Holweger’s appointment appears to be the final transition to a series of events that rocked the program. He also is Boro’s third head coach in the last 20 months.
Initially, longtime coach Troy Holtrey was not renewed as coach last summer. Community sentiment was against the board’s decision. Holtrey’s dismissal also seemed to be collateral fallout to an unaccounted booster fund that resulted in an indictment for embezzlement of former booster president Thomas Harves earlier this year. Harves was charged with taking nearly $500,000 over a 20-year period.
Jay Byrne, an assistant to Holtrey, vowed to serve only as an interim head coach last season.
Byrne stayed true to his word, but will return as Holweger’s assistant. That’s not surprising. Both Holweger and Byrne are Fenwick graduates and have had extensive coaching careers. Holweger said it was Byrne who gave him his first coaching job after he graduated from Wittenberg University.
“We go way back,” Holweger said of Byrne, both of whom are Middletown natives. “He’s a great coach and we’ll work well together.”
That wasn’t the only high-profile basketball position filled Thursday. Alter tapped assistant Eric Coulter to succeed Joe Petrocelli as the Knights head coach. Also, Hamilton athletic director Mike Dellapina was named the AD at Springfield.
Holweger, 41, has been an English teacher at Springboro High School the last 10 years. He coached many of the returning Panthers players in youth basketball.
He previously was head coach at Lebanon in 2005-06 and at Hamilton Township near Columbus for two seasons.
This past season he was a varsity assistant to Springboro girls head basketball coach Tom Benjamin. Before that he was an assistant to Petrocelli at Alter for a couple of seasons.
A coach for 20 years, Holweger yearned to be a head coach again.
“It was time,” he said. “The call to be a head coach has never been greater in me. This is one of the premier jobs in the area. I love the high expectations that go along with this job.”
Springboro was 22-5 last season. The Panthers also were outright winners of the Greater Western Ohio Conference South Division title, the fifth straight year they’ve won outright or shared titles.
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