Matt Dove is gearing up for his first season as the head coach of the Dike-New Hartford girls basketball team.
A graduate of Dike-New Hartford and assistant coach in the program for five years, Dove brings experience and a level of familiarity to the position.
“Being able to do it at your alma mater where you grew up, where so many people had such a positive impact on you, I think the first thing I think of is just being in a position to hopefully give back to your community in a way,” Dove says. “There’s so many people here that impacted me in such a positive way. So an opportunity to do that. And then obviously I got to learn under a great head coach for the last five years. So to have an opportunity to use those lessons that I’ve learned and then hopefully build on those. Hopefully we can accomplish some things going forward in that regard. So yeah, it’s exciting for sure.”
Dove helped guide the Wolverines to their current streak of four consecutive Class 2A state championships under previous head coach Bruce Dall. He says learning first-hand what it takes to win championships has provided a foundation for his philosophies he’ll bring to the table.
“The biggest thing I realized from Bruce right away was there’s a process for how we wanted to do things. As a young coach, I think it’s easy when you’re looking at drills, you’re looking at objectives, things you want to accomplish, it’s easy to get caught up. If we don’t accomplish everything we want on the first day, I think it’s easy to get bent out of shape. And I certainly know this summer on some things we’ve done, maybe haven’t always felt the greatest after certain things, but then try to kind of reflect back a little bit and remember how Bruce did it, when we were trying to put different things in. It takes time to do that. So I think that’s the biggest thing with Bruce that I took right away was, whatever it is, if it’s in practice, if it’s a new set or new defense you’re trying to run in a game, you’re not always going to get the end result that you want right away, so to be patient. So that’s something that I’ve tried to use.”
The Wolverines will have somewhat of a new-look varsity roster this season, but Dove says key players from the championship teams set the stage for the new leaders.
“Madde Buskohl, Izzy Norton, we went to a team camp here a couple weeks ago, and they were already showing signs that they’ve learned from the seniors before them. That that was a tremendous class, not only for what their abilities were on the floor but just the leaders that they were. All five of them: Miranda, Kennedy, Payton, Jadyn, and Maryn, they were leaders in their own ways. And I think the girls saw what they were able to do, not only on the competition floor, but I think they also picked up on in the locker room, in practice, in the huddle, how those girls carried themselves. Madde and Izzy, from day one, really kind of stepped out of their comfort zone. But it’s come very naturally to them to be those vocal leaders for us. Joy Eilderts, Sophie Bennett, just the way they come to practice. I mean, they’ll do anything for the team.”
The Wolverines have used the summer for open gyms and building as a team before the season begins. They’ll begin the season by hosting Decorah on Tuesday, November 26.
Interview with Matt Dove:
