Two coaches from Powell High School — Ray Bieber and Scott Smith — have been nominated for the National High School Athletic Coaches Association Coach of the Year Award. The NHSACA’s National Convention is being held in Peoria, Illinois, this week with the awards banquet Wednesday.

There are a total of eight finalists in each category. Bieber was nominated for coaching tennis and Smith for girls track and field.

Both coaches were nominated by the Wyoming High School Coaches Association by a scoring rubric which evaluates six categories: longevity, championship years, winning percentage, service, honors and membership.

Coach Bieber

Bieber was nominated for his years coaching tennis.

“It’s kind of a surprise,” said Bieber, adding that he’s “excited about the nomination and getting to go and see what the national convention is about.”

Bieber retired from coaching at Powell High School in 2016 and now resides in Helena, Montana.

During his coaching tenure, Bieber guided both the tennis and girls swimming teams for a total of 38 years, 17 of those at Powell High School.

At the convention, Bieber will do a presentation on team building for individual events and said he’s “looking forward to that.”

Of coaching, Bieber said, “I enjoyed the relationship with the kids, the parents. I enjoyed teaching skills to people, all being in it for a common goal to do the best you could.”

Although Bieber has retired from coaching in Wyoming, this last year he served as the JV tennis coach at Capital High School in Helena and he teaches swimming lessons at a local club.

Bieber said he’s enjoyed getting “to work with teaching skills and helping people develop the right attitude to play well.”

Growing up, Bieber really liked tennis and swimming and they, along with basketball, played a big part of his life.

He particularly enjoys tennis and swimming because they’re sports where it’s not a matter of being naturally gifted.

“I remember when I was a beginning swimmer and worked hard to get to a certain level and the same way in tennis,” he said.

Coaching people in those two sports is very rewarding, Bieber said.

They’re sports that, if you work hard and you have the right attitude, you can get a lot better at them,” Bieber said, adding, “They’re sports that you have to be taught to play, so it’s kind of interesting to watch people. I’ve watched a lot of people over my years go from beginners to more advanced and that’s really exciting — to watch people be able to do that and it just gives them confidence that they can do new things and learn new things,” Bieber said. “They’re unique individual sports in that way.”

The longtime coach said he had “such a great experience” at PHS.

“I had great assistant coaches and great people to work with along the way and this is just an honor for them, too,” Bieber said. “I’m excited.”

Bieber said he’s not sure what will happen at the convention, but he’s “just excited to be nominated and make the trip and meet some people and try to learn some more along the way too.”

Coach Smith

Smith called his nomination “a pretty big honor.”

Smith has been coaching in Powell for 25 years as the head track and field coach and has a total of 35 years of coaching under his belt.

Prior to coming to Powell, he helped teams in Idaho and Montana; in his first year at PHS, Smith served as an assistant football coach.

“When I first started out, I thought it was about wins and losses and the fun of the game, and as I’ve learned more and more, it’s more about developing relationships with kids, parents and coaches,” Smith said. “And track really offers you a little better opportunity to do that.”

Track, he said, gives him more of a chance to get to know the kids.

Smith has been on the board of directors for the Wyoming Coaches Association, sits on the National Federation for Rules committee and has spoken at coaching clinics.

“This Coach of the Year [award] is a little more based on service to the sport,” Smith said. “It isn’t just success.”

He was also nominated for the award in 2011.

Smith also noted that, within the last five years, Nate Urbach and Nevin Jacobs have also been finalists for the National Coach of the Year Award.

“That just says something about the quality of coaches we have at Powell High School. We have a lot of really good ones,” said Smith. “And a lot of our assistants are really good too.”

Smith added that there are young coaches at Powell High School who also have a good future.