Every time Nate DuChesne retraces his steps, he rises a bit higher.
Naturally, his latest move is the most impressive yet.
DuChesne, a 1985 Snohomish High graduate and former Stanwood High coach, has been named a full-time assistant men’s basketball coach at the University of Montana.
DuChesne, 39, will leave his job as head coach at Edmonds Community College. He coached one season at Edmonds CC 20 years after suiting up for the Tritons. Now he’s headed back to Montana, where he was a standout guard from 1986 to 1989.
“It was a great place to go to school (and) to play basketball,” DuChesne said of the Missoula program. “I have a lot of pride in that, and to go back there … it’s going to be a great challenge to try to build on the success they’ve had.”
In 2005-2006 Montana won the Big Sky Conference tournament championship, beat fifth-seeded Nevada in the first round of the NCAA tournament and had a 24-7 record. The Grizzlies are expected to return three starters.
On June 21, Wayne Tinkle was named Montana’s new head coach, replacing Larry Krystkowiak, who accepted an assistant coaching job with the NBA’s Milwaukee Bucks after guiding the Grizzlies to two straight NCAA tourney appearances.
DuChesne and Tinkle, 40, are longtime friends who played together for three years at Montana.
“We hit it off. We had good chemistry both on and off the floor,” said DuChesne, who accumulated 297 assists as a point guard and a shooting guard at Montana. He still holds the Grizzlies’ single-game record for assists (14 against Simon Fraser in 1989) and was known as a skilled defender.
DuChesne was simply a great fit for Montana’s revamped coaching staff, Tinkle said. “He brings instant credibility on the floor, which is a huge necessity these days. The student-athletes we coach, they have to believe what they’re listening to.”
Although DuChesne said it’s difficult to leave Snohomish County and his Camano Island house (“I’ve always called this my home. It’s a great place.”), he has family ties in Montana. His wife, Paula DuChesne, is a Missoula native who won a state championship in 1986 as a member of the Missoula Sentinel High girls hoops team. They met when Nate played at Montana and now have three children together.
Asked about his recent pattern of retracing his past to reach new coaching heights, Nate DuChesne said, “It is a little odd but there is a reason everything happens. I just feel like there’s a reason these doors open up.”
Tinkle is excited to reunite with DuChesne, who Tinkle called “a great teammate” and “very unselfish.”
“We went through some of the battles together (playing at Montana),” Tinkle said, “and he’s spilled some Grizzly blood over the years. It’s nice to have somebody who knows what I think and sees the game from a similar point of view.”
Following his junior and senior seasons at Montana, DuChesne received the Captain’s Award, an honor given to the player who best represents Grizzly basketball.
In eight seasons as Stanwood’s coach DuChesne guided the Spartans to seven postseason appearances and two sixth-place finishes at the state tournament (2001 and 2002). In his lone season at Edmonds CC the Tritons were 13-13, placed sixth in the Northwest Athletic Association of Community Colleges North Division and did not advance to the playoffs.
DuChesne said he values the dozens of lasting connections he made in Washington and believes that will eventually help him attract some of the area’s top prep players to Missoula.
Mike Cane writes for The Herald in Everett.
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