In Good Hands: Bartlesville AD Tim Bart

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Tim Bart took a rather unique road to his current job as basketball head coach and athletic director at Bartlesville High School. 

By Lynn  Jacobsen

The 1981 Inola graduate initially worked in the oil industry out of high school and after graduating from Oral Roberts, he worked one season as an assistant at Oklahoma Junior College before joining the Ken Trickey staff at ORU for five seasons before embarking on a high school career.

Bart’s first head coaching job came at Moore, where he took over a Lions’ program that had been on a 36-game losing skid. After a two-year stint at Rogers, Bart was hired in 2000 to coach at Bartlesville. In his time there, he has compiled a 215-85 record with a state runner-up, two area championships, six regional titles and five state appearances. As he enters his 18th season of coaching, Bart is 264-158.

Bart and his wife, Kristi, have one son, Jackson, a junior on the basketball and baseball team.

VYPE: Have you ever coached any sport other than basketball?
Bart: I coached football and golf at Edison. I was the defensive coordinator. I also coached tennis at Rogers and Bartlesville.

VYPE: You landed your first head coaching gig after just one year of coaching at the high school level. Tell readers about your first position at Moore.
Bart: Moore was on a 36-game losing streak when I took the job. They went 0-23 the year before I got there. They were pretty beat down at that time. It was a good experience.

VYPE: How’s the experience of coaching your son, Jackson?
Bart: It’s been fun. I’ve heard all the horror stories but with our mentalities, we get along so well that it hasn’t been hard. We do a good job of leaving it at the court. When we go home we don’t talk about issues. I’ve never been one to stay mad at kids. Once we leave practice, it’s over and done. He has sat on my bench since he was four years old. He understands a coach’s mentality. I coached Jackson in Little League baseball. I’ve really enjoyed it. It’s a lot of fun.

VYPE: There seems to be a lot happening in sports in Bartlesville.
Bart: We’re just far enough away from Tulsa that the community as a whole supports us. We’re a one-school community which helps. The community is very supportive with their dollars, their attendance, their advertising. It’s a sports town that goes back to the Phillips 66ers. There has to be some correlation there.

VYPE: Your fans really travel well, don’t they?
Bart: Yes. Last year we played regionals at Skiatook and they turned in over $12,000 to the OSSAA which the largest part was our fans driving in from Bartlesville. I think ORU only turned in $17,000 for the state tournament. The community really supports all of our sports.

VYPE: Tell readers a little bit about the Bartlesville Sports Commission. You are one of the founding members on the commission, correct?
Bart: Yes. They have helped take the support from the community to another level. We hosted the Division II Lone Star Conference basketball tournament the last few years. The key is our volunteers. We will have 300 volunteers. Once we added a new gym through the bond issue, we were able to host tournaments of that size. So, we had the support, including financial, we had the volunteers and now we have the facility.   

VYPE:  Didn’t you just sign a new three-year deal to host the Great American Conference?
Bart: Yes. We hosted it last year. It’s Oklahoma teams and Arkansas teams that joined together after the Lone Star disbanded.

VYPE: What other events has Bartlesville hosted?
Bart: We’ve hosted the American Legion World Series twice. We’ve hosted NCAA regional golf at Hillcrest. It’s not just a basketball town.

VYPE: Talk about the working relationship between Bartlesville High School and the Sports Commission.
Bart: We honor Bartlesville athletes in a black tie affair. The charity for the Sports Commission is the high school athletic department. So they help us in resources, both financially and they make sure to include us in any event.

VYPE: You were named athletic director last year. How difficult is it to balance the AD and coaching job?
Bart: It’s been tough. I took over in January.  I finished the year without an assistant AD, it was just my secretary Melissa Brooks and me. My secretary really saved me. I really had to work on time management.  Of course, my basketball staff: Rick Johnson, Gerald Thompson and Cecil Epperley have been with me for years. So they were able to do a lot of the day-to-day stuff for me. It’s a lot smoother now. I have such respect for all our sports, how hard they work, how dedicated they are. My assistant AD is Terry Hughes, longtime girl’s golf coach. He’s a Bartlesville Sooner grad. He’s really been helpful. We have over 900 athletes in all levels. It can be a handful.

VYPE: Have you battled any animosity issues since you are still coaching?
Bart: Not from any coaches. I’ve heard whispers but I have been more than transparent. They understand I have fought for them, increased budgets and have helped them purchase things that were outside their budgets. My basketball budget has not increased any. We have a great group of coaches here. Everybody gets along well, everyone goes to each other’s events.

VYPE:  Football drives the budget for all sports, doesn’t it?
Bart: Yes. It should be the cash cow. Financially it’s very important. Any athletic director will tell you at any level, anytime your football team is successful it will help the financial part of it. We can tell that in our gates already this year. They’re better because we’re winning.

VYPE: What’s the key to the success of the Bartlesville boys basketball program.
Bart: We’ve had good players. We have the type of player who is team-oriented, coachable, they play hard and compete. All the little intangibles it takes to win, we’ve been able to do that.  I’ve been blessed to have some quality players come through.

Bartlesville Sports Commission:

The Bartlesville Sports Commission (BSC) was established in the spring of 2007 with the mission to further the support of athletics and athletic excellence in the Bartlesville area.

Our purpose is to generate an atmosphere of excitement around Bartlesville athletics and athletic excellence, resulting in increased participation and financial support; to build relationships and rekindle old relationships among Bartlesville alumni for the betterment of the Bartlesville Public School Athletics; to promote athletic events and endeavors in the Bartlesville area; and to broadly serve as an ambassador for athletics in Bartlesville.

In doing so, we are recognizing not only the worthy inductees but also the value of athletics to quality education, personal enrichment, family values, community, and professional success.
Contact Us:

Bartlesville Sports Commission
P.O. Box 1304,
Bartlesville, OK 74005
(918) 440-4119

The Bartlesville Sports Commission established the Bartlesville Athletic Hall of Fame to honor athletes, coaches, teams and individuals who have made a lasting contribution to athletics and athletic endeavors in the Bartlesville area.

In doing so, we are recognizing not only the worthy inductees but also the value of athletics to quality education, personal enrichment, family values, community, and professional success.

Hall of Fame Inductees - Class of 2012
Bill Berryhill
College High School, University of Texas

Jim Clark
College High School, US Olympian

Kenneth Fitch
College High School, Kansas Univerisity

Coach Steve Hesser
Bartlesville High School coach 1985-92

1969 College High School Baseball Team
State Champions