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NILES — A familiar face will patrol the sidelines for the Niles High School boys basketball team this winter.

Mark Haase was introduced last week as the new Niles boys basketball coach. A 1996 Niles graduate, Haase has compiled a 196-162 record over 17 seasons of varsity coaching, which has included stops at Otsego, Berrien Springs, Kalamazoo Hackett and Paw Paw.

Haase takes over for Myles Busby, who resigned after compiling a 53-42 record in four years as head coach, which included a district championship in 2023 – the team’s first since 2012.

Last week, Haase sat down with junior Trenton Scott and English and Media Productions teacher Dustin Cornelius for an episode of The Viking Huddle, a podcast produced by students in Cornelius’ media production class.

Haase last coached varsity basketball with Paw Paw in 2020, citing the desire to spend time with and support his daughter, who was an athlete at Paw Paw at the time. With his daughter having graduated, Haase thought the time was right to return to coaching. When the Niles job became open, the opportunity to return home was too good to pass up.

“I was pretty proud to be honest with you,” Haase told Scott and Cornelius. “This is where I want to be. I was born and raised here. My dad was born and raised here, my dad went to school here, my mom still lives here. It’s home – I haven’t been in this building in 30 years but it is still home and always will be home…. Not many people get this opportunity to be the varsity coach at the school that you went to. To some people, it might not matter but to me it means a lot. 

“I’m proud as heck of being given this opportunity. I’m gonna do whatever I possibly can to make this as successful as I possibly can because I owe it to this place because I think that’s what people tried to do for me.”

As a Vikings athlete, Haase played football, basketball and baseball. He told Scott and Cornelius that fans can expect his teams to be smart, tough and disciplined. 

“We want to instill some toughness, not just physical toughness but mental toughness as well,” Haase said. “We want guys that Niles can be proud of and that’s a basketball team that does it the right way. They’re gonna win with class and if we happen to lose we’re gonna lose with class. I’m not a big yeller, I’m not a complainer, I’m not a finger pointer and I kind of expect that out of our guys as well. That’s not what we’re going to be.”

Haase said his goal is to make Niles basketball games must-see experiences in the community.

“I think you’re going to see a team that’s going to play exceptionally hard, a team that is going to play together and a team that hopefully is going to achieve a heck of a lot of success,” Haase said. “We want to put an exciting product out there where it’s an event to come to the game, it’s a raucous atmosphere. Those are the best types of games where it’s loud and everyone’s standing up the whole game.

“We should be good. We should be really good. The expectations should be high for us. Let’s pack this place and make this a destination on a Tuesday or Friday night.”

The Niles High School Media Productions class creates content to inform the students about upcoming events in an entertaining and engaging format. Readers can watch the full interview with Haase on episode 30 of The Viking Huddle on YouTube and are encouraged to subscribe to the Niles High School Media Productions YouTube page.