With the new school year quickly approaching, Daviess County High School has found its new face of the Girls Basketball program in Stephen Haile.
Haile, alongside his wife Leslee and his two-year old daughter Ann-Hampton, is thrilled for the opportunity and can’t thank Daviess County administration for the chance to make a difference in these student-athletes’ lives.
“I’m excited about the opportunity and I’m grateful that the administration in Daviess County has given it to me and I’m looking forward to working with everybody,” Stephen said.
Stephen has been a major part of the successful Henderson County Girls Basketball program over the past 11 years alongside his dad and longtime Head Coach Jeff Haille (34 years), who recently recorded his 750th win last season.
Stephen played varsity basketball all four years at Henderson High School before graduating in 2006 and later graduated from USI in 2012 with a degree in physical education.
He joined the coaching staff in an unpaid position in 2010 at Henderson, before coaching the freshman team the following season before becoming the JV Head Coach/Varsity Assistant in 2014.
It wasn’t until recently that Stephen realized he wanted to step into a head coaching role, but he’s ready to go and glad it’s somewhere close to home.
“A few years ago,” Stephen said. “I’ve kind of looked into it and I had a few other chances at a couple of other places, but it just wasn’t right for me at the time… Being Daviess County is only a 30 minute drive from my house, it’s a really easy drive, it’s a great school and we’ve got some talent returning, so it was kind of just a great situation all-around.”
Stephen had been looking for years to find a head coaching position relatively close to Henderson, not wanting to move too far with his family. So he was excited to be able to apply for the Daviess County job, one he considered to be the cream of the crop.
“To be honest, Daviess County was one of the best jobs around here in my opinion,” Stephen said. “It’s a great school, they’ve got good kids to work with and you know it’s just one of those things I looked at and said if that’s ever open it’s something I would definitely be interested in.”
With no physical education jobs open at the moment, Stephen will remain teaching at Henderson County for the first year of his tenure as the Daviess County Girls Basketball Head Coach.
Regardless of the fact that he’ll have to make a short drive after school days, Haille is ready to meet his players and others amongst the community after being in Henderson for his entire life.
“I’m looking forward to meeting some new people,” Stephen said. “I’ve been in Henderson my whole life… I’m looking forward to just meeting some new people and enjoying a new experience.”
The teams that Stephen was a part of in Henderson prided themselves on was giving it their all and getting after teams defensively, so he’s hoping to instill that in his players and help them improve night in and night out en route to bringing home some hardware.
“We just want to compete every single play, every single night, every day at practice and hopefully in the end it’ll work itself out and we’ll be able to compete for district and hopefully region championships,” Stephen said. “We want to be competitive at both ends, so that’s gonna be the goal.”
But before all the success he and the school hopes will come, Stephen is ready to meet the team and get right to work.
“I’m looking forward to meeting all the girls,” Stephen said. “I don’t know any of them, so I’m looking forward to meeting them and getting to work with them. And then obviously for myself, I’m looking forward to implementing some of the things that I want to do that may be a little different than what we’ve done even here in Henderson.”
