WATERVILLE — If anyone knows about the Colby College men’s basketball program’s heyday, it’s David McLaughlin. After all, he was there.

Four Colby teams have qualified for the NCAA Division III men’s basketball tournament, three of them in the mid-1990s when McLaughlin, a 1997 graduate, was a player. Now, he’ll try to bring the Mules back to their former glory.

Colby announced Thursday the hiring of McLaughlin as its next men’s basketball coach. McLaughlin was head coach at Dartmouth for the past 10 years, and previously was the head coach at Stonehill from 2004-13.

“It’s surreal; it’s kind of a full-circle moment,” McLaughlin said. “There are so many lifelong memories and also enduring memories that I made during my time at Colby, and those life lessons have stuck with me. The Colby basketball bond is unique, and I’m really excited that I can come back and take over this program.”

Colby had been searching for a new coach for a month after Sean Rutigliano left to join the coaching staff at Kansas State. Rutigliano, who went 16-9 in his lone season at Colby, was hired last July after the school dismissed Damien Strahorn, who had coached the Mules since 2011.

At Stonehill, McLaughlin was a two-time National Association of Basketball Coaches Northeast Region Coach of the Year (2006, 2011) and a two-time Northeast-10 Conference Coach of the Year (2006, 2010). He won a program-record 189 games and took the Skyhawks to NCAA Division II Final Fours in 2010 and 2012.

Colby athletic director Amanda DeMartino said the program got roughly 80 applicants for the position. Ultimately, she said, a candidate with McLaughlin’s résumé and pedigree who also had nearly 20 years of head-coaching experience at the Division I and II levels between Stonehill and Dartmouth was too good to pass up.

“We really went into the search wanting to find who was going to be the best fit for Colby and our students, and he was just so impressive,” DeMartino said. “He had a really great vision for the program, how he would work with our students and how he would continue to raise the competitive success of our program.”

The timing, DeMartino said, was also ideal. Colby was in the fortunate position of beginning a coaching search less than 10 days after McLaughlin left Dartmouth, which, like Colby, is a northern New England college with rigorous academic standards.

McLaughlin said it is an honor to take over the program built by the legendary Dick Whitmore. The winningest men’s basketball coach at any Maine college with 635 career victories, Whitmore had a 41-year run at Colby from 1970-2011, and McLaughlin cited his former coach as one of his greatest mentors.

“Besides my dad, Coach Whitmore was probably the second-biggest influence on my life,” McLaughlin said. “The way he went through adversity and taught us to embrace hard things and do it collectively together, it showed in winning basketball. With hard work, you can win, and you win together and form some really strong bonds.”

McLaughlin said his goal at Colby is to take the Mules to the forefront of the New England Small College Athletic Conference, which he called Division III’s top athletic conference, and to the national stage. He’s also excited to be back in the Pine Tree State.

“I love Maine,” McLaughlin said. “I grew up summering in Islesboro, and when my parents dropped me off at Colby, I fell in love with (Colby), too. It’s like a second home for me, and now, it is going to be home.”