Full circle

Heights High's head swim coach, Dan Budin (left), and head hockey coach, Jared Lavender, in front of some of the school's sports trophies, on display in the entrance to the school's main gym.

My son, Dan’s, fourth birthday party was all about games and, sort of, sports. For instance, I remember sitting in our kitchen, across from one of Dan’s pre-school friends, Jared, playing a game where we tried to blow a ping-pong ball across the table into the other guy’s goal. Jared won just about every match—because he really wanted to win, and I wanted him to win, too.

After pre-school, Dan Budin attended Roxboro Elementary and Jared Lavender headed to Fairfax. Jared then went to Roxboro Middle, and Dan switched to Ruffing Montessori for a few years. But they met up again at Heights High, where they both were members of the class of 2002, from ninth through 12th grades.

Jared played on Heights High’s lacrosse team all four years, and Dan joined the team for his last two. But that wasn’t either guy’s main sport: Dan was on the swimming team and Jared played hockey. And now, in a fairly unlikely turn of events, Dan is the head coach of Heights High’s swim team, and Jared, as of this year, is the head coach for hockey.

Jared’s sister, Heather Lavender, coaches the Cleveland Heights middle school’s girl’s lacrosse team, and for the city’s summer youth lacrosse camp, in which, coincidentally, Dan’s daughter participated last year.

Dan, who became head coach in 2014, after two years as an assistant, has had tremendous success. The boys’ team has had a winning record in head-to-head meets every year in that time, and the girls’ team has enjoyed winning records since 2016. In the previous 20 years, no girls’ relay team advanced to the District Championship; last year, every girls’ relay team did. And Dan is expected to get his 100th victory in a few days from the time of this writing, in mid-December.

Jared is just starting as the hockey team’s coach, so there are no results yet. But he told me that “the attitude that all the players have is extremely good. It’s a tough situation because we only have 13 players right now, and out of those, about half are newer to hockey and maybe even skating, too. You need, I’d say, at least eight kids. But I’m concerned for their safety—dealing with exhaustion and injuries—so it would be really tough to play a high school schedule with a team of eight kids or less.”

After graduating from Heights, Jared played junior hockey (for those 16 to 21)—two years for Cleveland Junior Lumberjacks, and one year in northern Michigan. From there, he was recruited by a coach for Castleton University in Vermont, where he played hockey all four years. Then he played professionally for five years, for a team in the American Hockey League, which is right below the majors.

Jared then moved back to Cleveland Heights and started coaching right away, with Heights youth hockey. “Then the opportunity came up this year to coach the Heights High team,” he said. “The school’s athletic director reached out to the hockey community [seeking a replacement] and he said that a couple of people mentioned me.” And Jared, obviously, got the job. He also serves as a senior account executive at Keller National, an insurance company.

Dan, besides coaching the Heights High team, also founded and runs Heights Tigersharks, a nonprofit swimming program for all youth age levels in the community. Tigersharks oversees the high school and middle school teams, summer rec program, competition teams, and basic lessons and safety. As its website says: “With fundamental aquatics at its core, Heights Tigersharks provides all levels of training and access, from crucial safety skills to elite competitive swimming.”

Dan described the program as “accessible and inclusive. It’s low-cost, overall, to make it accessible, without money as a barrier, and no-cost to any who need it,” as the Heights Tigersharks Foundation provides for that. Tigersharks, he said, is “open to beginners, without the stress and competitive atmosphere that might turn new swimmers away, but, then, also serving those who are ready for top-level swimming and elite competition.”

Dan’s assistant coaches are also Heights graduates, including one of the only female swimming coaches of color in the state, and another who represents the LGBTQ community.

Dan said the Tigersharks’ mission is to be “open and accessible, and then turn everyone into top-level swimmers, and to build up their confidence and courage. And, also, to build a pipeline of talented student athletes, who grow within the program and are ready for high school and college athletics.”

For Jared’s part, he said he wants “to give back to the community, and try to grow the hockey game that I love, and make better people, too,” as he said his Heights High coach did for him.