Maria Miller new girls hoop coach at Wallenpaupack
Jun. 23—She's spent 32 years working with players, but for Maria Miller, this will be her first basketball head coaching assignment.
The 55-year-old Honesdale native will take the reins this winter atop the Wallenpaupack Area High School girls program.
"I'm very, very excited about it because I've coached a lot of these kids, great kids," said Miller, who moves up in the program from the seventh- and eighth-grade level, where she was an assistant under former head coach Roy Gibbs. "I think they really want to learn and to continue to develop their skills."
Miller was hired at Monday night's school board meeting, replacing Gibbs, who became a victim of the district's collective bargaining agreement, which gives first choice at any opening to district employees.
Gibbs, 71, a retired teacher from the Wayne Highlands School District, made it clear that it was his idea for Miller and others on his staff to apply, after he learned that another teacher — not one of his paid assistants — put in for the position.
"This year the job was posted, as it is every year, and a member of the bargaining unit applied," Gibbs said. "I want people to understand it wasn't a member of my staff that applied for my job.
"Once someone else applied for my job and it became an issue with the bargaining unit, I then told my staff to feel free to apply because they were going to hire someone from the bargaining unit. No one on my staff applied until this came to light. They've been as loyal as loyal can be.
"Jim Kane, the high school principal, and Ann Marie Simons, the athletic director, have been absolutely super. They have been fantastic. They're first-class people. And Wallenpaupack has treated me great in my four years there. This hit me like a ton of bricks."
Miller was the freshman coach until Gibbs asked her to take over the seventh- and eighth-grade teams to focus more on fundamentals. That will continue in her new role.
"That's probably one of my strengths, working on the fundamentals of the game and understanding the why of what they're doing within the game," Miller said. "I think if you can get players to buy into trusting each other and working hard defensively and rebounding, the other things will follow. And it takes a lot of work and it takes a lot of heart."
There's one more thing Miller's seen in her years as an assistant coach, and as an AAU coach for her daughter Katie's team, which lost to Conrad Weiser in overtime in the Class 3A state quarterfinals in 2015.
"I want to try to focus on getting more of a bench," said Miller, who began coaching when she got her first teaching assignment in 1988. "If you look at a lot of teams, those seventh, eighth and ninth players, they're crucial to winning. And having players understand their role on the team, and how important every role is, whether they're scoring or not scoring.
"Unfortunately that's what a lot of kids focus on, and there are a lot of parts of the team that are invaluable to winning."
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