NEW LENOX – Keith Healy hasn’t thought much about stepping down in the near future as Providence Catholic’s wrestling coach, and he recently received an honor which only lit an additional fire under him to stay on as one of the state’s most successful coaches.

A month ago, Healy received the National Coach of the Year Award in wrestling among the eight finalists honored by the National High School Athletic Coaches Association at their annual conference, which was held in East Peoria.

During his 25-year career at Providence, Healy’s teams have won more than 525 dual meets and own an 82 percent winning rate. From his first season in 1992-93 through 2003-04, the Celtics captured six straight state championships (1997-2002) and placed third or better each year but one, a run of success unmatched in almost any other sport in Illinois history.

The Celtics also took second place in 2008 and completed an amazing run of 453-56-2 through 2011 before experiencing a few down seasons. But they’ve bounced back in the last two years and won their 13th state trophy under Healy in 2016.

After being nominated by representatives from the state to the NHSACA, he filled out paperwork to let him represent one of the regions throughout the United States. In Region 4, he had enough points collected in his career to advance as one of the eight finalists. At the banquet in East Peoria before nearly 400 attendees, finalists in all of the sports were introduced and the coaches of the year were announced, including Healy.

“It was very humbling,” Healy said. “We got to sit around for a few days and talk with some of the other coaches about their careers and about how they did things and it was a great week. Finding out what they do for team-building and raising funds, it was interesting to hear the different stories throughout the nation. To just be a part of that was unbelievable.

“You don’t realize everything until you start getting later in your career. The best part was that it’s entirely a coaches association. Obviously, without my coaches and the kids I coached, I never would have gotten here. It was neat because it’s a coaches association, so you’re being nominated by coaches, the decision was passed on by coaches and finally you’re honored with some of the best coaches in the nation in all sports. It was pretty awesome.”

Beside all the team success that the Celtics have enjoyed, they also have had plenty of individual honors, winning 21 state titles and claiming 48 other medals in the past 25 years.

And Healy is the first to admit that many different people have been responsible for the great success that his Providence program has enjoyed throughout the years.

“The best part about it is that I know that I didn’t do it on my own,” Healy said. “I couldn’t have done it without the assistant coaches that I’ve had throughout the years and obviously the kids and the families that we had who sacrificed to send their kids to Providence. And my administration has always given me everything that I needed to be successful.”

After enjoying so much success at a young age in the sport, Healy easily could have lost the competitive fire, especially during a few down times. But his program’s resurgence, and the extra boost that this national award provides, has him as excited as ever about his job.

“I was fortunate that I became the head coach when I was young and I learned the ropes early when I was an assistant coach at St. Laurence,” Healy said. “So going to these types of conferences and being honored like this kind of gives you a little more of a spark to push on and I still have more to prove. Wrestling is a sport that you have to love because if you don’t love it, it’s going to be hard to continue. I started when I was 5 years old and here I am 40-some years later, and I still love it as much as I did on the first day.

“I’ve been so blessed. At this point, I’m not even sure how many kids I had who are coaching now. I’ve had kids who’ve become lawyers and some who are successful in the business world. That’s what makes me more proud than anything is to see how successful they have become once they’ve grown up. And I still get to keep in contact with a lot of them, which is awesome. Now it’s a matter of just keeping the pieces in place and to just keep working as hard as we’ve been and trying to get the kids to lead the program to the next level.”