Author Description

This is a story of how a man’s love for basketball and his players turned Bradenton Southeast High School into one of the most successful girls basketball programs in the state of Florida.The best thing about John Harder is that in his 35 years at Southeast, despite winning three state championships, going to seven State Final Fours and winning 22 district titles, he was much more than just a basketball coach.Famed basketball TV commentator Dick Vitale is so impressed with Harder that in the book’s foreword he compared him to the great John Wooden, who won 10 national championships for UCLA.To the students at Southeast who helped turn his classroom into a shrine, he was an iconic figure who would always be there for them in times of personal strife.Harder’s fellow teachers and coaches noted how he could fill any role to help a student, even when it meant putting on a lawyer’s hat to get them out of trouble. As one coach put it, after talking to Harder you always felt like a million dollars.When Harder arrived in Bradenton 1983 from the Chicago area, the players and students were curious and cautious. But quickly they bonded and went on a joyous ride that lasted 35 years.This was a two-way street, however, Harder has repeatedly said. He had talented, coachable players come through his door year after year, leading him to say he had the best job in America and that he would be proud to call any of them his daughter.In 2003, the Southeast girls recorded the program’s biggest victory before what was the biggest crowd in the Manatee-Sarasota area when the Seminoles defeated national power Jacksonville Ribault, which had won five straight state championships and 120 consecutive games against Florida high schools.Among Harder’s achievements was a 72-game win streak against county opponents, a record which still stands to this day. During perhaps his best run from 2000-04, Southeast went 118-14 winning 31, 31, 29 and 27 games.Harder was inducted into the FACA Hall of Fame i