Sports

"What's through the next door"

By Matthew Semisch

06/10/2014

Although he’s no longer the head men’s basketball and women’s volleyball coach at Dakota College at Bottineau, there’s a part of Cory Fehringer that’s struggling with that fact.

The 2013-14 basketball season, Fehringer’s final sporting campaign at DCB, had been a banner one. The Lumberjacks won the NJCAA Region XIII championship on their home court and finished one win away from qualifying for the NJCAA national tournament.

He was also named the 2013-14 Region XIII men’s hoops coach of the year. Now, though, DCB has to replace him.

On May 22, Fehringer was named as the new men’s basketball coach at Williston State. The Tetons, rivals of DCB in the Mon-Dak Conference, had recently lost their previous head coach after Eric Peterson became an assistant coach at NCAA Division I school South Dakota.

Fehringer, 29, is hoping his own coaching career continues on a similar upward trajectory.

In the end, that’s what led him to take the job in Williston despite not initially knowing if they would’ve been interested in him.

“When that job opened up, there wasn’t a whole lot of interest from my side because I just wasn’t sure of the likelihood of getting it,” Fehringer said Wednesday during a phone interview.

“I’d also been happy with Dakota College and what we’d accomplished at Dakota College, and over time it became more and more clear that becoming the coach at Williston State was a possibility.

“At that point, for my age and situation and what you’d like to do as a coach during your time coaching, I just thought it was not necessary but a step one has to take to find out what’s through the next door.”

What’s behind that door is a WSC team that finished 26-5 last season. The Tetons also went 9-1 last season in the Mon-Dak, good enough to win them the regular season conference title.

Last season, DCB went 5-5 in the league but finished 25-8 overall.

Fehringer led the Lumberjacks to a 37-27 record in his two years in Bottineau. Before coming to DCB, he was the top assistant men’s coach at Dickinson State.

He knew he had a good thing going at DCB, and he says there was never a desire to leave the school.

“I never once felt an urgency to leave Bottineau or Dakota College,” Fehringer said. “I’d always been extremely happy with the campus, the community and the support.

“Probably more importantly, I’ve always felt a lot of responsibility and pride for the foundation of our program there.”

However, Williston made it clear it was interested in obtaining Fehringer’s services, he had to make a decision. Potential career advancement was on the proverbial table, but he also knew seizing the opportunity would affect the program he’d been in charge of.

“There comes a place and time in this coaching profession where, day-in and day-out, you make decisions with 100 percent in mind doing what’s best for your program and the players in your program,” Fehringer said.

“It’s not very often that a time comes where you have to make a decision for yourself, and this seemed like a time where I had to make a decision for my future.

“That’s why I felt like it was a good time to leave now while Dakota College still has a very strong team, a great freshman class, really good support and an ability to hire a new coach that really wants to continue moving forward in their coaching career.”

It’s worth noting that the Tetons weren’t Fehringer’s only suitors during his time at DCB. What’s more, it wasn’t even just North Dakota schools that were trying to pry him away from the Lumberjacks.

“One thing that not many people are aware of is how many jobs I’ve turned down in my two years there,” Fehringer said. “I’ve turned down NCAA jobs, NAIA jobs and other junior college jobs.

“I got phone calls from junior colleges in Kansas and schools in South Dakota and junior colleges in North Dakota and Nebraska. During that time (at DCB), I turned down several very good jobs because of how much I enjoyed and appreciated what we did at Dakota College.”

Fehringer had been one of four in-house applicants vying to become DCB’s new director of athletics. Scott Johnson, the current AD, is resigning effective June 30.

The school’s next AD will also serve as DCB’s head men’s basketball coach. Former Ladyjack Allison Scherr has already been named as Fehringer’s successor as DCB’s head volleyball coach.

“For me, it’s tough because you want to leave Dakota College in good standing and that you only want what’s best for Dakota College,” Fehringer said of his time at the school, “And I spent two years doing that, and I’m very pleased with our results.

“I’m leaving (DCB with) an expectation level of winning games, graduating players and moving kids onto their next university.”
As for when he’ll look at himself exlusively as a Williston State Teton, Fehringer said he didn’t know.

“The biggest obstacle I’ll have to come is my connection with Dakota College, my connection with its players and my connection with the community because of how much we’ve all invested in that,” Fehringer said.

“Leaving was far from easy and was very difficult, and I think it’ll take me quite a long time to stop considering myself a Lumberjack.”