York looking for a boys’ basketball coach too, after Dalton resigns

York boys’ basketball coach Michael Dalton has resigned, becoming the second Cougars’ hoops coach to leave the program this offseason.

York athletics director Steve Boyd confirmed the news in an email Wednesday morning. Later in the day Boyd said that he found out from Dalton Monday morning that the coach wouldn’t be back for a third season.

“I wasn’t looking for that to come,” said Boyd. “He’s done a good job in two years for us and worked hard to build the program up in two years.”

Dalton lives in Gaffney, with his wife, Meghan, and 5-year-old daughter Claire, who starts kindergarten this fall. The hours required of a head basketball coach meant Dalton was often returning home at midnight, before heading back to school at 7 a.m.

“I feel like I’m missing out on my child’s life,” Dalton said on Wednesday. “I’m still planning on me coaching basketball, but for me, I don’t know that the next five years is the right time for me to be a head coach.”

Dalton’s departure follows his second season in charge of the boys’ team. York finished 13-12 and made the second round of the playoffs before losing to Hillcrest. Dalton, who was hired two years ago after serving as an assistant coach at Gaffney, went 19-28 in two seasons at the helm. York’s next boys’ coach will be the program’s fifth coach in six years, following the departures of Kendall McCarter, Ali Patton, Larry Dixon, and now Dalton.

“I haven’t had a lot of success hiring head boys’ basketball coaches it seems like,” Boyd said. “We hired quality people we felt like every year, but things just didn’t turn out.”

But Dalton, who is now searching for a social studies teaching position and assistant basketball coaching job in Cherokee County, wanted to be clear that the coaching carousel didn’t mean anything was wrong with the situation at York.

“As an A.D., Steve Boyd has been nothing but supportive of me,” he said. “There is nothing wrong with York School District One. I know they’ve had some turnover, but some of that turnover has been on the coaches’ part of it. I feel York needs somebody that can move to the community and stay there long-term to take it to the next level.

“I didn’t feel like, with my family situation, that I could be that guy for the next 14, 15 years.”

York is already looking for a new girls’ basketball coach after longtime leader Paula Blackwell was “reassigned” earlier this month. Boyd said he’s been taking applications for the position and hopes to start the interviewing process next week.

Blackwell took over the York girls’ basketball program in 2004 and produced a record of 107-57 and two region championships. The Cougars girls made the playoffs in seven of her 11 seasons, and eight players went on to play college basketball.

But results dipped the last four years. The Cougars won 19 combined games in that stretch and haven’t made the playoffs the last three seasons. Blackwell was informed her program “was not making the expected progress.” She said Wednesday she’s not sure what her next move will be, though she is still planning to hold a basketball camp in York in July. Blackwell’s assistant coaches, Cristi Kemp and Arsonia Stroud, resigned as well.

This story was originally published April 8, 2015 at 10:11 AM with the headline "York looking for a boys’ basketball coach too, after Dalton resigns."