Mike Dudash is eager to take over the Merrimack High School baseball program after several years at the middle school level. (Courtesy photo)

MERRIMACK – Mike Dudash to the rescue.

The Merrimack High School baseball program was in a pickle last month, when head baseball coach Kevin Moyer surprisingly stepped down.

That was the last thing the program, which has been looking for stability over the years, needed. Moyer, a former varsity assistant, coached the ‘Hawks for just the 2019 season. Last summer he coached the Merrimack entry in the New England Independent Baseball League (NEIBL).

“You’re always surprised when a coach resigns,” Tomahawks AD Mike Soucy said. “Life happens, it takes you in different circumstances. You’re thinking in 10 different directions when it happens.

“Fortunately we had Mike in our system.”

In fact, the Tomahawks never really started a search. Dudash had been the town’s middle school baseball coach for several years and now he’s the head varsity baseball coach, and who knows, this could be a marriage that lasts a while. With four coaches in five years, that would be a marriage made in heaven.

“They needed to find somebody who could lead the team for this particular time,” said Dudash, who retired after 38 years in the Merrimack police department. “I got the call asking if I could come up the program. I said I’d be happy to. They grabbed me from the minors.”

Dudash said that running the Tomahawks program is “something I’m definitely looking forward to. But right now I have a task at hand, which is to get the program back on track, after COVID and all that stuff. Being retired, and having more time than most people. … But yes, if the marriage works, we’re going to continue with it. Right now I have that goal. They’ve asked me to get the program back on its feet, and hopefully I could be here for years to come.”

Dudash would seem like a perfect long-term fit. He grew up in Merrimack, played three years of varsity baseball for the ‘Hawks, graduating in 1980.

“I’m proud of this community, I’m proud of the kids,” he said. “I’ve coached hundreds of kids, and I think Mr. Soucy thought I was a good mix, giving some consistency and some kind of normalcy.”

Most important, he coached most of these players at the middle school level.

“It’s been a few years since they’ve seen me and I’ve seen them, but at least we know each other,” Dudash said.

“The philosophy is going to change,” he said. “I’m going from nine or 10 years at the middle school level and before that was travel baseball or AAU baseball.

“I always saw myself as a teacher at the middle school – not that I wouldn’t be at the high school – but my goal was to get the guys prepared for the high school. Now I’m at the high school level, and things get narrowed down. But I told the parents the other night was the goal, the objective was to make a respectful, competitive Division I baseball team.”

And that’s music to the ears of Soucy, who said that the goal is always “We want to have our kids have a positive experience.”

“It’s no different than any of our other teams at the varsity level,” Soucy said. “We want our varsity teams to compete at the highest level they’re capable of, and continue to improve from the first day of the season to the end.”

And yes, Soucy said long-term was talked about with Dudash and both sides will talk again after the season is over.

“We certainly need to shift the focus, shift the culture,” Soucy said.

Merrimack hasn’t made the Division I tournament since 2016, winning a prelim round game that year vs. Manchester Memorial before losing to Dover in the quarterfinals.

Moyer’s team competed two years ago, but just fell short.

“I just want to see baseball come back and be competitive,” Dudash said. “When they mention Merrimack High School baseball I want it mentioned in the same context as the basketball program and with Kip (head coach Jackson) with the football program.

“I think the philosophy is everybody has to work together, everybody has to be responsible, and that means all of us in the program, from the school district to the players to the coaches to the parents.”

Parents actually helped run winter workouts for a few weeks in between the time Moyer stepped down and Dudash was hired. Dudash said about 20-25 athletes took part, which he felt was a good number considering winter sports were still going on. Dudash watched from a distance.

Last year was the first year in 40 years that Dudash didn’t hit a baseball or softball, so he can imagine the players’ excitement about returning.

“Hopefully,” Dudash said, “I can give them some consistency.”

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