Paul Smith's College Men's Basketball

Bio Sam Dale, a Charlottesville, Va., native, joins Paul Smith’s College with 15 years of coaching experience spanning the youth, AAU, high school, collegiate, and player-development levels. Most recently, he served as the boys’ varsity head coach at Tandem Friends School in Virginia, where he guided the Badgers to back-to-back VISAA Division III State Elite Eight appearances during the 2024–25 and 2025–26 seasons while capturing a conference championship. Under his leadership, Tandem made its first-ever appearance in the VISAA Division III State Tournament and followed that historic breakthrough with consecutive State Elite Eight finishes. During his tenure, the program produced two 1,000-point scorers, two All-State selections, and back-to-back Greater Piedmont Athletic Conference (GPAC) Player of the Year. Dale also co-founded the Sam Dale Academy in 2017 and has developed a strong reputation through extensive player-development work across the DMV, training athletes at the youth, high school, collegiate, and professional levels. Throughout his coaching career, he has helped numerous student-athletes continue their basketball careers at the collegiate level. As a player, Dale competed successfully at multiple levels of collegiate basketball. He began his career at Allegany College of Maryland, an NJCAA Division I program competing in the highly competitive Region 20, where he earned First Team All-Region honors. At Green Mountain, he helped lead the Eagles to a conference championship and the winningest season in program history, finishing 21–4 during the 2015–16 campaign. Following his collegiate career, Dale competed with the USA Select Team during a semi-professional summer tour of Italy in 2017. In addition to his high school success, Dale led his Able United AAU team to a national championship game appearance in 2021.