The term “manager” is often associated with a statistician or towel boy on a basketball team. But for Nate Weigl, being the manager at the University of Arizona was so much more.
Weigl, 25, is now the coach at Bel Air High after spending three seasons as legendary Wildcats coach Lute Olson?s manager while studying math and Spanish at Arizona.
“It was amazing,” said Weigl, who was a sophomore in his first season as manager when the Wildcats lost to Duke in the 2001 Final Four.
As for the towel-toting, water-carrying stigma?
“That?s part of the job,” Weigl said. “It was humbling, that?s for sure.”
But Weigl also got the opportunity to review film with the coaching staff, and he picked up a number of tendencies from Olson.
“He might be the best practice coach of all time,” Weigl said. “He breaks it down to just a science. If you?re six inches from where he wants you to be, you?ll hear about it.”
Weigl has tried to maintain that intensity and focus in his own practices at Bel Air, a job he took three seasons ago.
“I try to make my practices as high-energy and efficient as possible,” Weigl said. “We don?t want to be standing around.”
Weigl has taken some of that mentality from Olson, who has won a national title and 576 games in his 23-plus-year Arizona career. But Weigl also has picked up some tendencies from his own coaching staff. The Bobcats? staff consists of Doug Rudd, Russell Peyton (a former Bucknell point guard) and George Constantine, who was Weigl?s high school coach at C. Milton Wright.
“He was an extremely coachable kid, a very hard-working kid,” Constantine said of Weigl the player.
“I was going to retire, and he applied for the job and asked me if I?d be his assistant,” Constantine continued. “Anybody that played as hard and worked as hard for me, that?s the least I could do with him.”
The Bobcats boast a solid senior class, which includes Kevin Dezell, Ben Bledsoe (10.5 rebounds per game) and Rob Trudeau (14.5 points, 6 rebounds per game). There?s also junior Lionel Perkins (13 ppg) and sophomore guard Don Hill (15 ppg, 5 rpg), whom Weigl feels can play at the next level.
Weigl left C. Milton Wright, where he played two varsity seasons, with the intention of trying to walk-on at a major program. Arizona fit the bill, but Weigl knew immediately the task would be too big. So he walked into Olson?s office trying to find any way to help the program.
He left with great memories and a desire to become a college coach. Now, as a math teacher at Bel Air, he?s keeping his options open. Weigl and his wife, Elizabeth, were married two years ago, and his focus on keeping a balanced life is at the forefront.
“When I?m looking back on my life, I want to be a family man first,” Weigl said. “There are college coaches that can do it. But it?s hard.”
