Girls Basketball Aide Becomes Head Coach In Shuffle At Kellogg

Kellogg High School has promoted Mark Holzer from assistant coach to head girls varsity basketball coach.

Holzer, also head coach of Kellogg’s track and field team, replaces Wayne Pfeifer, who will assist with boys basketball.

Holzer and Mike Gundlach, also a girls basketball assistant, were the finalists.

“Mark has been very successful at the JV level and he’s run a successful track program,” Holzer said. “He’s got good rapport with the kids and he’s a very responsible individual.”

Soccer coach hired

Jim Facciano has been named head boys and girls soccer coach at Lake City High School.

Facciano, 42, replaces the very successful Bill Eisenwinter, who announced his resignation midway through the boys spring season.

Facciano teaches at Lake City and has coached track at Canfield Middle School for five years. He also has coached soccer in city and youth club associations.

Eisenwinter resigned to spend more time attending to his duties as director of the Lake City Sting Club.

Kootenai hires hoop coach

Russ Baker has been named head boys basketball coach at Kootenai High in Harrison.

Baker, an assistant at Whitewater, Mont., High School, takes over for Gary Japenga, who resigned after four years at the helm.

NIC signs tracksters

After one of the most successful seasons in school history, North Idaho College track coach Mike Bundy has hit the recruiting trail.

And he didn’t have to go very far. In fact, the greater majority of his recruits are from the Panhandle.

He welcomes some talented long-distance runners in Todd Bruce of Lakeland, Chris Gossette of Lake City, Chris Blood and Preston Martin of Sandpoint, Lance Clark of Priest River and Steve Parker and Jason Clouse of Post Falls.

Also headed to NIC are hurdles standout April Near of Bonners Ferry, thrower Jeff High of Bonners Ferry, sprinter Amber Lauritzen of Sandpoint, Gonzaga Prep javelin thrower and Coeur d’Alene resident Jeremy Strand, and Idaho A-1 high jump champion Katie Roark of Capital in Boise.

Bundy also said Christina Finney of Post Falls, who died in a car accident last week, had been signed.

“She’d been an awfully fine person to be associated with for two years,” Bundy said.

Bundy is already looking ahead to next spring.

“We’ll have an excellent women’s track team next year,” he said.

Cards sign locals

Pitchers Jeff Anstine, from Coeur d’Alene High, and Ryan Kempton, from Post Falls, have signed to play baseball at North Idaho College.

Anstine, a left-hander, was 7-2 with a 1.99 earned-run averaged and helped the Vikings to second place at the state tournament.

Kempton, after a dandy junior year, struggled to a 4-6 mark this season.

Transfer rule approved

Region 18 athletic directors recently adopted a rule that will require athletes who transfer within the Scenic West Athletic Conference to sit out one season.

Previously athletes that transferred were immediately eligible. That policy created ill will among SWAC schools, said North Idaho College basketball coach Rolly Williams.

“There were a lot of negative things about it,” said Williams, referring to athletes leaving one SWAC school for another. “Certainly loyalty is one of the positives kids can learn from athletics.”

The Region 18 baseball tournament has been expanded to include three teams from the North Division and three from the South.

Under the old format, the top two North and South finishers advanced. NIC competes in the four-team North Division.

Keller named top coach

University of Idaho men’s track and field coach Mike Keller was named the Big Sky Conference Coach of the Year.

Keller, in his 21st year at the helm of the Vandals men’s track squad, led Idaho to the Big Sky Conference outdoor track title last month in Boise. The team title was Idaho’s third since the inception of the championship in 1964. Keller also guided the Vandals to titles in 1981 and 1983.

Idaho tallied 148 points, just 12 points better than the Weber State Wildcats. Idaho had seven individual champions and captured both relay titles.

This is Keller’s third outdoor men’s Coach of the Year honor.

Keller began his coaching career as an assistant at Oregon State. In 1967, he was named the head coach at Spokane Falls Community College. In four years his team won every regularly scheduled meet.

In 1974, Keller became the 24th head coach of the Idaho track and field program. In his tenure, he has led Idaho to 18 top-three finishes in the Big Sky Conference Indoor and Outdoor Championships.

Keller has also served as sprint coach for the West at the 1989 U.S. Olympic Sports Festival and he was the head coach of the West Team in the 1990 Festival. Since 1990, he has been a coach of the Decathlon National Team where he coaches world record holder Dan O’Brien. O’Brien competed for and currently trains at the University of Idaho.

Keller received his undergraduate degree from Washington State University in 1959 and his graduate degree from Oregon State University in 1968.

, DataTimes