After 45 years, he’s stepping down as coach of the Bishop Miege girls hoops program

Standing on the sideline as his team raced ahead in the third quarter, Terry English’s mind began to wander.

What happens next?

His Bishop Miege girls basketball squad had just taken the lead in the 2021 Kansas Class 4A state-championship game and would not trail again. The Stags’ victory over McPherson in Salina last Saturday would give English his 22nd state title in 45 seasons with the school, but there was something else on his mind, too.

Retirement.

“I hadn’t told the coaches, and I hadn’t told the kids, because I didn’t want them to worry about winning a game for me when it’s all about them,” he said.

The longtime head coach had been contemplating retirement, but he’d done so in silence. He’d made the decision that if his team won another state title, he would hang up his whistle for good; if they lost, he’d stick around at least one more year.

When the final buzzer sounded, signaling a 51-36 victory, he confronted a quietly bittersweet moment. The reality of the situation began to set in.

The girls enjoyed their deserved spotlight. They celebrated on the court and posed for pictures. But once they returned to the locker room, English told them, and his coaching staff, that this had been his last game.

“There were a lot of people crying, and I was probably the worst,” English, 70, said. “It was very emotional. It was very hard for me to get out what I wanted to say.”

English’s final record is a remarkable 910-168. Along the way, he recalled being told on countless occasions that he’d done everything he could at Miege, that it was time to do something else.

“But I loved what I was doing,” he said.

Plenty of rivals disagreed with Miege’s classification at 4A in a state whose classifications run as high as 6A. That was out of English’s hands, but if it was up to him, he said, he would’ve been competing for state titles with the largest schools in the state all along. (During the regular season, Miege did play some of Kansas City’s biggest schools.)

The Stags went 22-1 this season. Their only loss was against eventual 6A state champion Shawnee Mission Northwest, 65-60. They defeated 5A state champion St. Thomas Aquinas twice, 56-47 and 39-37, and ran the table against five Blue Valley programs and other big schools around Kansas City.

“I can tell you this right now: There isn’t anybody in town that played a tougher schedule than us,” English said. “We call everyone we can to play us — the top Missouri schools we try to play, the top Kansas schools.”

At the end of the day, what English valued most were the relationships forged through the years. Not just with his players, but with parents and fellow coaches, too.

“I don’t think it’s about the wins and losses in coaching,” he said. “Sure, that helps, but I think it’s teaching the kids to do the right things through sports and building character through sports.”

Colleen Parsons, a 1993 Miege grad, has fond memories of her time in his program. As a junior, she was once asked by a reporter how Miege continues to have such great success — at the time, 1992, Miege had just won its fourth straight state title.

“Mr. English,” Parsons told the reporter. “He has almost everything to do with it.”

English was known for being incredibly intense with his players. Whether it was the top shooter on the team or a girl on the bench, they received the same treatment.

“I could be very tough on them,” he admitted. “I was probably not an easy guy to play for.”

He had no qualms about getting in his players’ faces and chewing them out. The upperclassmen on the team knew what he was doing, but that intensity could be a daunting prospect for fresh-faced underclassmen.

He’d always tell his players the same thing: “Don’t listen to how I’m saying it, listen to what I’m saying.”

To his final day as as a coach, English said, he learned much from other coaches no matter the sport.

“I’ve learned from so many great people at Miege, both football coaches and basketball coaches — doesn’t matter to me,” he said. “If they show me a way I can make my team better, I’ll take it.”

English kept a game-film library. It was a resource he made available to his staff, too. If they wanted to try a new type of offense or play, they would head to the film room. The collection includes clips from coaches and teams around the country.

“I’m blessed to have had the opportunity to play for Terry and to help him coach some amazing athletes,” said Carol Higgerson, who played for English through the late 1980s and later coached alongside him. “I learned so much as a player and how to be a competitor, but what I learned as a coach is priceless.”

Heading into retirement from being a head coach, English is mulling a next phase as an assistant coach. It’s tough to leave behind altogether a game that’s been your life, and if the opportunity arises, he may just take it.

But for now, even that can wait.

“I know my wife and I want to travel some, and we have some grandkids in California, so we want to see them,” he said. “We have five here and two out there, so they’re growing up and we’re going to be around spending time with them.”

This story was originally published March 18, 2021 at 9:30 AM.