Several members of the Menlo community reflect on memories of Michael Harris. Staff photo by Davis Rich.
Michael Shames | Print Editor
Keith Larsen is the head coach of the Menlo basketball team. Michael Harris was a member of his staff during the 2014-15 basketball season.
“When Kris Weems hired me to coach basketball at Menlo, it had been since 2002 since I had coached high school sports. I asked [Weems] if the basketball coaching staff was intact, and he said no and told me that the staff was up to me. So I told him ‘I need somebody to help me out with figuring out what’s too little and what’s too much for high school. And I need somebody that knows Menlo.’ Weems said he just got off the phone with one of his former players who just graduated from the University of San Diego and he’s doing graduate work at Santa Clara. He’d be a perfect fit. I knew the Harris family from meeting them a few times. I knew they were a great Menlo family. So Michael shows up and we changed his name to a pronoun. I need me some Harris. What that meant was that I needed to know how to do things the Menlo way. So, whether it’s figuring out how to get this thing started, to the bus schedule, to traveling, everything that I needed to know. Michael was the key. Plus, he turned out to complement me very well as a coach. I don’t want to call myself the ‘bad cop,’ but I tend to be very direct with the players. You know exactly how I feel at all times. Whereas Michael was that intuitive person, that counterbalance to me, which is super important as an assistant. I didn’t realize until these last few days how many of those conversations he had with the players.
Coaching was so important to him. That became apparent to me as I got to know him coaching at Menlo. He realized that the more he did the counseling thing, the more he worked towards his degree, it would hamper his ability to coach at a full-time level. It was also apparent to me that he loved the counseling part. While he was at Santa Clara, he was involved in counseling at a lot of high schools in the area with mental issues. However, if you asked anyone, his brothers, his dad, his friends, Michael just couldn’t see life without coaching. He was 26 years old. There were a lot of moving parts in his life. He had been in school his whole life, and he just wanted to enjoy life. That’s the stage he was at. This was definitely the best part of his life.
One of the things I will remember about him is that he always had this bounce in his step. It’s too bad the majority of Menlo students didn’t get a chance to fully know him because I think ten years from now, he would be an icon at this school. I could easily see him being a counselor or a head coach, being that guy that no matter what sport or what situation, you could go to. He’s not shoving anything down your throat, either. He is that gentle soul. Nobody can replace that. You can try to find another assistant coach, but there is really no one with that package that Michael had. Now when I say ‘I need me some Harris,’ I don’t have it anymore.
Talking to all of my players over the last couple days, I didn’t realize how much of an impact he had on them. The seniors were really looking forward to this year because he was that accessible guy that they all felt comfortable going to. That’s a beautiful thing. To have a guy like Michael, where after I get on a player on our team, you know that Michael will be there to pick the player up a little bit. I would never have to tell him. He would just do it.
The one great story was when we were playing the student vs. alumni basketball game. It was our first game of the season. Michael came out on the alumni team and started trash talking. I told our players that Coach Harris was not going to score. He’s not scoring. Every time he gets the ball, we are just going to run at him with 3 guys, 4 guys. We can’t let him trash talk us like that. So the first time he got the ball, we swarmed him with a few players, and Michael looks over and says, ‘Coach, what are you doing.’ I just told him that he trash talked. So he ended up scoring one free throw the entire game. But that was his personality too. He understood that he was an adult and had to be a mentor for these high schoolers. But he also understood that when he laces his shoes up, he can also be a player. It’s a great combination to have.
Michael was just that person in your life that you could talk to about anything: athletics, academics, relationships, anything. That’s why Menlo not only hired him, but approached him. He didn’t approach Menlo. They came to him and said we need you, we want you. And he really did everything for me. The selfish side of me is saying that I am going to need to hire four different people just to do the job that Michael did. He will be greatly missed.”
Tracy Bianchi is the head counselor at Menlo and was excited to work with Michael in the counseling department.
“Michael will be remembered by his energy and his complete elation about being back at Menlo. Having been a student, and then an alum, and then graduating from Santa Clara, he felt so grateful to be asked back to Menlo. He didn’t hesitate at all when he was offered the opportunity. For us, we felt it was a really good hire because of how much we care about all of the students here. The reality is that Michael was a very down to earth outlet for all students. For him to be back in this setting was a really hopeful message for students and for faculty to see that there is something very special about alums coming back and working on this campus. They have experiences and great value to provide to students during hard times. We will miss everything that we did not have the opportunity of having. He was so open and ready to take on any task that I gave him. He didn’t want to miss a beat on any opportunity to talk to high school students. I will definitely miss his laugh and his quirky sense of humor. Especially finding a sense of humor in a job that is not always full of humor. He had a funny way of taking himself very seriously but also laughing at himself when he needed to. I think the boys in the basketball program saw that a lot out of him last year. He was really approachable and very easy to be around, and that is why he would have made a terrific counselor.
I would say one of the strongest memories I have of him is seeing him at “the web” activity on the senior retreat. Seeing how grateful he was to have witnessed the ability for young adults to express themselves and really be that vulnerable, in order to make their senior year that much more memorable and meaningful. I could tell it was really powerful for him to see that, to be a part of that.”
Senior James Thygesen is a member of the Menlo basketball team that Michael Harris helped coach last year.
“Before [Michael Harris] was my coach, I didn’t really know him. I knew who he was and I knew his younger brother Richard Harris. But I really bonded with Coach Harris and the rest of the team last year. Throughout the whole basketball season, he increasingly seemed less like a coach and more like a teammate to me. He was in our team group chat where we could go to him about any problems we had and we would tell us about all of the fun things he did in high school. That was one of the things I loved about him. That he was so accessible.
After we lost in the CCS playoffs, he was crying and he told us that we were a brotherhood. He told us he wasn’t sure if he was going to stay at Menlo for this year after he graduated from Santa Clara, but he assured us that he would never leave us. When the school year started, I was really excited to learn that he was going to be a high school counselor. I was really excited to continue my relationship with him, and I know everyone else on the team was excited too. He told me he knew he wouldn’t be able to be as involved in the basketball team as he was last year but then he said “you know I would never leave you guys.” That is something that really hit home for me. He really really cared about our team and all of us individually.
At the senior retreat, Coach Harris came up to me. He told me how proud he was of me for what other people had said about me and what I had said about other people at the senior web activity. He told me that when we got back from the retreat, that we and some other basketball guys need to get lunch. And I’m really sad that we never got that lunch. It’s been a really sad few days. I’m all cried out. He was just really special.”
