Boys Ice Hockey

Coach Barbin

Entering his 16th season as head coach of the Big Red hockey program, Dana Barbin has enjoyed a string of success that has included a New England championship, two trips to the tournament "Final Four," six quarterfinal appearances and a  310-136-25 record. His championship team of 1998-99 posted a stunning 30 wins against just three losses, earning him prep hockey "Coach of the Year" accolades.

Over the years, Coach Barbin has sent numerous players on to Division I and Division III college hockey. Nine of his former players have been drafted by National Hockey League clubs.

A 1981 graduate of the University of New Hampshire, Coach Barbin, served as a co-captain, and was part of the Wildcats' 1979 ECAC championship team. From 1981 to1987, he played professionally in both Denmark and Sweden.  He also coached the Danish National team from 1985 to 1987.
Coach Barbin, who came to Exeter in 1987, has also been an assistant baseball coach for 20 years. From 1989 to 1999, he served as the school's athletic director.

Barbin is married to Marianne Billing Barbin, Assistant to the Athletic Director at Exeter. They have a 10-year-old son, Henrik.  Send email to Coach Dana Barbin.

Winter Indoor Track & Field

Coach Coder

Coach Hilary Coder has coached track and field at Exeter for 25 years. Her approach and key to success has been simple: Take great kids who want to learn and work and find coaches whose love for and knowledge of the sport is apparent and combine the two.

Indoor Track at Exeter continues to grow and thrive. A combination of track specialists and other serious athletes training for other spring sports creates a formidable group which competes against a variety of opponents throughout the winter months. There is competition for JVs against other comparable athletes as well as the highest level of challenge (open meets at colleges and the National High School Scholastic Championship in New York) for our most serious and accomplished athletes.

Supported by a number of experienced coaches, Coach Coder is a USA Track and Field certified Level II coach in all event groups. Only a handful of high school coaches in the country hold that level and breadth of certification. One step away from Level III recognition, Coach Coder loves indoor track for the chaos and energy that only indoor track can duplicate. She was a New England Champion high jumper in high school and was also an athlete at Penn State before coming to Exeter.

Coach Coder is also the head coach of Spring Outdoor Track & Field and Soccer at Exeter.

Send email to Coach Hilary Coder.

Girls Swimming & Diving

Coach Farnum

Entering her 27th season at the helm of the Swimming and Diving Program, Farnum’s success can be seen both in the numbers in the win column as well as championship banners hanging poolside.   Over her Exeter career, she owns an impressive 150-32-1 (.819) overall record.  Along with those impressive numbers come ten undefeated seasons and six New England titles.    Over the years, 93 Exeter female swimmers and divers have won New England Championship event titles.  Additionally, dozens of Exeter competitors have earned All- America or All-America Consideration accolades. Exeter’s team has been nationally ranked since the 1994-1995 season. A number of competitors continue collegiate swimming and diving in both Division I and III programs.  Farnum was the 2003 recipient of the New England Prep School Swimming and Diving Distinguished Service Award and a 2006 recipient of the NISCA 25 year Service Award.  A graduate of Springfield College with a B.S. and M.Ed., Farnum was a four-year national qualifier for not only swimming but also one-and-three meter diving.  A former record holder for swimming and diving events while at Springfield College, Farnum was also a New England Collegiate Diving Champion. Farnum is also the head coach of Girls Tennis.  Send email to Coach Jean Farnum.

Wrestling

Coach Hudson

This is Dave Hudson's second tenure at Exeter. This time he's back as chair of the physical education department and wrestling coach.

Hudson also coached Exeter wrestling from 1982 to 1991. He then moved on to St. Lawrence University, where he coached wrestling from 1991 to 1995. He spent the next four years at Governor Dummer Academy as athletic director and wrestling coach. In 1999 Hudson returned to Exeter.

After serving as an assistant wrestling coach under Ethan Shapiro for two years, Hudson took over as head coach six years ago. Shapiro, now the Director of Summer School, stayed on as an assistant coach. "We have the exact, same philosophy," Hudson said. Either Hudson or Shapiro has coached the team since 1985. During that time, Exeter has won 12 Class A championships and eight New England titles.
Send email to Coach Dave Hudson.

Girls Ice Hockey

Coach Pacific

Coach Pacific has been the girl's ice hockey head coach since 2006 following an internship year in 2005. 

A native of Rockford, Illinois, Coach Pacific played youth hockey there, then played high school hockey at St. Mark's School in Southborough, MA. She played on the U.S. Under-22 National Team in 2000 and 2002 and graduated in 2005 from The Ohio State University with a BA and MA in Sport and Exercise Studies: Coaching and Sport Performance. She played for the OSU women's ice hockey team from its inaugural season in 1999, persevering through two major injuries to complete her career in 2005.

Coach Pacific was an OSU scholar-athlete. Her awards and honors include Verizon At-Large Academic All-District Team, Western Collegiate Hockey Association (WCHA) Scholar All-American, WCHA All-Academic Team, Academic All-Big Ten, OSU Most Valuable Defensive Player 2004, OSU captain in 2000 and 2001, assistant captain in 2005, and WCHA and USCHO player of the week awards.

In addition to coaching ice hockey at Exeter, Coach Pacific is the academy's Strength and Conditioning coach.  She also helps out with JV Boys Soccer, Track, and coaches the JV Girls Water Polo team.

Send email to Coach Melissa Pacific.

Girls Basketball

Coach Mahoney

Over the course of his forty years at Exeter Rick Mahoney has coached every interscholastic basketball team that the Academy sponsors: boys JV and varsity, girls JV, and, since 1982, the girls varsity team. In all, he has led the Big Red into competition more than five hundred times.

 Those girls varsity teams have compiled a 250-155 (.617) record, and have appeared in four New England Championship games, including winning the 1990 title to conclude an undefeated season. In 2005 Mahoney was honored by the New England Basketball Hall of Fame with the Donald "Dee" Rowe Mentor Award. 

 A native of Cambridge, Massachusetts, Mahoney attended public schools in Nashua, New Hampshire, before entering Exeter as a tenth grader. He went on to earn a bachelor's degree from Dartmouth and a master's degree in education from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. At Exeter he has served in a variety of administrative posts, including Dean of Students, Associate Director of Admissions, and his current position as Director of Financial Aid. Mahoney and his family are also veterans of twenty-one years of dorm mastering in Cilley Hall.

Send email to Coach Rick Mahoney.

Boys Swimming and Diving

Coach Mills

A new face will be behind the water polo bench in 2005 as Don Mills inherits what has been the dominant water polo program in the region for over 20 years. Mills is certainly ingrained in the program, having served as assistant coach the previous three seasons under legendary coach and program founder Roger Nekton.
Mills will also have the luxury of inheriting a team that is the eight-time defending New England Champion having posted a 21-3 mark last year, as well as a program that has garnered an incredible 21 titles overall.

Mills spent the last three years coaching the Exeter cycling team which took the 2005 New England Championship, its second title in the last three years. Since he took charge, the program as grown from just five members to an average annual roster of 24.

Mills has been a USA Cycling Expert coach for six years.
As a competitive cyclist, he has ridden in the elite category for 18 years. He is a two-time New England champion and a member of the top-ranked elite team in the nation.

A graduate of Plymouth State College, he also coaches mountain biking and boys' JV hockey at Exeter.  Mills is also the head coach of Boys Water Polo.
Send email to Coach Don Mills.

Boys and Girls Squash

Coach Randall

Kirk Randall came to Exeter in 1999 as the coach of the boys and girls squash teams. "It has been our goal to have a consistent program which is competitive with the top schools of New England prep school squash and which measures up to the tradition of excellence of past Exeter squash teams," Randall said. "It is important to me to create an atmosphere where each player has a real curiosity for exploring how good they can be while at Exeter and then hopefully continue with their passion for the game on a college team and post-college years."

Randall, a Springfield College graduate with a master's degree from Penn State, previously coached at Bucknell, Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Dartmouth. He has also been a squash professional at several clubs, mostly in Boston.

In the spring, Randall is an assistant coach with the Exeter track and field team. He is a former national masters' champion and record holder in cross country, indoor and outdoor track and road racing.  Send email to Coach Kirk Randall.

Boys Basketball

Coach Wesselink

After serving for a year as an assistant to Chuck Hamblet and coaching two years of JV basketball, Coach Malcolm Wesselink took over the Exeter's boys' varsity program in 1983. In his 24 years as head coach, Coach Wesselink has compiled a 256-206 record with 19 winning seasons. Coach Wesselink says, "There are so many strong teams in the New England Prep School League. We teach our players a brand of basketball that gives them the confidence to compete in one of the best leagues in the country."

The Bethesda, MD native played his college basketball at Washington & Lee University in Lexington, VA. Coach Wesselink received his bachelor's degree in American History from the University of Rhode Island in 1976. He started his coaching career at the Peddie School in Hightstown, NJ. Send email to Coach Malcolm Wesselink.

Boys Basketball

Coach Tilton

 Jay Tilton is in his fifth year working with Exeter boys basketball and has helped develop alums now playing at top Division I and Division III programs nationally. He says, “The combination of academic and basketball talent at Exeter is certainly difficult to match at the prep school level. Having the opportunity to assist in the development of our student athletes is a dream job.”

A graduate of Hobart College, Tilton served as Assistant Coach to the mens basketball program at Dartmouth College from 1997 – 2001. Tilton is the full-time Associate Director of Admissions at Exeter. Send email to Coach Jay Tilton.