Former Hall coach 
moves up as head man at Seneca

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Witte, 33, guided Hall High School in Spring Valley to an overall slate of 34-26 in two years at the helm. He has been a math teacher at Seneca for three years. He helped out with the Irish scouting reports before taking over as the Seneca sophomore boys coach last winter.

“I am very excited to be named as head coach,” said Witte Friday night. “I definitely have some quite large shoes to fill. In my mind, Doug Evans is one of the top two or three basketball coaches in the state. Being the person that replaces a legend is difficult ... a tall order. But I just look at it as a chance to represent the school and the community and continue it the positive fashion that coach Evans maintained.”

Witte, a resident of La Salle, grew up in Edwards County in southern Illinois. He graduated from Greenville College where he majored in mathematics and played on the Division III men’s basketball program. He spent two years as head coach of the boys basketball program in Hamilton, Mont., before coming to Hall.

Witte applied for the Princeton job that went to current Tiger coach Jesse Brandt. He spent two years as the assistant coach at Illinois Valley Community College men’s basketball program.

Seneca Athletic Director Steve Haines, who said “there were a lot of candidates” for the open position, stated, “We believe Coach Witte will continue the strong basketball tradition at Seneca High School.”

Witte went 19-12 in his first season at Hall before ending 15-14 in his second campaign. That was back when the NCIC played a 12-team format regular season, playing each other school in the conference one time each year. Hall was one of the smallest teams in the NCIC at the time.

“With my becoming the coach, it will be a little different era at Seneca High School,” said Witte. “But we will maintain the philosophy that coach Evans has got in place. Our philosophy will be based on defense.”

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