Longtime North coach Steve Lane decided it was time to end his 14-year boys basketball coaching tenure at Nashua North. (Telegraph photo by TOM KING)

NASHUA – Steve Lane simply felt it was the right time to end his 14-year basketball coaching era at Nashua High School North, seeking work-life balance.

“I just want to be sure that I am able to fully enjoy my family, my passions other than hoops and some free time,” he said in a text message to The Telegraph on Monday after it became public knowledge that he was stepping away from the Titans boys basketball job. The coaching opening was officially posted by the Nashua School District yesterday.

Nashua Athletic Director Lisa Gingras said she wasn’t completely surprised when Lane told her a week ago he was calling it quits.

“It’s a matter of he’s been coaching for over 30 years, and coached 14 years as the varsity head coach at North and done a lot with that program,” Gingras said. “He’s just at the point where he wants more time in his life.

“It’s a huge loss for our whole athletic program. And not just the basketball program, and not just for North, but overall. … I wasn’t overly shocked, but it’s devastating for the program, it’s devastating for all of us. He’s a coach that changes culture.”

And Lane built a culture at North, which he said was his goal.

“I completely love and loved my time at North, coaching hoops and hopefully created a culture, passion and love for the game that made a lasting impact on the players that played for us,” he said in his text.

For the record, Lane plans to continue teaching at North and the former State Am finalist will continue coaching Titans golf in the fall as he has been. Lane was the third boys hoop coach in the history of North, as Mike Fitzpatrick coached for two seasons and then Andy Otaka for the next five. Lane, who once taught at Elm Street Junior High and was a former head coach at Reading (Mass.) High, was hired in 2011 after 13 years away from basketball coaching and thus a long-lasting era of North basketball began.

He played his college ball at the University of Rhode Island for coaches Tom Penders and Al Skinner, and UMass Lowell for Stan Van Gundy. As a freshman at URI he was on a Penders coached team in 1988 that went 27-4 and made it to the NCAA Division I Sweet Sixteen.

While at Reading, he coached against his father, Ellis “Sonny” Lane, the head coach back then at Wakefield (Mass.) High. Lane credits his father as his biggest coaching influence. Lane’s son Casey is currently an assistant at Springfield College.

And his Titan teams were consistent contenders, focusing on the defensive end. However, Lane’s Titans struggled this past season to a 5-13 mark, missing the Division I tournament for the first time in several years. But they had reached the championship game in 2024, bowing to Pinkerton in a packed Lundholm Gym.

The previous two years the Titans made the Final Four, losing to Goffstown in 2022 and Pinkerton in 2023. The previous year they lost to eventual champion and city rival Bishop Guertin during the tournament that had an open regional format due to COVID.

The job should attract a plethora of candidates, and experienced ones at that. However, Gingras said that Lane’s longtime assistant and friend Chris Gaudreau, a former head coach at Bow, does not want to be a candidate. He too, stepped away but left the door open to return if the next coach wants his help. Lane scouted for Gaudreau when he was at Bow during his time away from coaching.

Gingras wants to have the job filled by June, so the program has the direction for the summer league programs, etc. The job wasn’t posted until yesterday to give Lane time to let his players know.

Lane also gave thanks and credit to, besides Gaudreau, his other assistants through the years – the late Mike Henderson, Ryan Gauthier, Clyde Boykin, and Adam Nelson.

“Coaching basketball is 11 and a half months out of the year job if you want to commit to doing it right,” he said, “and I believe we did that as a collective staff.”

“He truly is a coach it’s about the people and the kids, and not the sport,” Gingras said.