Dana Daugharthy has taken over as Iola High School’s track and field coach.
Daugharthy takes the reins from long-time coach Marv Smith, who retired after 48 years at IHS. Daugharthy was an assistant in Iola for the past two seasons and has taught chemistry at the high school for three.
“I’m excited. I’ve really enjoyed my experience being the assistant coach,” Daugharthy said. “I love coaching and I like being around track and field.”
Daugharthy is an Iola native and IHS graduate. He was on the track team his freshman and sophomore years.
“It was great for me to coach under him,” Daugharthy said of Smith. “I was an athlete for him so that was a great experience, but it was also great to see him as a coach, from a different perspective. I’m really glad that I got the opportunity to coach with him. I have the highest respect for Marv.”
Part of the reason Smith didn’t retire from coaching after he gave up his teaching duties in 2012 was because he didn’t have a replacement in place.
“This was one of the things I was held up on after retiring,” Smith said. “I wanted someone in place, and that was Dana. He’s got a good science background and is great in the classroom. He’s also a great coach.”
Daugharthy first got started coaching by helping out his brother, David, an All-American javelin thrower at Bethel College.
Daugharthy threw the javelin and ran sprints in high school. As an assistant, he worked primarily with sprinters and throwers.
“One thing that I’d like to see in the next season, it may not happen this next season, is to be able to get the numbers up,” Daugharthy said. “The past two seasons that I’ve been coaching, we just haven’t had any numbers.”
The team didn’t have any varsity male throwers or jumpers.
“Our numbers on boys and girls are down,” Smith said. “Our junior class for boys had two athletes, we had one sophomore. We have about eight or nine freshmen, though. Until the next two classes graduate, it will be hard to increase the numbers.”
Smith believes Daugharthy is the right man for the job.
“I’m confident he’ll get the numbers,” Smith said. “He’ll do the best job that he can. That’s just the type of person he is.”
