Debbie Connor gave her heart and soul to Trinity’s dance program for a decade, coaching her three daughters — Amanda Morris, Tara Groves, and Kendal Howard — over that span. Then one day in 2012, she decided to take the same job at Daviess County, her daughter Howard in tow.
The duo inherited a Lady Panthers roster that only had six to seven athletes, building the program from the ground up and filling the school’s trophy case with 13 KDCO Region, two KDCO State, seven KHSAA Region, four KHSAA State, and three NDA Nationals titles.
Now, after 13 seasons together at the forefront, Connor and Howard have recently stepped down as head coach and assistant coach of Daviess County’s dance team.
“Being the head coach at DCHS for the past 13 years has been incredibly meaningful to me,” Connor said. “I love teaching and watching our athletes develop, bond, and grow into confident teammates. The energy of competition and the pride of representing our school and community are experiences I will always treasure.”
Connor’s tenure as head coach of the Lady Panthers dance team began at the start of the 2012-13 season. She invited her youngest daughter, Howard, who had just recently graduated from Trinity in 2011, to join her staff. Over 70 kids showed up to their inaugural tryouts, and they finalized the roster with around 25 new faces.
In just their first year, Connor, Howard, and the Lady Panthers qualified for NDA Nationals, finishing 14th. With a taste of success, the dance program slowly morphed into the perennial powerhouse it is today.
“We were lucky to make it to the finals our first year,” Howard said. “We were shocked and so happy to just make finals, and now we are so used to reaching the top three. This year at nationals wasn’t the outcome we were hoping for. We went into finals in first, and our goal was to win, but to still be second in the nation the past three years is something that I thought I would never get used to. It is something we need to be grateful for.”
Connor acknowledged that this wasn’t an easy decision, but she believed now was the right time for her to step away and start a new chapter. With two young kids and a third on the way, Howard has begun to rearrange her priorities, but still hopes to help out the program in some capacity in the future.
“It’s really sad, and I want to cry thinking about it,” Howard said. “I hope I’m not gone forever, and hopefully it’s a see you later, not a goodbye. That’s why my mom and I have been going for so long, because it is hard to step away from a program that you built from the very beginning. It’s not even titles and trophies to us, it’s the impact that you make on these kids’ lives. The relationships that you build not only with the dancers, but also with their families.”
