Buckeye Local by way of Wheeling Central and left little doubt that he stressed defense. During his seven years as the Panther head coach, Nau became highly-respected throughout the Ohio Valley Athletic Conference as one of the area’s best young coaches.

His teams, although outskilled and outsized at times, were recognized as some the hardest-working teams on the court in the area. When conversations came up about the talented young coaches in the valley, Nau’s name was always on the list.

All told, Nau coached 10 years as a head coach including three at Central. He surpassed the 100-win mark this season, but had his best success during the 2004 and 2005 seasons.

Nau’s Panther squad advanced to the Division II District with a team that featured one of the school’s best all-time players in Chase Groves. With Groves as a junior, the Panthers moved into the District tournament, but dropped a tough decision to Cambridge. The next season, with Groves as a senior, they advanced to the sectional finals before losing to a very good Claymont team.

“I’ve had a lot of very good athletes play for me at Buckeye, but Chase was the best true basketball player we had over the past seven years,” Nau remarked.

“It was a real tough decision to make,” Nau said about stepping down at Buckeye, a position he has held since replacing Tom O’Connell. “I really enjoyed the kids here and I had a lot of fun. There are a lot of great kids here and that’s what I’ll miss the most.”

“Looking back, I really appreciate the opportunity that I had here and wish my successor all the luck in the world. I’m not leaving the cupboard bare, we had a lot of good sophomores and juniors this season that should do well next season,” Nau said.

Best replaced a very popular coach in Angie Hicks. The latter had the opportunity to move into administration (another reason coaches leave), and in doing so was forced to give up her coaching duties. Best served as Hicks assistant and was highly-successful with the Lady Panther jayvees before moving up the ladder.

An aggressive coach, Best demanded a great deal from his players, but struggled through some tough times over his four year tenure as the Lady Panther hoop boss.

“It was really hard for me to walk away,” Best said about leaving the Lady Panther job. “Even with the tough season we had, I really enjoy coaching.”

“There is a real good group of girls coming back next year that really worked hard this season. They should do well next year,” Best said.

With two young children, Best made the decision to put family first. “I had to set my priorities and those two little ones came first.”

After serving as an assistant to Hicks for one year, Best took over a team that had just graduated the school’s all-time leading scorer and did not return one of the top juniors from a year earlier.

Buckeye finished at 3-17 during Best’s first year, but recorded a 12-8 mark the next season with a strong starting cast. The next season graduation took its toll and so did the injury bug as the Lady Panthers were without one of the valley’s premier players in Monica Clyde, who suffered a season-ending knee injury. Best’s squad finished at 4-16 that year and closed at 2-18 this past season.

Replacing the two will be tough, but there are plenty of good young and experienced coaches around the valley that can fill the void. It’s a complex formula, finding a coach that will stay for the long haul. But building a program is no quick fix.