LEBANON — Mike Stone has been on a hiring spree. The Lebanon High School athletic director has brought seven new head coaches on board during 2023, not to mention the assorted assistants needed to round out each staff.

Ideally, candidates meet a committee of up to six people, comprised of Stone, Raiders coaches, administrators and students. A perfect candidate knows how to treat their athletes with dignity, is comfortable around teenagers and is a teacher of the game, although Stone admits finding a candidate who excels in each of those areas can be difficult.

“It’s been a busy and challenging time,” Stone said. “The most important job we do is getting quality people to coach our young people, so you want to get it right.”

Five of the hires are first-time head coaches, although the group is heavy on previous leadership experience. Here’s a capsule look at each coach, with the exception of cheerleading boss Samantha Elledge, a pharmacist moving to the Upper Valley from Kansas in August.

Boys ice hockey

Cashman takes over a program altering its NHIAA co-op membership and coming off a 1-19 season under previous coach Jim Damren. The Raiders will maintain Stevens as its second co-op member and are replacing Mount Royal Academy with Mascoma. A challenge created by that move is that the co-op’s combined enrollment number pushes the team up into Division II.

Cashman, 45, was involved behind the scenes to make the co-op switch, which is hoped to keep the program afloat. Mount Royal would have contributed only one player, Gabe Ouellette, to the team this coming winter, and he graciously chose to switch to Kearsarge-Plymouth to allow the new co-op to form.

Cashman was a Hanover assistant for 10 years before moving to the Upper Valley Storm youth program’s U14 team last winter to coach his son, Ben, who will be a Lebanon freshman this winter. Roughly a half-dozen others from that squad are also expected to join the Raiders.

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“I have to get up to speed quickly, but there are enough pieces and positive energy that I think we’ll be competitive,” said Cashman, a 1996 Hanover High graduate who played hockey and golf for the then-Marauders before graduating from Providence College and entering the banking industry.

Cashman soaked up the equivalent of a master class in coaching from longtime Hanover boss Dick Dodds. He was assigned to coach the forwards in particular, but said the most important lessons came on a broader scale.

“Dick always shows up prepared, and he’s always passionate at every practice and every game,” said Cashman, who helped guide Hanover’s 2018 NHIAA Division I state title team. “If you’re not prepared, these kids will see right through you.”

Softball

The 43-year old Montana native recalls a pivotal game during his freshman baseball year at the Air Force Academy. The Falcons were hosting top-ranked Rice, and Kaercher had surrendered home runs to the first two batters.

That extended what had been a lengthy stretch of poor performances.

“I realized this could be my last game,” Kaercher said. “I needed to thank the people who had gotten me there, so each pitch after that was for someone: my Little League coaches, my parents, my teachers. Coaching is another way to give back.”

Air Force won that day, and Kaercher struck out a dozen Owls during a complete-game effort. He later progressed to the AA level with the Boston Red Sox organization and left the Air Force as a lieutenant colonel who had flown fighter jets, jumped out of planes and overseen security for an entire military base.

Given his background, becoming the third coach in four years of a softball program that’s gone 14-98 during the past seven seasons isn’t likely to rattle Kaercher. He previously helped coach his daughter, Ava, a rising sophomore at Lebanon, in highly competitive club softball while the family lived in Tucson, Ariz.

“That level of play is very expensive, with a lot of time on the road, and the parents have heavy expectations about winning and how their kids perform,” said Kaercher, who works in quality control for a medical technology company. “This is a different approach, in an academic setting, and my heart is in teaching the life lessons I learned in school sports.”

Previous Raiders coaches rarely staged optional practices during the summer, but Kaercher’s been working on weeknights with whatever players are willing and able to attend. His step-by-step instruction process brings a level of expertise sorely lacking during the past decade.

“When you get to the point where you’re teaching someone to fly a jet, but you’re not going to be in the cockpit with them, you’d better be able to explain every little thing and its how and why,” said Kaercher, the holder of three master’s degrees. “If it make sense and they believe in you, then they’ll keep trying during difficult times.”

Football

A 1977 Lebanon graduate who’s steering the program during its drop to the JV level in 2023 and perhaps beyond, Johnson wants to temper any expectations about victories and losses this fall.

“Our program is broken, and the experience for the kids last year wasn’t good,” he said, referring to the Raiders’ winless campaign last fall in the wake of heavy 2022 graduation losses and the resignation of the entire coaching staff.

“Our success is going to come in small gains during practices and in the weight room. We’re trying to lift the program’s culture, because the idea that football is important here and worth committing to went away.”

Johnson earned 12 varsity letters in football, basketball, baseball and track at Lebanon before successfully running local restaurants for more than 30 years. During that time, he was a six-year football assistant at Hartford before working on Dartmouth College’s freshman gridiron staff for a decade.

Johnson returned to coaching last season for the first time in nearly 20 years, working as a Raiders assistant. He accepted the head job early this year after it became apparent few others with appropriate qualifications were interested.

“I didn’t want to see a program fail that’s played continuously since 1896,” said Johnson, who’s spent significant time at the high school to raise his profile amongst the students. “We’re going to lose our program if we don’t pay attention to it.”

Golf

The former owner and operator of Roberts Auto Service on Mechanic Street is the Raiders’ third coach in five years, following physical education teacher Matt Dancosse, who helped Lebanon become an NHIAA Division III title threat the past two seasons.

The program lost six seniors to graduation, however, so expectations will be a bit lower for Roberts, who didn’t seriously take up golf until after his 1988 graduation from Lebanon. One of seemingly hundreds of youngsters who learned the sport at Carter Country Club during the 1980s and 1990s, he was previously a three-year assistant under Dancosse and predecessor Chris Pollard.

“I’m not a swing coach, so with me, it’s more about club selection and how to play the holes,” said Roberts, 53, whose two daughters and son all played sports at Lebanon. “It’s course management.”

Roberts has also been a popular youth baseball and hockey coach in the area, known as a straight shooter with a dry sense of humor.

“The personal connection is a big part of coaching,” he said. “Kids are fun and the give and take with them is fun, as long as everyone treats each other with respect.”

Boys basketball

Salls is just the program’s third coach in the last 27 seasons, following three-time state champion Kieth Matte and the legendary Lang Metcalf, who won over 500 games.

“It was a no-brainer for me,” said Salls, the CCBA’s sports director and previously a coach and athletic director at Thetford Academy. “I played and coached under Kieth, so I know the program and its system and I can give the kids consistency.”

Salls, 40, said he doesn’t plan to change much about the Raiders’ system, other than a desire to see them play at a faster pace, if possible. Lebanon, which was mediocre last winter, graduated top players and twins Dawson and Sam Bates and is participating in a local summer league.

The 2001 Lebanon High graduate has long coached local club basketball and has three children ranging from first through ninth grade in the Lebanon schools. Combined with his current job, Salls has the connections to continue Lebanon’s longstanding reputation as a hoops-first town in the winter months.

“I’m working with kids on a daily basis, and hopefully one day I’m coaching them or coaching against them or just watching them compete in high school,” he said. “That’s part of what makes our community so great.”

Girls basketball

It wasn’t long ago that Lebanon girls basketball was an NHIAA powerhouse, reaching the semifinals 20 times, the finals 11 times and winning five championships under 29-year coach Tim Kehoe. The three seasons since his retirement haven’t been kind to the Raiders, who now turn to his son-in-law with their rebuilding hopes.

Sowa, married to Kehoe’s daughter, Emily, is a former Manchester Memorial star with Lebanon assistant’s experience in both the boys and girls programs. He began his eight-year coaching career in the lower levels at his alma mater and has also coached club and junior high teams locally.

Sowa was his future wife’s assistant for the one season after her father stepped down and she coached the Raiders. He and Emily are both Lebanon health teachers, she at the high school and he at the junior high, so knowledge of the girls program runs high in their household.

“I think there’s a lot of room for growth,” said Sowa, who’s had some of his players in his health classes. “The girls are willing to work hard, and they want to win. There are lot of pieces there we can work with.”

Sowa, 32, is young enough that he vividly recalls how his own coaches made him feel.

“I don’t take the impact of coaching lightly,” he said. “You have the power to affect kids, maybe for the rest of their lives, in how they feel and think about themselves.”

Tris Wykes can be reached at twykes@vnews.com.