PETE SMILIKIS

A couple of hours prior to a Bishop Guertin High School boys basketball tournament game some 10 years ago at the University of New Hampshire’s Lundholm Gym, some of the coaches were wandering the hallways out front.

What they saw stunned them – a plaque that said “Pete Smilikis, UNH Hall of Fame.”

“Hey, Pete, what’s this?” current Alvirne High School boys hoops coach Marty Edwards said he asked Smilikis that day. “You never told us about this!”

“We were like, ‘What the heck?’,” recalled Edwards, then a Cards assistant, along with Smilikis. “We knew nothing about it. And he goes, ‘Yeah, that and a nickel will get you a cup of coffee.'”

Edwards realized he had been working with New Hampshire basketball history. Smilikis, born in Nashua some 86 years ago, was an Alvirne standout, and from 1957-1960 was one heckuva rebounder for the Wildcats in Durham. He has held a triple record – rebounds in a single season, average rebounds and rebounds in a single game.

Telegraph Sports Reporter Tom KIng.

But, as Edwards said, you would have never known it.

“He had an extraordinary career,” Edwards said of Smilikis, who passed away a little over a week ago. “But he never liked talking about himself.”

No, what Pete Smilikis liked to do was coach kids, and teach them basketball in its simplest form. To hear Edwards tell it, he’d frown when coaches would get too complicated. Edwards was the Cards JV coach with Smilikis next to him on the bench.

“I’d always try to go to these plays and stuff,” Edwards said. “Pete would just look at me and go, ‘Why? We haven’t mastered this yet.'”

And the ‘This’ would be the simple fundamentals.

Smilikis loved being around the players, from young kids to high schoolers. He worked the popular Chris Ford/Wayne Embry Camp at Daniel Webster College for some 35 years, because it was teaching fundamentals.

“All he wanted to do was be in the gym teaching and coaching kids,” Edwards said. “He worked with thousands and thousands of kids.”

And as Edwards said, “He loved being one of the guys.” Smilikis was helping out Edwards at a practice and jawing with one of the players. Edwards was shaking his head.

“It’s OK Coach,” the player said. “Pete was just getting on me about my shooting…”

And Smilikis blurted out with a straight face, “You can shoot?”

Too funny. Too much fun. Smilikis would work the Embry-Ford camp with a lot of the Celtics greats – including Bob Cousy, the late Tommy Heinsohn, etc. After a day’s session,he would listen to the stories they’d tell.

“And he’d share them with us,” Edwards said.

Now coaches will be sharing stories about Smilikis. It’s tough to use a legendary figure like that, especially one that wasn’t a legend in his own mind.

Edwards, who started the Broncos tryouts this past week, oversaw a few skills and drills sessions in the couple of weeks leading up to it. He gathered the players together and let them know that this season was being dedicated to Smilikis.

“He always said it didn’t matter how much talent you had, the players who would do well and win were the ones who worked really, really hard,” Edwards said. “That’s the kind of guy he was. He worked hard. And that’s the kind of team we’re going to be.

“We’re going to do that in honor of Pete Smilikis. He was one of the best basketball players ever to come out of New Hampshire.”

A Bronco, a Wildcat, and a great coach you probably didn’t know much about.

And that’s the way Pete Smilikis always wanted it.

Tom King may be reached at tking@nashuatelegraph.com, or on twitter at @Telegraph _TomK.

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