NILES — The Niles boys basketball program will look to a familiar face to help turn the program around.

Niles announced the hiring of former Vikings girls basketball coach Patrick Touhey as its new coach following the resignation of Tyler Denby after just one season.

“Coach Touhey brings a passion to the school that is contagious,” said Niles Athletic Director Jeff Upton Thursday. “He has a joy and love for basketball that is reflected every time he walks into our gym. Beyond that, coach Touhey teaches life skills to his players and is focused on building relationships with his players.”

Touhey coached the girls varsity basketball team from 2009 to 2014. During his tenure, the Vikings were 73-63, which included a 0-21 season in 2012-13. That team consisted mainly of freshmen and sophomores, but laid the foundation for future Niles teams that achieved success starting with a 14-9 season the following year.

The Vikings would win a pair of Class B district championships under Touhey’s direction and reached a pair of regional championship games.

After leaving Niles, Touhey was an assistant coach at Brandywine under Josh Hood from 2014 to 2017.

Besides coaching basketball, Touhey is a life coach. He is hoping that he can use some of the things he has learned in the business world to help Niles turn around its fortunes.

Touhey said he had missed coaching and had spoken with Denby about doing some life coaching with the Vikings in the upcoming season.

So, when this opportunity came about, he decided it was time to return to being a head coach.

“I had gone back and forth with ‘is it something I wanted to get back into in respect to being a head coach,’” he said. “The reason why I struggled with not getting back into it sooner would be because of my life coaching work. I was weighing between the two how much more I wanted to build my life coaching business because that is really fulfilling, and I really enjoy doing it and coaching. I decided that I wanted to pursue this opportunity and let go some of my life coaching clients.”

Touhey said he appreciated his experience at Brandywine, and he learned a lot from working alongside Bobcats’ coach Josh Hood.

“It made it very clear to me that an assistant role was something that was not meant for me,” he said. “Not in a bad way. I loved working with Josh. I learned a lot from Josh. It just wasn’t for me.”

Touhey saw the Niles boys basketball team play just once last season. He attended the Lakeshore game.

“My motivation, passion for doing this, is that I have such a love for Niles,” he said. “I always have. I have lived here for 27 years. My children all graduated from here and played athletics. So, my love for this community has always been the same. So, when I saw them play, what went through my mind at that point was to try and be involved in some way. I actually talked to coach Denby about doing some life coaching, and we were talking about organizing that. So, that lit a fire under me about being part of the team in some fashion.”

Touhey understands what he has gotten himself into. He set the bar pretty high when he coached the girls team.

“This is what I hope to accomplish,” he said. “The most important thing we are going to focusing on is developing our players to be their best people. That goes beyond basketball. My passion for coaching and my love for coaching is about helping young men succeed in life. That wasn’t who I was eight years ago. I had an attachment to it, and it was important to me, but I was very much driven on winning as a measurement of my success.”

His focus has since changed to creating experiences for his players that will help them well beyond high school.

“What I know is this, if we can produce young men who love each other, care for each other and respect one another and respect the uniform and representing the community of Niles, then that will help them succeed in life,” he said.

Touhey believes that the life lessons that players can learn through high school athletics are getting trampled on by the desire to win at all costs.

“How we are acting and who we are being have become somewhat acceptable as the norm,” he said. “It is sad. There is no reason it needs to be that way. I think what I want to do more than anything is introduce into our program that there are many things that basketball teaches us about ourselves, that we have to pay attention to and we will pay attention to.”

That will be Touhey’s first objective.

“You know me. I do not like to lose,” he said. “I am a very competitive person. So, I didn’t say that I didn’t want to have a competitive, hard-working team. But you can be that and still be men of great character and men who are being the best possible version of themselves.”

Touhey is busy putting together a coaching staff that will be on the same page he is.

His first hire is former Niles standout Myles Busby. Busby is a 2012 graduate of Niles High School.