Science Hill High School

Gary Scheuerman

Gary Scheuerman 1960

No one in Science Hill athletics, or probably anyone else for that matter, has ever wondered where they stood with Gary Scheuerman.

A passionate player for basketball coach Bill Wilkins in the late '50s and 1960 and a fiery girls basketball coach in the mid-1980s, Scheuerman pulled no punches while making his mark on Hilltopper hardwood.

Scheuerman scored 22 points in a 55-51 defeat of Dobyns-Bennett in 1960. It snapped a 43-game conference win streak for Guy Crawford's Indians, who were ranked No. 3 in the state.

Scheuerman, who also ran track, averaged 15.8 points his senior season, which included a defeat of Buck Van Huss's eventual state champion Hampton.

"Gary was a really fine basketball player and one tough competitor," Wilkins said. Scheuerman went on to play for Madison Brooks at East Tennessee State, then coached ETSU's freshman team in 1965-66 when Skeeter Swift and George Pitts played on it. Perhaps Scheuerman's favorite win that season came against the Tennessee freshmen, who were coached by A.W. Davis.

Scheuerman indirectly had a hand in a lot of Tennessee wins, though it would be Pat Summitt's Lady Vols. Scheuerman coached Melissa McCray two seasons at Science Hill (1983-85), and McCray caught Summitt's attention after making back-to-back state tournament appearances.

Scheuerman says he got a lot smarter coach when McCray arrived. Science Hill was 4-24 the year before McCray, and 56-12 in the ensuing two seasons with her. But Scheuerman had also taken over a fledgling program.

Numerous coaches have lauded his coaching ability. "He's very low-key about what he did coaching at Science Hill," Pitts said. "But trust me, Gary is an excellent basketball coach."

McCray said the Lady Toppers wouldn't have gone far without Scheuerman, who was also good preparation for the demanding Summitt. The '85 Lady Toppers finished the regular season 26-1, then lost two games in the district tournament and another in the regional. But they rebounded with a 56-35 victory at No. 2 William Blount in the substate, apparently after some candid inspiration from Scheuerman.

"Coach Scheuerman could always push all of the right buttons," McCray said. Scheuerman resigned as girls coach after the season, in part, because freshmen weren't eligible to play at Science Hill. And in the case of the girls, there weren't many freshmen teams to compete against. So talented freshmen such as Leah Jackson were left out in the cold.

"If we'd had Leah as a freshman when Melissa was a senior," Scheuerman says, "I believe we might've won the state."

Freshmen were eligible for the varsity shortly after Scheuerman's resignation. Scheuerman loves the thrill of competing, like coaching at North Junior High while winning championships with players like Paul Faw, Ralph Kiser and Little Joe Bradley.

"I really have a lot of respect and admiration for Coach Scheuerman," she said. "When you're a kid sometimes you think coaches are being too tough, but I appreciate what he did. He invested a lot of himself in us and he effected my life in an extremely positive way."