Coles back to coaching RedHawks after four operations in offseason

OXFORD, Ohio -- Charlie Coles is having a good day.

The 66-year-old coach has finished the final class in his nine-week, Basketball Theory 336 course, sharing insights about the game he loves with 28 Miami University students. He's taught the course for 13 years on the southwest Ohio campus.

Afterward, he'll stop home and see his wife, Delores. Today is their 44th wedding anniversary.

"I don't know how happy it is for her, but it's a real happy day for me," Coles joked on Tuesday, his distinctive pencil-thin mustache stretching into a straight line as he smiled.

Then it's on to a meeting about the basketball team, which begins practice this weekend. The RedHawks return four starting players and have high expectations heading into Coles' 13th season as head coach.

He'll appreciate this one. A few months ago, Coles feared he was finished.

And not just with coaching.

The coach with a history of heart problems became ill at home on March 1. He knew something wasn't right with his body and drove himself to a hospital, where doctors started the first of many tests. A few hours later, he was in a medical helicopter headed for a bigger hospital.

The odyssey had begun.

Coles had four operations over the next few months as one problem led to another. Doctors shocked his heart to get it back into rhythm, replaced the blood vessels around it in a quadruple bypass, fixed a bleeding ulcer in his stomach and removed his gall bladder.

He wasn't sure how he would come through it. For weeks on end, the best part of his day was when it ended.

"The only thing I looked forward to was when I went to sleep," Coles said, sitting by an oblong, wooden table in his basketball office at Millett Hall. "I looked forward to that because I didn't have to worry about my health. I don't care how old you are, when you get sick, you worry about what's going to happen. And I certainly was worrying about what's going to happen."

Basketball? His lifelong passion was the last thing in mind.