Adam Squires, pictured at center in this file photo, has been named the new head baseball coach at B-U High School. Squires is a three-year veteran coach of the B-UHS baseball and football teams. File photo by ANDREW REINER/The Record Delta

TENNERTON — A new head coach will call the shots for the Buckhannon-Upshur Buccaneers when they take to the baseball diamond this spring. The Bucs’ new coach, however, is hardly a stranger to the B-UHS athletic programs.

Adam Squires, a four-year athlete at B-UHS and three-year assistant coach in the Bucs’ football and baseball programs, will take over the reins following the retirement of 17-year veteran Mickey Tenney. Squires was officially approved by the Upshur County Board of Education to fill the coaching position on Nov. 18, and he will inherit a program which reached the Region II Tournament finals last season.

“The thing that excites me most is that it’s an opportunity to continue the tradition of Buccaneer baseball,” Squires said. The newly installed coach says taking over after winning a sectional crown and regional runner-up honors is “a positive and a negative. It’s a positive in that it’s a great year and kids expect to do even better, but it’s a negative in that I have some big shoes to fill.”

“Adam was the logical choice, because we were looking for the program to remain stable,” B-UHS athletic director Ed McDaniels stated. “I think after sitting under the teaching and coaching of Coach Tenney, it makes him one of the best qualified coaches out there. Coach Tenney was a very thorough teacher, and [Squires] could not have been anywhere else to get any better training.”

As he takes over the position from his mentor, Squires says he has many of the same expectations for his players that Tenney did, both on and off the field. While the Bucs saw five players earn All-State honors during the 2008 season, they had an even greater number earn honors in the classroom, with 10 B-U players finishing the season with a cumulative grade-point average of 3.5 or better.

“First things first, the biggest expectation [for the players] is to be good kids — to stay out of trouble and get good grades,” Squires said. “The ultimate goal is to make the state playoffs and win a state championship.”

McDaniels echoed, “We want to have success on the field, but the greater goal is to have success in life.”

“I’d like to see our program play with the enthusiasm with which they played in the past — to hustle and carry on the B-U pride of staying in the game from the first pitch to the last pitch. If they do that, the wins and losses will take care of themselves. Teams were always hard-pressed to outwork Coach Tenney’s teams, and I see that in Adam Squires.”

Squires is a 2001 graduate of Buckhannon-Upshur High School.