Remembering Windsor's Bill Walsh

Walsh was stricken with an illness that prevented him from attending games this year. Walsh died on July 28 at the age of 76.

The empty seat was but one symbol of the enormous impact that Walsh had on the girls basketball team, the Granby Memorial athletics program and the entire community as a whole.

The girls basketball team also named an award after Walsh two years ago. The Bill Walsh Teammate Award, which is voted on by the players and coaches, is bestowed on the player who best exemplifies teamwork, girls basketball head coach Dean Godin said.

That was Walsh in a nutshell, according to Godin: a coach who cared not just about having good players, but ones who developed a sense of team.

Walsh, according to his obituary, coached football, cross country, softball and girls basketball. He coached the 2012 Granby Memorial High girls junior varsity basketball team that was the first in school history to go 20-0.

But even more powerful than empty chairs, awards and records are the statements that his fellow coaches and neighbors made about Walsh, as they spoke of him with the reverence reserved only for local legends.

Godin said Walsh was a “father figure” to him who was not his assistant coach, but “a dear friend.”

“He’s going to be missed so much,” said Godin, noting that hundreds of people attended his wake in Windsor on July 31. “There’s no one who ‘got it’ more than him. He’d take a player who was maybe on the fringe … and keep her in it.”

Granby Memorial High coaches Wally Hansen (track and field, boys basketball) and Dennis Lobo (track and field) described a man devoid of ego, who coached because he loved kids.

“I knew him every day 8 seasons; he was in it for all the right reasons,” Hansen said. “He had a way with kids. … The way he went about his business and how he related to kids - he was an old-school coach but he valued his relationships with his players and he cared about them. He was a great guy. He was a guy who I would listen to and take in as much wisdom as I could during the winters. …

“He absolutely got it.”

Lobo recalled Walsh’s senses of humor and humility.

“When I walked into the coaches’ office, he always would have a droll comment that would break me up,” Lobo said. “He looked forward every day to coming to practice. He looked forward every day to coaching the kids. It came out in the way he talked and the way he praised his athletes.

“I’d have to pull it out of him how his team was doing. I’d ask him how his team was doing [during the 20-0 season], and he’d say, ‘Pretty good.’”

That’s not a reflection of a crusty, impossible-to-please coach. Instead, it’s one of a coach who, yes, cared about victories, but cared more about his kids improving as players and as people.

“He was never one to say annoyingly, ‘I’m 17-0,’” Lobo said. “It was always, ‘The team is this’ or ‘The girls did this.’ He was a humble man. He’s going to be missed.”

Walsh was a coach who believed that sports were transcendent, that certain skills learned on a softball field or a basketball court could, indeed, be translated to other aspects of life.

“He was one of those people who was a foundation of the community,” Lobo said. “The girls loved him. It’s going to be a big loss.”

Walsh’s reach went beyond sports. He and his wife were active in Alex’s Lemonade Stand, which is headed up by fellow Windsor resident and neighbor Liz Flynn Scott.

“He was a unique person in a good way,” said Scott, adding that Walsh coached her in junior high school. “He was just a great guy. Funny, energetic. When you meet him, you don’t forget him. He was all about the kids. [Coaching] went beyond his kids and grandkids and being part of their lives.”

In addition, Flynn said Walsh had to “move many lemonade stands and rooms in his house for lemonade supplies.”

“He had a commitment to his family and to helping kids,” she said. “He’s a great example of how to be involved in the community and how to have an impact on people’s lives beyond the years you live. His family, his grandchildren and everybody who knew him will take something away with their experiences with him.”