He was sitting calmly on the bench, wearing a nice casual sweater, knowing the Nashua High School North freshman boys basketball team he co-coaches with Connor Dunning’s fate was just about decided as a runnerup to Exeter in the state tournament.

But that relaxed image is a far cry from the one yours truly has of Arthur Kobs when he was coaching the one Nashua High and then Nashua North junior varsity back in the 1990s and all the way to around 2010. Sleeves rolled up, tie flapping, fiery, and good grief, something we’ve always moaned about – always in a ton of JV overtime games.

Current South varsity boys coach Nate Mazerolle remembers this when Kobs was coaching junior high ball:

“My favorite story about Arthur, when I was a seventh grader, at the end of the bench because we had like 30 kids on the team, water spilled during a game,” he said. “This was back when he wore a sportcoat and tie. He took the sportcoat off, threw it on the ground, that’s how he wiped up the spilled water. Which is quintissential Arthur.”

That’s why we love Kobs. He is more known for his incredible work in track and cross country, but he could probably coach anything, which is why he was a popular inductee into the Nashua Athletics Hall of Fame in 2023.

In the better part of six decades and 110 consecutive seasons in track and cross country he presided over 16 championship and runnerup banners and 42 individual champions.

But we have always had that lasting image of Kobs in basketball, and were glad to hear a few months ago that new North boys varsity hoop coach Kyle Tave had asked him to help coach the freshmen. Kobbs’ son, Matt, gave Tave the idea knowing his father had basically stepped away from full time track duties.

Tave wasn’t around the area when Kobs was a JV hoop show, but he had since heard how much Kobs had loved coaching hoop. So he approached him, and Kobs said, “Well, if I do it, I’m going to ITALICSdo it.END ITALICS”. That meant do it 110 percent. Then Tave sat while Kobs and Tave’s varsity assistant Bob Boissoneault, the former Bishop Guertin JV and varsity head coach, were telling old war stories, and he was floored.

“The amount of basketball education I’m getting by having him and Artie Kobs in the same room together, this is the best thing for me and all the younger guys,” Tave said. “It was just unbelievable. …. When you see him in the gym working with kids, you just know.”

There’s just no substitute for experience. Tave says the amount he’s learned in the last few months with both of them has been incredible, and same for what the freshmen have learned from Kobs.

“Coach Tave came to me and said, ‘Would you like to do it?'” Kobs said. “And I thought, I don’t know, it’s been at least 2010. We’re talking 14, 15 years. These kids are phenomenal, 18 of them. I’m having a ball.”

Kobs set three rules: “Show up, work hard, and be nice,” he said. “And they’ve done it. They’ve shown up every day. “They’ve worked hard every day. And freakin’ nice kids. Worked on their academics. … It felt great. It rejuvenated me.”

The season wasn’t a lot of heavy lifting. Kobs would teach til noon ever day, then go home and come back to North with his beloved dog for practice which usually was done by four. He could then go to the indoor track meets on the weekends if he wanted.

Plus, the veteran coach loved what he saw, and the team took off on a 13-game run after a 2-2 start, ran through Timberlane, Goffstown and Bedford in the tourney before falling to a tall, more athletic Exeter team early this past week at Nashua South’s Belanger Gym in the finals.

“We saw so much improvement as the year went along,” Kobs said. “We saw them doing the stuff that we talked about doing in practice, we saw them play hard every game. We work on their grades, they’re A-honor roll kids.”

Kobs didn’t know any of the players, and, as he said with a wink and a chuckle, “And they didn’t know me.”

Kobs joked the biggest adjustment he had to make was he couldn’t swear, as he knew he was there to set an example. Referees were probably glad about that, but Kobs left all the heavy lifting during games to Dunning, who was now the one dressed in a jacket and tie.

“I learned a long time ago, the harder time Arthur gives you, the more he loves you,” Mazerolle said. “He’s so good with kids. Any kid who has ever worked with Arthur, loves him for life, because he knows Arthur would do anything for any kid anytime. He’s exactly what we need in high school sports … It’s really good to see him out here.”

Nashua North freshmen basketball co-coach Art Kobs gives some support to Titan Connor Johnson during the state freshmen tourney final at the Belanger Gym early this past week. (Telegraph photo by TOM KING)

Now the question is, will Kobs continue? Tave certainly wants him to, telling him in kinda-sorta jest when he took the job it was “a three-year contract.”

“I think so,” Kobs said.

Music to everyone’s ears. Hey, after all, none of his games this year went into overtime, right? But seriously, Kobs is a Nashua coaching jewel, and the more lives he touches, the better.

“Now,” Tave said, “you see what a Hall of Fame coach is.”

Tom King can be reached at tking@nashuatelegraph.com, or on X, formerly known as twitter, @Telegraph _TomK.