Vikes’ Moran doesn’t intend to slow down

Some people want to start slowing down a bit when they reach age 56, but not George Moran.

The veteran junior high, freshman, JV, and assistant varsity basketball coach was recently named the new Caribou girls varsity head basketball coach. When former head coach Roland Duprey resigned, Moran felt it was the right opportunity to take over the program.

“I’ve always felt I had the ability to coach varsity teams,” Moran said. “I’ve always wanted the challenge of taking a team and seeing it develop.”

Moran has a solid reputation as a teacher of the game and his behind-the-scenes work has helped enable some of the success the Caribou boys and girls programs have enjoyed. He taught math at the Caribou Junior High for 33 years before retiring last year, but kept his ties to Caribou athletics.

He could have ended his affiliation with Caribou sports with the satisfaction of knowing he had been very beneficial to the Viking basketball programs. Instead, he sought more.

“I still get excited coaching. It just gets in your blood,” Moran said. “I love the time in the gym and love teaching. It’s a big high for me to see kids improve on things you’ve worked on.”

Through the years, Moran logged many seasons as an assistant coach and coach of junior high and freshman teams. He had opportunities for head coaching jobs in other towns, but wanted to keep his family in Caribou.

“Once you put down roots – your wife is teaching in the community, your kids love the community, and you like what your’re doing – then it’s hard to move,” he said. “Things didn’t open up in Caribou, I wasn’t in the right place at the right time.”

The right opportunity finally opened up when Duprey resigned, and Moran received the job against a field of younger candidates because he is a proven commodity, said Caribou Athletic Director Dwight Hunter.

“George is probably one of the best teachers of skills that we have on our coaching staff,” Hunter said. “He has a good rapport with the kids, but is firm, and has experience at all levels.”

Coaching high school basketball requires a major time commitment, especially in an Aroostook County city like Caribou, where the sport is steadily scrutinized by the fans and many travel miles are logged to play Class A teams. Hunter believes Moran saw beyond those factors to the challenge of fielding a winning basketball team.

“He knows there are a lot of good coaches and teams in the Big East and wants to go against that tough competition,” Hunter said.

Moran is a 1953 Presque Isle High graduate and graduated from the University of Maine-Presque Isle in ’58. He started coaching the seventh-grade boys basketball team in Caribou in ’56 and then took the eighth-grade boys team for a year. After that, he coached the freshman boys team for 15 years and then was an assistant boys varsity coach for eight seasons with head coach Gerry Duffy.

Moran then felt he needed to get away from the game for a while and took five seasons off, but started coaching the JV girls basketball team in the ’87-88 season.

Moran’s experience will receive an early test this season as he faces the challenge of putting together a young basketball team as the Vikings graduate seven seniors. He will meet the challenge by relying on his emphasis of executing the fundamentals and playing pressure basketball.

“It’s doing the little things right that win ballgames for you. If you have a team with less ability, then you especially have to do the little things better,” Moran said.

He explained some of those little things – boxing out, taking charges, working in the weight room – are factors which many girls teams do not do consistently.

Moran’s basketball knowledge is well-known in the Caribou area and some fans may be expecting him to produce early, annual winners. However, Hunter said Viking fans know their basketball and are realistic.

“They know there’s some good talent coming up through the program, but I don’t think they’re naive enough to think a team can win an Eastern Maine or state championship every year,” he said. “I think they’ll give George a fair shake.”

Giving Moran a fair shake doesn’t seem like asking too much from a man who has dedicated many years to Caribou basketball and still isn’t slowing down one bit at age 56.