WEST LEBANON — Just two months after suffering a heart attack, Dick Dodds was back on skates.
Dodds, who is in his 40th season as head coach of the Hanover High boys hockey team, was teaching an adult hockey lesson at James W. Campion III rink on Nov. 4 when he felt something was amiss. He went straight to his office, called his doctor and was subsequently taken to the hospital after a fall.
But since then, his recovery has been as smooth as anyone hoped. Dodds was on the bench for Hanover’s first practice on Nov. 29 and has been with the team throughout the season. On Tuesday, two months to the day since the incident, he led practice from the ice again.
“It was nice to be back,” Dodds said. “It’s difficult to stand on the bench and try to run a practice. The beauty of my group is I’ve got two students who it’s not their first rodeo. So they did a lot of the on-ice stuff and I did a lot of the Xs and Os and drawing practice plans and organized the best I could from the bench.”
Dodds recently graduated from his cardiac rehabilitation program at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center, which took up a lot of his hours. He is gradually working back to his full-time role as manager at Campion Rink, with his son Alex, one of his assistants with the Hanover team, picking up some of his shifts.
Alex Dodds said he took over some of the more labor-intensive tasks that his father usually handles, including making ice, sharpening skates and moving nets around. With Hanover, though, his role did not change much.
“There’s not a lot that I took over in terms of the team,” he said. “It’s not easy to coach from the bench during practices, and we’re doing the best we can with that.”
The Dodds family has its fingerprints all over the Hanover athletic department. Dick’s brother, John, has coached the girls hockey team for 17 years, while another brother, Tom, is in his 10th season coaching the ski jumping team. The whole family has received an outpouring of support after Dick’s heart attack, with community members making meals for them and making sure Dick was going to the hospital for rehab.
Hanover athletic director Megan Sobel said Dodds’ passion for coaching likely motivated him through the rehab process because he was so eager to get back on the ice as soon as possible.
“Obviously, he’s a super-committed coach,” Sobel said. “Part of what drives him is coaching and how passionate about it he is. He was working hard to get back out there and not have it impact the season. Not missing much and being able to be involved is an important part of his recovery.”
HHS opened its season with a 3-1 win over Nashua North-Souhegan on Dec. 19. Hanover then annihilated Bishop Brady, 13-0, four days later, with five players scoring at least two goals. But the team has lost three straight since, including twice to Concord, the defending NHIAA Division I state champion.
Dodds, though, is enjoying every moment with this group, knowing nothing about his job was certain just weeks ago.
“I haven’t felt this good in 10 years,” Dodds said. “And I attribute a lot of that to these kids. We’re going in the right direction — both my health and the team.”
Benjamin Rosenberg can be reached at brosenberg@vnews.com or 603-727-3302.