Decatur coach retires after 45 years

Photo by Mike Eckels In his last basketball game of his high school coaching career, Bill Niven (right) goes over a few play changes with his Decatur senior girls’ team during the 2A 4West district tournament at Hackett March 16. With this game, a 45-year high school coaching career ended for Niven. He plans on volunteering as an assistant coach for the John Brown University women’s basketball team under a coach who is one of his former students.
Photo by Mike Eckels In his last basketball game of his high school coaching career, Bill Niven (right) goes over a few play changes with his Decatur senior girls’ team during the 2A 4West district tournament at Hackett March 16. With this game, a 45-year high school coaching career ended for Niven. He plans on volunteering as an assistant coach for the John Brown University women’s basketball team under a coach who is one of his former students.

DECATUR -- "Coaching is something that gets into your blood and is hard to get out," said Bill Niven, who is retiring as the Decatur High School girls' basketball coach after 45 years of coaching, 42 in the boys' ranks and 3 in the girls'.

But Niven is not giving up his love of coaching or the sport around which he built his life. He has agreed to take a volunteer position as an assistant at John Brown University, coaching women's basketball with Jeff Soderquist, one of Niven's former students in Rogers.

"This position is something I want to do," Niven said. "I want to keep coaching a little bit longer only on a more limited basis."

After graduating from Hendrix College in Conway, Niven started his career coaching junior high boys' basketball in North Little Rock in 1970. He stayed at that position until 1975, when he moved to Hope. From there, Niven moved to several schools before ending up at Decatur.

"From Hope I spent one year in Texarkana, Texas; then I went to Rogers," Niven said. "Then back to the Arkansas side of Texarkana. Then I went to Green Forest where I retired the first time, and then I took the job here in Decatur."

Coaching has been a family affair for the Nivens for many decades. Niven's father was a basketball coach and also ran a small business. When Niven approached his father about his desire to coach, he was surprised at the answer he was given.

"When I graduated from college, I had this idea that my daddy wanted me to go into business with him," Niven said. "When I told him I wanted to go into coaching, he said, 'I wondered why you never said anything until now. I thought you would be a pretty good one,' and he was right."

Niven had a very similar experience with his son Aaron after he graduated from college. The only advice he gave his son was, "you know you will never make very much money going into coaching. If you are in it for the money, you are going into the wrong profession." Aaron Niven now coaches basketball at Spring Hill College in Mobile, Ala.

When Niven decided to retire from Green Forest in 2012, he was all but through with coaching high school basketball. After 42 years, his love of the game began to diminish.

"When I left Green Forest, my last year there, I really lost the fire, the passion for the game," Niven said.

As he began to wrap up his last year at Green Forest, Niven began receiving phone calls from some of his former students from North Little Rock, Hope and Rogers.

"I had a conference call while I was at Green Forest from players I coached in junior high in the mid-'70s that wanted to know where I was and what I was doing. One of them was Roger Hunter who is now an academic counsellor working with athletes at the University of Arkansas," Niven said. "Then I heard from some kids I coached at Rogers in the '90s. They all asked the same questions. At this point, I figured I was going to get back into coaching or I was going to die, which ever one. Fortunately, I chose coaching."

Niven's new boss at John Brown, Jeff Soderquist, remembers when Niven took over the Rogers basketball program in the late '80s.

"Coach Niven came to Rogers High School the summer of 1987, the start of my senior year. It was the best year of high school basketball I had," Soderquist said. "He taught us so much and pushed us so far. I gave him everything I had that year. It was that year I decided to be a coach."

But the one thing that Soderquist remembers about his former coach was his compassion for the players.

"The one thing I also love about Coach was how he always kept a friendship with his players after they were done," said Soderquist."Still today, Coach and I are very close because he truly cares about his players."

Soon after these calls, Niven realized the scope of his influence and the impact he had on his former students. It was at this point he decided to continue his career by going a completely different direction, girls' basketball.

When he starting coaching girls' basketball at Decatur, Niven realized the two programs were not that different. While there are a few differences in the rules between boys' and girls' basketball, the courts are the same. However, he has noticed that the girls tend to play with more intensity and are more competitive than boys.

"As far as basketball, you treat them like athletes, you don' t treat them like girls or boys," said Niven. "You just treat them like athletes."

Niven struggled to rebuild the Decatur girls' program over his three years at the school. The low number of girls going out for basketball, particularly in the senior ranks, and low interest played on his nerves at times. But through all the hardships he never gave up on any of his athletes or the program.

In his final season, the junior high team began to grow and do well, still posting more losses than wins. But in losing, Niven found the girls were growing in their love of the game. When they hit the courts against bigger and stronger junior high teams, his kids never quit. They played hard and learned from their experiences.

The influences of the Decatur girls' program and the calls from former students gave Niven the spark he needed to love coaching again. He leaves the Decatur program heading in a positive direction and that, more than anything, is the crowning achievement in his brief time with the Bulldogs.

"If I have accomplished anything at Decatur, it is that we got our numbers back up. The seventh, eighth and ninth graders had 27 girls go out for basketball. Whoever comes in after me has some numbers to work with which was a little bit more than what I had when I got here.

"As long as I have something to give to kids and I still have that passion for the game of basketball, I am going to continue to do it," Niven said. "Coaches have a lot of responsibility to give the kids the right influences."

Sports on 06/10/2015