Clark resigns as Ellsworth coach

Ellsworth girls varsity basketball coach Matt Clark has resigned after three seasons on the Eagles’ bench.

Clark submitted his verbal resignation Thursday, but will remain as a full-time educational technician and study hall monitor at the high school.

Clark’s resignation was a bit of a surprise since both Ellsworth principal Leon Beal and athletic director Dan Higgins planned to recommend renewing his coaching contract to the school board.

“He did a fine job. I had no complaints,” said Beal. “There will always be complaints whenever you have a losing record, but Matt’s a good young coach and he sure would get a good recommendation from me if he ever decided to take another job.”

Clark said if the right situation arose, he would be interested.

The Eagles compiled a 13-41 record the last three years and went 6-12 this past season, but Clark said the team’s record had nothing to do with his decision.

“If that had anything to do with it, I would have been out of here two years ago,” he said. “There’s always rumors, but that’s just part of the business and I personally laugh at that stuff. Anybody who knows anything about the maturation of a program can take one look to know the strides this one has made.

“We went from JV and varsity practicing together to having freshman, JV and varsity teams. We went from 16 kids in the program and losing by 40 points a game to 6-12 and losing three games by three total points.”

Clark is also an assistant spring track coach at Ellsworth and head football coach at John Bapst in Bangor, where he has led the Crusaders to a 9-11 mark and two playoff appearances the last two seasons.

Carl Parker has resigned his position as boys JV basketball coach at Nokomis High School in Newport to devote more attention and time to his Amateur Athletic Union summer basketball program.

Parker, a former head coach at Bangor, Foxcroft Academy, and Maine Central Institute in Pittsfield, decided to resign after three years at Nokomis to avoid a potential conflict with Maine Principals’ Association rules involving coaching out of season.

“They have a rule where you can’t coach players from your own school,” Parker explained. “I guess the intent is to keep people from coaching kids out of season.

“We have one player from Nokomis, Jeff White, who can play on the AAU team. I checked with the MPA and they said we’d be in violation. I didn’t want to penalize him just because of the school he was at.”

This will be Parker’s eighth season of involvement with AAU. It all started when his two daughters became interested in playing AAU. First he was asked to help out, then he ran some tryouts, and then he became a coach.

His first team included Old Town and Bangor standouts Matt Arsenault, Steve Pooler, Scott Springer, John Tennett, and Ryan Bradford. Last summer’s team included all four Mr. Maine Basketball finalists.

Parker will coach at least two teams – comprised of players from Hampden to York – this summer and will probably coach a third. His 16 and 17-year-old teams have already qualified for national tournaments.

“We’re at the point now where we’ve had some success at the national level and we’re attracting lots of interest and quality players,” he said.

Parker said his resignation hasn’t closed the door on a return to high school coaching.

The Eastern Maine Board (No. 111) of Approved Basketball Officials has presented its annual sportsmanship awards to the Bangor Christian girls and Islesboro boys varsity teams.

Board 111’s area includes 33 schools from Classes A, B, C, aincluding players, coaches, fans, and game administration are graded on a game-by-game basis the entire season. A banner was presented to each winning school this week.