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Hampshire's Barnett announces coaching retirement

Hampshire boys basketball coach Bob Barnett announced his retirement from coaching Monday afternoon, effective at the end of the season.

Barnett, 54, said his decision is not directly related to his health, though he suffered two heart attacks on Nov. 20, 2012. He missed a game last week due to illness.

In the wake of his heart issues, the veteran coach vowed to alter his behavior, to reduce stress where possible, to take it easier during games and to not take the game home with him.

In fact, Barnett told the Daily Herald upon his return to the sideline in 2012: "After this occurred it changed my outlook on a lot of things. Am I still going to be intense at times? Yeah, I'm still going to be intense. I'm not going to be the ogre I was, I guess. I'm just going to have more fun with it."

However, Barnett said on Monday he wasn't able to stop internalizing losses, of which there have been several lately as Hampshire has dropped nine of its last 10 games since a 13-2 start. The resulting angst led to a lack of sleep, which, in turn, led to mental fatigue and coaching methods he didn't recognize as his.

"I am not coaching to the level of my expectations, which is difficult to swallow," Barnett told reporters after school on Monday. "I don't do mediocre. And if I'm not at my best, then somebody else should be doing it.

"It started when we were on the bus after the Grayslake North game (on Feb. 7). I started thinking about that. There were times in that game that I could have made adjustments that I didn't, that three years ago would have been a no-brainer. I wouldn't have even had to think about it. It would have just been reaction, normal preparation and setting up two possessions in advance. Whereas, in that game I was reacting to what they were doing and not how to dissect their defense for our offense.

"Then I went back another game, the Grayslake Central game, Crystal Lake Central and then Grayslake Central. I found things in those three games that three years ago I would have had no problem. I would have seen it early. We would have corrected it and it wouldn't have happened. That's why I say I'm not coaching to the level of my expectations, and nobody can set expectations any higher than I can. But I felt that I've lived up to them for 26 of my 28 years."

After missing the first 6 games of the 2012-13 season due to his health scare, the driver's education and physical education teacher resumed his coaching duties and guided the Whip-Purs to a 23-6 record.

An all-state player himself at Oregon and a 2013 inductee to the Illinois Basketball Coaches Association Hall of Fame, Barnett (456-302) led the Whip-Purs to a 13-15 finish in 2013-14.

He returned last November for his 13th season at Hampshire (218-133) and his 28th as a head coach overall, which included previous stints at Franklin Center, Hinckley-Big Rock and McHenry.

The Whip-Purs got off to a hot start last November and improved to 13-2 on Jan. 20, when sophomore Brennen Woods capped a 30-point performance with a game-winning tip-in before the overtime buzzer.

Then came the slide.

Hampshire lost its next 7 games and 9 of its next 10. Some contests have been close, like a 51-49 loss to 22-win St. Edward and a 6-point loss at Crystal Lake Central.

Other games were one-sided. The Whip-Purs lost by 14 at Prairie Ridge, Grayslake North beat them twice - by 13 and 18 points - and Grayslake Central bested them 64-46.

Barnett returned to the sideline on Friday in a 62-59 loss to Fox Valley Conference Fox Division champion Prairie Ridge. He will remain a teacher at Hampshire for five more years, but his coaching career will end with Hampshire's postseason. The Whip-Purs are the No. 1 seed at the six-team Class 3A Burlington Central regional, which begins for Hampshire on Wednesday, March 4 against either No. 4 Genoa-Kingston or No. 5 Sycamore.

Barnett decided to make the announcement Monday rather than after the final game of the season as a courtesy to his players, he said.

"If my coach comes in and says either I'm resigning or retiring or whatever and walks out the door, I'm going to be looking at the rest of the guys going, 'What just happened?'" Barnett said. "And I don't want them to think it's them. This has nothing to do with them, so that's why I did it early. This week especially because now they've got time to digest it. I didn't think it would be fair to them to do it at the end of the year. I wanted to be able to explain my reasonings."

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