Joseph "Dutch" Nichols

Joseph "Dutch" Nichols was considered by those who saw him play to be the finest basketball player in Manasquan High School history. A four-letter man on the hardcourt, he scored 1,049 career points at a time when such totals were extraordinary. The Asbury Park Press named him 2nd Team All-Shore in 1953 and 1st Team All-Shore and 1st Team All-Conference in 1954. He won the 1954 Frederick Lyman Abbott Award, given annually to MHS's most outstanding basketball player.

In baseball, Nichols was equally valuable. He batted .333 in 1953 and was a key member of that year's NJSIAA Group III Championship team.

After graduation, Nichols became one of the most successful basketball coaches in the country. His career accumulated 699 girls' high school basketball wins, tying him for 27th nationally all-time. He also founded the longest-running girls' high school basketball clinic in the United States — a program that ran for 43 consecutive years. He was inducted into the Southwest Missouri Community College Sports Hall of Fame (1974), the Missouri College Athletic Hall of Fame (2006), and the Mississippi Community and Junior College Hall of Fame (2009).