Judah Kupers
Bill Treseler, the current Athletics Director (AD) and longtime basketball coach, has deep roots in Albany and in the coaching field. His career path took him to multiple top high schools, and even college programs across California.
When asked about what has inspired him to keep coaching, Treseler said, “Well I really enjoy it, I love the relationships. When you’re a teacher, you see the students every day but unless the student is really into your subject area they don’t have the same passion for the subject. But when you’re coaching basketball almost all the students have a real passion for what you are working on.”
While attending UC Berkeley in the late 1970’s and early 1980’s, Treseler played both club basketball and intramural football. But after breaking his hand his senior year, Treseler was asked to coach the same club basketball team. He accepted, gaining his first coaching experience. A year later in 1981, he took interest in Albany’s basketball program after seeing an index card at Cal describing a job opening at Albany. Treseler took the job of freshmen basketball coach.
After one year at Albany High School, Treseler moved to a new school and became a teacher and coach at Moreau High School in Hayward. He then went back to UC Berkeley as an assistant for the basketball team. After working at Berkeley for two years, he became the head basketball coach for the UC Santa Cruz Banana Slugs.
Treseler’s coaching path then took him to Salesian High School in Richmond, where he coached the team for five years before he became the head coach at Dominican University in San Rafael. After five years at Dominican, he became the head coach at San Francisco State University for another five years before coming back to Albany in the early 2010s. A big reason for this decision to come back was to coach his son at Albany Middle School. When the coaching job opened up at the high school, Treseler made the leap up, and a few years later became the AD.
He also talked about his former players coming back years after they went to Albany. He said, “Now that I have been doing it for a while, I’ve had the blessing to have former players come back and either thank me or tell me that they learned something that we did in basketball was helpful to them later in life. I’m starting to get the benefit of those long relationships.”
One of those former players is assistant varsity basketball coach and world history teacher, Avri Finch. Finch first met Treseler as a sixth grader at an Albany basketball open gym. Treseler coached him all throughout middle and high school and they have known each other for 13 years.
Finch went on to play basketball at UC Santa Cruz, while sustaining a personal relationship with Treseler. He said, “I would reach out to him all the time. Obviously as a coach he’s on your side but he’s also thinking about what’s best for everyone and then once you move on, now he can just be like my fan, just like my ally. I would call him after games. He was super helpful just listening to me and what I had to say and if I wanted advice, he was there for me.”
Finch also talked about how Treseler is as a coach, saying, “Coach Bill is very intense, he has a high standard that you have to meet in practice and games, but you always know he has your back. I think his intensity really carries over in just building that culture of aiming for perfection. We know we’re never going to get there but he definitely provides the support to reach the best you can be.”
When asked about his job now as the AD, Treseler described some of his goals for AHS, saying, “We’re just trying to create as many good opportunities for as many kids as we can. My mission is to try to support our coaches so they can put great programs together so the students can experience the highest level of competition, learning, and social benefits that you can get from high school sports.”
