YORK — The year was 1977 and Rick Clark was in his first season as coach of the York High junior varsity girls’ basketball team.

He was young and still learning to coach. And in an early season game, he learned a very valuable lesson.

Rick Clark is closing in on his 500th career victory in 36 seasons as a varsity basketball coach at York – two seasons with the boys, 34 with the girls – and the Wildcats are ranked No. 1 in Class A South with a 10-0 record. John Ewing/Staff Photographer

“We’re down by two to Kennebunk, about 30 seconds left,” he said. “I called a timeout and told the girls what we were going to do. We were going to save some time on the clock, so I told them when they were inbounding the ball to just roll it down the floor and pick it up at the last second. I assumed they knew what that meant. They didn’t know what that meant.”

They let the ball roll. And roll. Finally a Kennebunk player picked it up and went in for a clinching layup.

“I learned when you call a timeout, you better be thorough in what you’re telling them to do,” he said. “Because if you assume anything, it’s probably going to come back to haunt you.”

That was the last time the JV girls lost a game under Clark. They won 77 in a row before he became varsity head coach for the 1982-83 season. He hasn’t lost many games with the varsity, either.

Clark is in his 34th and final season as the varsity girls’ coach. He is 66 and stopped teaching five years ago.

The Wildcats, with five seniors and six other returning players, are 10-0 and ranked first in Class A South. Clark needs three more wins for the 500th of his career – including 10 with the York boys’ team that he coached for two years before moving to the girls.

“That’s a longevity thing,” said Clark, who was inducted into the New England Basketball Hall of Fame in 2009. “It doesn’t necessarily mean that you’re the best coach that came down the pike. But if you stay around long enough and have some talent and some kids, you’re going to win some games.”

That’s typical Clarkspeak. He doesn’t want to take credit for creating one of the best girls’ basketball programs in the state. The Wildcats have won three Class B state championships (1992, 1994 and 2010) under Clark, along with two other regional titles (1986, 2009). They’ve reached the regional final 14 times. Only twice have they failed to make the playoffs.

Eighteen of his players have gone on to play college basketball. At least two of this year’s players, Shannon Todd (Northeastern) and Chloe Smedley (Maine Maritime Academy), will join that list.

WELL-RESPECTED

Others know what his impact has been.

“He’s been a good ambassador for girls’ basketball in the state of Maine,” said Don Abbott, the Wells coach who grew up in York and had Clark as a teacher. “It’s going to be sad to see him go. It will leave a void in our game, no doubt.”

“It’s going to be a huge loss,” said Greely Coach Joel Rogers. “He’s a gentleman of the game, old school, wears a shirt and tie. He’s extremely respectful of officials and players.”

Clark stresses fundamentals, defense, teamwork and sportsmanship. He runs the same drills in practice and same plays during games as he did when he first began. He’s had six technical fouls – “A fact I’m not proud of,” he said – the last coming in 1992.

“His teams are always extremely disciplined,” said Lake Region Coach Paul True. “One of the things they do better than most teams is simply execute Rick’s game plan.”

Clark doesn’t try to do anything extraordinary.

“If I’ve done my job in practice, I’m not going to have to do a lot (in a game), except occasionally make an adjustment, decide who comes in, make sure we have fresh people,” he said. “Coaching is really about knowing your stuff and implementing it in practice and then tweaking it occasionally in a game.”

He refrains from picking his best players or greatest teams because to single any out would be unfair to others. More than anything, he will miss the relationships he’s formed with his players. He stays in touch with many, getting Christmas cards and attending weddings or other events.

“My part-time job, all through the 40 years I taught, was a carpenter and a painter. Now I do it full-time,” said Clark. “When I do a carpentry job or a painting job, I look at it and know if I did it well or if I could do a little better. You know it instantly.

“You don’t know that with kids, as a teacher or a coach. So five years down the road, or 10, or 20, when people come to me that I’ve taught or coached and talk to me about things they remember, that I had an impact on their lives, that’s why you do it.”

One of the things he did early in his career was to bring his children to practices. Now he brings his grandchildren. “I think it humanizes you a little bit,” he said.

A BOND WITH PLAYERS

His players have certainly appreciated his efforts. Angie Suffridge was perhaps his first star, a point guard who could dominate a game. She went on to play at Central Connecticut State and is now a 47-year-old middle school principal in Terryville, Connecticut, and a former coach. “There are people in your life that you remember that had an impact,” she said. “He was one in that he cared a lot about his players. He knew us, and it was important that he got to know us off the court as well. And there wasn’t anything he wouldn’t do for us.

“I could call him, and we haven’t seen each other in three years or so, and it would be like we never left. He was a very caring man and that’s what I’ll remember.”

Joanna Brown was on Clark’s first two state championship teams. She went on star at the University of Southern Maine and said she wouldn’t have done it without Clark’s influence.

“I wasn’t the best student in high school, but Mr. Clark helped keep me focused on something that I cared about and that was basketball,” said Brown, now 39 and working for Guardian Life Insurance. “He really taught me to love the game. And I used my love of basketball to keep my grades up.

“He made me feel good as a player, made me feel proud to be part of a team and to be an integral part of the team. I felt like I was part of something bigger.”

Niki Taylor, who helped York win the Class B title in 2010 and then went on to play at Vermont, said Clark wasn’t just interested in winning. “For him, it was not only important to win, but to improve as a team and a player,” she said. “He wanted everyone on the team to improve. And he did a very good job of making sure that people, even if they didn’t play, felt like they were part of the team. That’s important.”

ONE MORE TITLE?

Todd and Smedley are proud to be part of his final team. “It’s just a real special year,” said Todd. “And it’s been awesome so far.”

“We’re all pushing our hardest,” said Smedley. “We want it for us and we want it for him.”

Clark thought briefly a couple times about retiring because he sacrificed a lot of family time. He coached against his four daughters, who played at Wells. And one year, when his daughter Kristi was a senior, he was going to stop so he could watch her. “Her reaction was that she said if you don’t coach because you want to watch me play, I will not go out for the team,” said Clark. “What do you say to that?”

He also coached boys’ track at York for 31 years, and girls’ track, too, for a decade.

Now he will get to spend more time with his wife, Lauren – “Maybe there’s a winter vacation in our future, getting away from the cold and snow,” he said – as well as his five children and seven grandchildren (and possibly eight by the time you read this). He’ll keep busy with his carpentry jobs. He is a volunteer firefighter in Wells. He has offered to continue to work with the York basketball program in any way he can, which you would expect from someone who says, “This program has been my heart and soul for 34 years.”

He’d like to leave with a championship, but knows not every story has a fairy-tale ending.

“I say this to every team I’ve ever coached: You can do the best you possibly could do, try the hardest you’ve ever tried, it doesn’t mean it’s going to happen,” he said.

“But if you walk away knowing you gave everything you had and understand that in life, no matter how hard you want something to happen, you’ll be all right.”

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