by: Joanna Chadwick

David Dunn has been an assistant for the Derby Panthers since 2014, but this spring he was named the boys tennis coach. 

“This year taking over as the head coach for boys tennis was exciting,” Dunn said. “I was very fortunate to follow a great coach and role model in coach Dennis Burns.”

The boys tennis team was an upperclassmen heavy team, so Dunn let them lead the way a lot. 

“This year I took an approach of letting the seniors and upperclassmen drive our practices,” Dunn said. 

Isaak Bowman and Hayden Carrillo were the team’s leaders and their best players as they led by example the whole season, ultimately winning the Class 6A regional and then taking 11th in Class 6A with 30 wins as a doubles team. 

Being a first-time head coach is always a different avenue, especially when you were previously an assistant. But for Dunn, he admitted that his transition was better than it could have been. 

“It was a pretty smooth transition. I have had great assistant coaches; that made my job as a head coach much easier,” Dunn said. “Coach Burns also prepared me pretty well to be the head coach.” 

With great senior leadership to where Dunn could really get settled in as head coach, the seniors took the underclassmen under their wing and showed them the ropes so that next year can be even better for the Panthers as a whole. 

“It was a successful season and I enjoyed working with all the players,” Dunn said.