After 39 years in the basketball coaching business, the last five at Wyoming Area, Mark Casper resigned as the head coach of the girls basketball team.
It was a decision Casper wrestled with for the previous two months. Casper said the breaking point came at the conclusion of Wyoming Area’s final regular season home game when a parent of a player came down to the floor from the stands and confronted him. The parent was immediately escorted out of the gymnasium by Wyoming Area athletic director Joe Pizano, who confirmed there was an incident with a parent.
“I turned in my resignation, I’m trying to be respectful to the program and give them sufficient time to find a replacement,” said Casper, who spent the last three seasons as the head coach of the Warriors.
“It led me to think about continuing to coach at Wyoming Area,” Casper said. “I have communicated with all the kids. With this current sophomore class, the next two years they are going to make some noise. I had a five-year plan. The fact I am leaving this group we have been bringing along for the last five years, it really crushes me. Something like this has never happened to me before.”
Casper said following his resignation he received a tremendous amount of support from current and former players, as well as other coaches throughout the community. It’s those things that made the decision even harder.
“I was unsettled by it, I though about it for two months,” Casper said. “It’s not fair to the girls to not be totally into it. The amount of messages I have received from the players, when you get those kinds of messages it really makes you proud.”