After over 30 years of coaching the girls’ cross country team, and being named Macomb Area Conference Red coach of the year four times, Scott Cooper is passing the baton leaving behind a substantial legacy.
Having an impact on many runners’ lives, specifically senior captain Lucie Leonhard, has led her to believe Cooper has positively influenced her and pushed her to thrive in the sport.
“He has impacted my life tremendously [as] he’s taught me to be confident in myself and my running,” Leonhard said. “He has pushed me to achieve goals that I never would have thought to have been possible. He made me fall in love with the mentally and physically challenging sport.”
The positive coaching style of Cooper is found to be truly contagious according to assistant coach and all-state alumni, Erin Lubienski who was coached by Cooper. His teachings have stuck with many past players.
“Cooper had a large impact on the community,” Lubienski said. “I ended up running [in] college after running at North. I was able to bring some of the community aspects I got from the team from how Cooper runs the program into my cross country team in college, which ended up changing the community there as well.”
Reminiscing about her time with Cooper, Leonhard is most appreciative of his guidance. “It seems really weird to think of the cross country program without Coach Cooper. He has been such a guiding force for so many athletes.”
(Photo credit: Courtesy of Diane Montgomery)
Cooper would also say that the players have had a tremendous impact on him, and he will always cherish the many memories created by his teams.
“They keep me young [and] they keep me going,” Cooper said. “I remember when I was teaching I could have the most awful day at school and could just come here and they were just a pleasure to be around. Great attitudes, great work ethic, just great kids. The only reason I continued for 31 years is because of them.”
Over the course of 31 years, Cooper accumulated many memories, but his most cherished memory is coaching his own children.
“My fondest memory is having both my daughter and son on the team and getting the opportunity to coach them and have them with me and watching them develop is pretty incredible,” Cooper said.
Although Cooper has been thinking about retiring for many years, the reality of retiring has just recently hit him.
“I am really going to miss being here,” Cooper said. “It’s starting to sink in these last 2 weeks here as I’m coming to practice everything is the last this, the last that. I’m realizing just how much the kids have meant to me and how much I am going to miss the kids.”
