Billy Galipeau has been hired as the Amherst Regional girls basketball team’s new head coach.
The Hurricanes finished last season without a victory (0-20), with just four wins (4-16) the year prior. Galipeau will strive to build the program back up to a point where it can once again attain double-digit win totals. Amherst won 17 in 2022-23, and 15, the year before that.
Hailing from North Adams, Galipeau attended McCann Tech and UMass Amherst, graduating from college in 2021.
“It’s a great community,” Galipeau said. “All of the coaches that I’ve sort of worked under in the few years leading up to this have all been great mentors to me. So it is a community that I have come to care very deeply about.”
Initially, Galipeau was hired this past offseason to be Amherst’s assistant coach, behind Anthony Quinones. Quinones ended up stepping away from the team, leaving an opening at head coach.
The assistant coaching opportunity came after a year of AAU coaching for Galipeau, where he worked alongside Hampshire Regional head coach Jason Plamondon. Plamondon was impressed with the young coach, recommending that Quinones should bring him in.
With Quinones now gone, Galipeau saw applying to the vacant head coaching spot as a no-brainer. He went through the interview process with the Hurricanes’ athletic director, Victoria Dawson, along with players and parents returning to the team.
“The process was good,” Galipeau said. “[Dawson] was very helpful. I also thought [having returners there] was a cool thing to do in the process, sort of getting their feedback on who the new coach was going to be.”
One of the big reasons Galipeau was brought in was his previous connection with the incoming freshmen class.
Over the past couple of years, Galipeau was a coach with the Next Up AAU program out of Amherst. Through that time, he coached many of the same girls he’ll have with the Hurricanes this year.
Amherst is set to have a large number of freshmen suiting up for the varsity team this season, with Galipeau’s goal to lean into the youthfulness and focus on developing skills, as well as a new culture.
“[I’m hoping for] an environment where the players are excited to play, and they have a lot of fun being on the team,” Galipeau said. “I want it to be something that’s a great experience for them, where one day, they’ll think back fondly about how much fun they had with their friends and hopefully competing at a high level.”
Based purely on initial sign-ups, Galipeau figures the ‘Canes will have one senior, three juniors and the remainder of the roster will be filled out with 10th graders or younger.
“Another metric that I think would prove a successful season is retention, both throughout this season and into next season,” Galipeau said. “I would like to have everybody return next season, and I would also like to have enough players to put together a [junior varsity] team next season, because currently it’s looking like we won’t have the numbers for that.”
Galipeau knows that a critical component of building a good culture is listening to his players. Throughout the offseason, he has made sure to get his team’s opinions on as much as possible, including the play style they’d like to implement and some ideas to help others.
The team has come up with the idea to host a charity game at some point this season, where tickets can be sold to give back to the community. Galipeau knows how valuable a good relationship with the surrounding population can be, hoping it can also help lead to success on the court.
“My vision for the program is that eventually, there is a symbiotic relationship between both the high school team and also the local recreational league,” Galipeau said. “I would like to run programs and summer leagues where the high schoolers can serve as mentors to kids in the community.
“I would also like it to be one of the programs where eventually we are competing for playoff spots,” Galipeau said. “But I think before you get there, you need to have a program that really does focus on building talent.”
Taking over a team that has struggled over the last two years, Galipeau knows how important it is to turn things around in the right direction.
Rebuilding a program can take time, but Galipeau is up to the task, excited to hopefully put together a solid first season that will help the team continue to improve in the future.
“We do want to win some games,” Galipeau said. “The girls have made that very clear that that’s one of their goals for the season, is to put some wins on the board.”