Bill Casavant of Presque Isle, who has umpired at all levels of baseball during a 42-year career, will be among the nine new members of the Maine Baseball Hall of Fame as this year’s induction ceremony and banquet will take place Aug. 3 at the Holiday Inn by the Bay in Portland.
Casavant got his start in umpiring in 1972 by joining the Northern Maine Baseball Umpires Association and he currently serves as the board’s interpreter and assignor.
He has umpired 25 Maine high school regional finals and 22 state championship contests.
The 66-year-old Casavant is the athletic director at Northern Maine Community College, where he was employed during earlier stints from 1984-95 as AD and again from 1995-2008 as director of admissions. He also coaches the Falcons’ soccer and basketball teams and is the assistant boys’ basketball coach at Caribou High School under his son, Chris.
A native of Holyoke, Mass., Casavant is a graduate of the University of Maine at Presque Isle and went on to teach at Limestone and coach basketball at Caribou, Limestone and UMPI. He served as the athletic director at UMPI for two years and has also officiated both soccer and basketball. He served as a basketball announcer on radio for 20 years with both WEGP and WCXU.
Casavant is a member of the UMPI Athletic Hall of Fame. He and his wife, Daryl, have three children and six grandchildren.
Casavant will join current Boston Red Sox third base coach Brian Butterfield of Orono, former major league pitcher and current Hermon baseball coach Matt Kinney and former University of Maine baseball coach Paul Kostacopoulos in the 2014 induction class.
Others to be inducted at this summer’s ceremony are Rick Crawford of Topsham, Jack Holmes of Stockton Springs, Jason Lariviere of Buxton, Bob Nutter of Kennebunk and Artie Taylor of Rumford.
For tickets to the banquet, contact Don Douglas at 846-3460 or by email at ddouglas@douglastitle.com.
