Ryan Fairchild caught a glimpse of Joe Stewart walking across the Lakota West High School gymnasium.
Stewart matched eyes with Fairchild and the two connected in front of the Fayetteville-Perry bench.
You could tell they’ve known each other for quite a while.
They shared some hugs.
They shared some laughs.
They shared some words of wisdom.
But what they didn’t share was how both coaches prepared to face off against one another in a Division VII boys basketball tournament game.
“I called Joe and joked with him when we were both hired around the same time last year,” Fairchild said. “I figured we’d probably play in the state tournament in a couple years.
“Well, turned out to be less than a year.”
On Thursday night, it was Stewart’s Fayetteville-Perry Rockets versus Fairchild’s Middletown Christian Eagles.
It was — essentially — the veteran versus the rookie in a full-circle event for a pair of respected friends.
‘A coach’s posture’
Fairchild, a 1995 Middletown graduate, is the physical education teacher at Edgewood and has been since the 2000-01 school year.
It wasn’t until Stewart became Edgewood’s head boys basketball coach in 2013 when Fairchild got his first crack at being an assistant.
“The bottom line is, I get the job, and we needed to build a staff,” Stewart reminisced. “I go through the gym, and there’s PE class going on.”
It was Fairchild’s class.
“I saw an awful lot of learning going on,” Stewart said. “I saw a coach’s voice. I saw a coach’s posture, and I saw kids in an afternoon class responding to a guy.”
This was far from Stewart’s first rodeo and far from his first job.
Stewart is a 1982 Wilmington College graduate and landed his first head coaching role at southern Ohio’s Piketon high school that same year.
He had numerous other gigs throughout the next couple of decades, including stays at Miami Trace, Hillsboro, Chillicothe, Southern State Community College and again at Hillsboro.
“I looked at Ryan, and said to myself, ‘Well, I’ve got to have a varsity assistant,’” Stewart recalled. “There’s the guy that needs to be varsity assistant.
“I was told he’ll never want it, though. He’s all about being a dad to his kids.”
Stewart and Fairchild reasoned, and Fairchild was convinced that an accommodating schedule could be made.
“We figured it out,” Stewart noted. “He can do both, and he can be exceptional at both.
“We had a deal.
“I’ve never been about number of wins. I’m not even about what the scoreboard says at the end. But the one stat on my resume is that I’ve had 20 former assistants and former players become head coaches.”
Fairchild — hired at Middletown Christian this past offseason — was No. 20.
It’s the first head-coaching gig for Fairchild, who was an assistant at Lakota West under Kelven Moss the previous three seasons.
“I would be negligent if I did not include Lakota state champion coach Mike Mueller in the list of coaches that have believed in me in becoming a head coach,” Fairchild said. “He and I have become close over the last couple of years, and he was the person that nudged me to apply for the MCS job.”
Fairchild was an assistant for Moss, former Edgewood coaches Mike Daley and John Thomas, and former Madison coach Jeff Smith.
“I’ve learned a tremendous amount from them. I’ve been around some of the best,” Fairchild said. “But it was Joe who first put me in position to find out how to run a program with the utmost excellence.
“He’s a high man of integrity, and that’s something I’ll always live by.”
A lifelong companionship
Fairchild never imagined going to a Duke practice to watch Coach Mike Krzyzewski and his Blue Devils.
Fairchild never imagined going to a North Carolina practice to watch Coach Roy Williams and his Tar Heels.
But he did.
And it was Stewart who took him.
“He’s been one of my very closest friends despite being 20 years apart,” Fairchild said. “I’m extremely blessed for that.”
The friendship has helped Fairchild get to this point in his life. But it’s also helped Fairchild get past a lifelong speech stutter that he felt has held him back.
“I learned that I can do this job and do it well even with a speech handicap,” said Fairchild, who credited numerous other coaches who have pushed him along the way. “I’ve always had former coaches believe in me to become a head coach — and finally I had an administration in Middletown Christian believe and take a chance on me.
“And for that, I’m eternally grateful for the opportunity.
“I hope I can be an inspiration to other people with handicaps that nothing should stand in their way of accomplishing goals and callings in life. Sometimes you just need a person to believe in you and nudge you out of your comfort zone.”
Fairchild, as a thank you or a kind gesture, invited Stewart to his wedding. But it went beyond that.
He wanted Stewart to officiate it.
“I don’t know if there’s any higher compliment — an offense and a defense is one thing — but to say, ‘You know what, I want you to be there to bless my marriage and be a part of it,” Stewart said.
“That’s pretty high ground.”
Building a culture
Fairchild said he models his Middletown Christian program after Stewart’s example of culture building.
The Eagles use core values of Passion, Unite, Servanthood, Humility and Thankfulness — which is taken right out of the Stewart playbook.
“I saw that tonight. I saw that in Ryan,” Stewart said. “It reminded me during my first year at Piketon. We went into the last week of the season with five wins, and we had snow. We had to play Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday.
“And lo and behold, we scratched out a win on Tuesday, which became a win on Wednesday, which became another win on Thursday,” Stewart added. “And doggone we turned around and beat a team by nine that beat us by nine earlier that season.
“First year, you’re young, you’re enthusiastic — but the thing you want to establish is that we ain’t ever giving up. Our kids didn’t give up on the season.
“You’re literally seeing that over there right now.”
Indeed.
Middletown Christian did play its best basketball in the last two and a half weeks.
“Ryan typically knows that I’d always say that if we could play until midnight, we would,” Stewart said. “We definitely wanted this one to be over when it was over. We didn’t want to play until midnight.”
Stewart’s Rockets led 41-28 — the largest margin of the game Thursday night — with nearly seven minutes left.
Fairchild’s Eagles had other things in mind. They finished on a 15-6 run.
“They stretched us right to the limit,” Stewart said.
Josh Prows laid one in to pull MCS within 43-40 with under a minute remaining. Then the dagger came when leading scorer Alex Bradshaw — who had 21 points — bucketed an offensive rebound with 20 seconds left to give Fayetteville-Perry a five-point advantage.
The Rockets closed it out from there.
“Just a heck of a high school basketball game,” Stewart said. “Just a lot of learning situations for both teams. We had just a good ole blue-collar victory against a good ole blue-collar team.”
As the two met for a postgame handshake at halfcourt, they again shared some more laughs, some more hugs and even a couple of photos together.
“You made me sweat a lot,” Stewart joked to Fairchild.
“You can blame yourself,” Fairchild responded. “You taught me.”
