The 2021-22 Oliver Ames girls basketball team following a state championship win on March 19. (Photo courtesy Easton Public Schools) 
The 2021-22 Oliver Ames girls basketball team following this season’s Final Four win. (Photo courtesy Easton Public Schools) 
Coach Elaine Clement-Holbrook’s overall record is 733-244. She passed 700 wins in 2020 and was recognized by the Massachusetts Basketball Coaches Association (MBCA) and Women’s Basketball Coaches Association (WBCA) with Victory Club Awards. (Photo courtesy Easton Public Schools) 
Coach Elaine Clement-Holbrook (center) pictured with the trophy following the team’s state championship win on March 19. (Photo courtesy Easton Public Schools) 
Coach Elaine Clement-Holbrook (center) pictured with the trophy following the team’s MIAA Final Four win this season. (Photo courtesy Easton Public Schools) 
Coach Elaine Clement-Holbrook coached at Oliver Ames High School for nearly 50 years. (Photo courtesy Easton Public Schools) 
Coach Elaine Clement-Holbrook coached at Oliver Ames High School for nearly 50 years. (Photo courtesy Easton Public Schools) 
Coach Elaine Clement-Holbrook coached at Oliver Ames High School for nearly 50 years. (Photo courtesy Easton Public Schools) 
Coach Elaine Clement-Holbrook began coaching at OAHS in 1975. She became the head basketball coach during the 1976-77 season. (Photo courtesy Easton Public Schools)
EASTON — Superintendent Lisha Cabral and Athletic Director Bill Matthews announce that girls basketball Coach Elaine Clement-Holbrook has retired following close to 50 years coaching athletics at Oliver Ames High School.
She began coaching at OAHS in 1975 as an assistant field hockey coach, assistant basketball coach and the head softball coach. She became the head basketball coach during the 1976-77 season.
Coach Clement-Holbrook’s overall record is 733-244. In January 2016, she broke the Massachusetts record for most wins by a girls basketball coach, passing the previous record of 633 wins.
Her teams have qualified for the State Tournament 44 times in 46 years. The team won the championship in 2006 and 2010, and for a third time earlier this month. Other team accomplishments with Coach Clement-Holbrook at the helm include:
- 19 Hockomock League Titles
- Four Division 2 South Sectional Championships
- Two Division 2 Eastern Mass Championships
- Two-time Division 2 State Semifinalists
- Three-time Division 2 South Sectional Finalists
- Four-time Division 2 South Sectional Semifinalists
Coach Clement-Holbrook has been named the Massachusetts Basketball Coaches Association (MBCA) Coach of the Year four times, and recognized by both the MBCA and Women’s Basketball Coaches Association (WBCA) with Victory Club Awards for each time passing another 100 wins, the latest recognition being for 700 wins in 2020. She has also been recognized as Coach of the Year by the Brockton Enterprise, Boston Globe, Hockomocksports.com, National Federation Interscholastic Coaches Association for District 1-Northeast, and the WBCA-District 1.
During her career, she additionally received the Oswald Tower Award for Professionalism and Ethics in Coaching in 2011, and was selected to be Head Coach of the East for the McDonald’s All American Game in Chicago in 2017.
“Coach Clement-Holbrook will leave an amazing legacy with Oliver Ames athletics. She has mentored and coached hundreds of Oliver Ames students during her career, and has served as an excellent role model demonstrating patience, dedication, enthusiasm and humility,” Director Matthews said. “She has achieved many incredible coaching milestones and consistently set her teams up to succeed year in and year out. More importantly, she has instilled character and values in her team members. She will be missed by our student-athletes and athletics staff. We wish her the best in her retirement.”
Added Superintendent Cabral, “Coach Clement-Holbrook’s abilities, experience and dedication are extraordinary. She will leave a lasting legacy and example for others in Easton that is almost impossible to recreate. Her impact is far beyond athletic coaching. Her athletes and students alike have benefitted from her consistent model of courage, passion and excellence that will touch their loves forever. We are fortunate that she will continue teaching at Oliver Ames, but she will be missed tremendously as a member of our coaching staff.”
Coach Clement-Holbrook has served as a district representative for the MBCA and as the MBCA’s first female president, and on the WBCA High School Coaches Committee. She is an inductee of the Northeast New Agenda Hall of Fame (1992), Dedham High School Athletic Hall of Fame- Inaugural Class (1999), Bridgewater State College Athletic Hall of Fame (2001), New England Basketball Hall of Fame (2006), Massachusetts Basketball Coaches Association Hall of Fame (2008), and the Oliver Ames High School Athletic Hall of Fame (2018).
She has officially retired from coaching following the conclusion of the 2021-22 season. She is currently continuing to teach classes at Oliver Ames.
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