Best High School BB Coach Ever in the State of Connecticut

[ucjoet]

The old HCC had three very good coaches. Stan Ogrodinik, Joe Reilly and Charlie Larson.

And Gary Palladino at St. Paul. Won back to back state championships with Mark Noon as his best player. He then coached at UHart ( not great success), then went to Notre Dame of West Haven

 

[WrenchFan69]

Tony Falzarano. Coached at Putnam for 33 years, then coached at Tourtellotte for another 6 years. Two tiny public schools in CT. 609 wins. Won a state title in 1986 and reached two other state finals in 1995 and 2006. What he was able to do, with such little talent in Northeast CT, was amazing.

Played against him when he was at Tourtellotte. Both teams were pretty mediocre but he was a class act

 

[MilliniumPrince]

Great coach and a better man than coach

Amen.

 

[Waquoit]

CT coaches haven't done UConn many favors over the years.

In any sport.

Makes you wonder if a decent AD could have done some outreach back in the day.

 

[Deepster]

I went to South Catholic when Joe Reilly was there. He ended up winning over 500 games and 5 titles. His brother Gene did even better with 547 wins mostly at Portland High after assisting Joe at South. The HCC had great games with teams like East Catholic, South Catholic, Northwest Catholic, St. Thomas Aquinas, Xavier, St. Bernards and St Pauls. I remember games with Joey Whelton going against Randy Lavigne and others at South. High school is where I learned to love basketball. John Pinone was a bit younger but played for Joe along with Steve Ayers.

Gene Reilly was my gym teacher after he came home from Viet Nam. If you were late to the gym from the locker room, you could expect a football or basketball thrown at you depending on the season. One poor sap forget his sneakers and had to hang from the pull up bar for the period. Good times, he certainly couldn't get away with that nowadays but I don't think Lempa ever forgot his sneakers again.

I went to South Catholic as well. Joe Reilly was my gym coach. Day 1, he handed out hockey sticks and I thought "Cool. We're going to play hockey." Nope. We used them as rifles as he taught us to march and do thinks like "Present....arms", "Right shoulder.....arms".

Another day he challenged anyone in the class to a push up contest. A couple of the football players took him up on it and, at maybe 60, he embarrassed them both.

 

[Deepster]

Interestingly enough, Joe Reilly was a great coach himself but has quite the lineage behind him of his former players coaching after him.

His sons Luke and Joe
John Mirabello
John Pinone
Steve Pinone - Asst on the Villanova/Rollie Massamino title winning team
Anthony Latina at Sacred Heart

Also, a little known fact, Dom Perno coached at South Catholic briefly.

 

[XLCenterFan]

It's not even a question. Vito Montelli from St. Joe's in Trumbull.

Windsor's Kenny Smith in second, and Northwest's Mirabello 2-a.

 

[2ndFlBelden]

Sam Bender - Hillhouse
Sal Verderame - Wilbur Cross

For those who are listing Hillhouse and Cross coaches. I like to say that UConn had some great teams in the 50's, but the best basketball in the state was Hillhouse vs Cross in the New Haven area from the 50's into Early 70's. Said they could have beat most college teams. He was a Highhouse grad of '48, then Korea, then UConn '56.

 

[the Q]

Tony Falzarano. Coached at Putnam for 33 years, then coached at Tourtellotte for another 6 years. Two tiny public schools in CT. 609 wins. Won a state title in 1986 and reached two other state finals in 1995 and 2006. What he was able to do, with such little talent in Northeast CT, was amazing.

Coaches of this ilk are not going to get enough Credit.

Public school coaches don’t get to choose their talent base.

 

[M.S.G.]

Tony Falzarano. Coached at Putnam for 33 years, then coached at Tourtellotte for another 6 years. Two tiny public schools in CT. 609 wins. Won a state title in 1986 and reached two other state finals in 1995 and 2006. What he was able to do, with such little talent in Northeast CT, was amazing.

I do think there's something to this. Says a lot when you just win with who ya got.. However, I played against his teams in high school when they were state championship level good - and then coached against him when he was on his way out the door & then the odd duck run @ Tourtellotte. While the win total is remarkable, he won many of those games playing a very weak QVC schedule, and then feasting on tech schools. 609 is 609 whatever way you slice it, but he'll never be revered as many others in this thread.

Oh, and course I nominate myself.

 

[Kurebeach5]

There is nobody in the state of Connecticut who did so much with so little as Don Usher at New Canaan. Although he never won a state title, he made two championship games - one in 1980 versus the Wilbur Cross team that beat Ewing. NC was down one as the clock ran down and executed his play perfectly except the kid missed a wide open "J" at the elbow. In 1989, he played Danbury and Anthony Harris and before the game Jim Calhoun stopped by the bench to say "Hi" to the Pete Carrill of Ct. HS basketball, as he called Don. Once again NC fell a bucket short against a team they had no business being on the floor with. Per earlier observations, Bob Saulsbury of Wilbur Cross loved Don because he would play Cross EVERY year, not just call when he had a good team. Personally I find it impossible to vote for any Catholic school coach due to recruiting advantages. As an example NC was playing ND (WH) and before the game Gary Palladino was proudly pointing out that he had players from TWENTY different towns in his program. Needless to say NC had kids from ONE, and a small one at that. One final note, in that 1989 run to the title game NC beat Hamden to end Scott Burrell's high school career.

 

[Chief00]

It’s the legendary Bob Saulsbury of Wilbur Cross. I can’t imagine anyone in this state being better.

A wonderful guy and friend of Chief.

 

[Chief00]

Dave Shea, Bacon Academy, won a state title in both Boys and Girls. Has hundreds of wins in both. Taught Chief how to shoot foul shots at STM summer camp. A legend on fundamentals. Ernie D speaks highly of him too.

 

[Ant3411]

The Reilly family, old and young. Curious how many wins Luke has and if he can possibly catch his father Joe and uncle Gene. Amazing teachers of the game - Luke still runs an amazing camp if you can send your kids.

 

[UConnMike04]

Ralph King, my coach at Brien McMahon
Vito
Bentley
Salisbury
Ray Berry at Norwalk
Walsh at Trinity
Need help with the name of Hillhouse`s coach in the 70-80`s.

McMahon grad here also!

 

[Jbirdp5]

Ralph King, my coach at Brien McMahon
Vito
Bentley
Salisbury
Ray Berry at Norwalk
Walsh at Trinity
Need help with the name of Hillhouse`s coach in the 70-80`s.

I went to McMahon after king retired but people still talked about his greatness.

 

[Hey Adrien!]

I was fortunate to be mentored by former Greenwich High coach John Czarnecki and Choate coach Jim Irzyk during my early years of coaching basketball. About a decade ago, Irzyk was brought in as my school's AD and a few years after that Czarnecki was hired as our "director of basketball operations" for a few years.

It was the early years of the development of the athletics program at my school. At the time, I was in my mid-20s and had no idea what I was doing with coaching but both were mentors and like father figures to me (both guys are about my dad's age and like my dad, 100% Polish). Great guys to work with, they both taught me a lot and both are hilarious guys.

They've both moved on to other schools, but their basketball impact on me is huge.

 

[alphasigko]

Bob Sylvester @ Fairfield Prep deserves an honorable mention

 

[Deepster]

Was just looking up some articles, found out more than 35 of Joe Reilly's former players went into coaching basketball. Thought that was interesting.

 

[olehead]

Coach Vitolo coached Hillhouse in the 80’s. He definitely won a championship in 1985 and also went undefeated that year. Tharon Mayes was on that team. That team was a complete beast.

Championship in '86, they beat McMahon.

 

[BLUEDOGHOUSE]

John isn't even the best coach in Cromwell history. Jake Salafia is. 24 consecutive tournament appearances in his 25 year career, including 11 finals appearances and 7 titles.

I remember talking to Mike Savage and John Fontana about CT high school coaches many years ago. They thought the coach that got the most out of his talent and was arguably one of the best high school coaches ever happened to be Herb Neuhauser. Neuhauser coached at the smallest high school in the state. If not mistaken it was East Granby High School. The smallest boys enrollment in the state.

According to these legends in 1970 or thereabout East Granby met Cromwell in the state tournament when Jake Salafia had Weston. Cromwell won five titles from 1967-71. If odds could be put on a high school game Cromwell would have been favored by 20+. Cromwell was a powerhouse that year. Neuhauser according to sources studied the tendencies of Weston/Byrd to such a degree that Weston was held scoreless at the half and Byrd had four points. The late Mel Kleckner coach @ East Windsor in the 70's (then on to UConn) once told Bohdan K. of the Hartford Courant that Salafia has nightmares about that game to this day. Cromwell had five guys that went on to major colleges. Not only did they have a Soph Weston but also the twins Dave/Ed Dlugolenski and Keith Byrd. East Granby led for most of the game until the final few minutes when their best player sprained his ankle. Clay Young (who went on the play briefly at University of Hartford) had guarded Weston most of the game and was injured with a few minutes left in the game. Weston scored the final two baskets of the game to ice it for Cromwell. This could have gone down as the biggest upset in CT high school basketball history. One of the biggest anyways.

Cromwell went on to beat Wamogo by thirty-two points in the championship game.

Sometimes it is hard to gauge who is the best based on state titles and wins at the high school level. So many decisions such as quality of life come into play when contemplating a move at the high school level.

I played against all the talented South Catholic teams with Doug McCrory and Mike Thomas when I was in high school. Reilly was a great coach blessed with great talent coming through the doors at South Catholic. As an example Mike was talented and left Enfield to play @ South ect ect...South recruited the best.

 

[Deepster]

I played against all the talented South Catholic teams with Doug McCrory and Mike Thomas when I was in high school. Reilly was a great coach blessed with great talent coming through the doors at South Catholic. As an example Mike was talented and left Enfield to play @ South ect ect...South recruited the best.

McCrory and Thomas were when I was there. I think Mike Thomas was 2 years older, McCrory 1 year older. My junior year, McCrory's team took on Charles Smith of Knicks fame in the state tourney title game against Warren Harding.

Thomas was a smaller leftie guard with a smooth stroke. He may have been pretty high up on the schools scoring list, if I recall.

McCrory was a slashing swing 3/4. He was the first guy that regularly dunked around (thankfully never on) me in open gym nights.

 

[Horatio]

Championship in '86, they beat McMahon.

yep, 85-86 season. Hillhouse went undefeated in basketball and football that year. What’s funny is I was college roommates with two of the guys on that McMahon team. That was a great team.

 

[olehead]

yep, 85-86 season. Hillhouse went undefeated in basketball and football that year. What’s funny is I was college roommates with two of the guys on that McMahon team. That was a great team.

I was cool with Rodney Smith. He was a 6'3" PF, who put in work for Coach King. Quietly, they had a kid on McMahon by the name of Keith Thompson who was a scoring machine. He might have been the most dominant offensively in Southern Ct. Nicknamed Fruity, he was 5'9", dunked with ease and gave you buckets from everywhere.

 

[HCCForever]

McCrory and Thomas were when I was there. I think Mike Thomas was 2 years older, McCrory 1 year older. My junior year, McCrory's team took on Charles Smith of Knicks fame in the state tourney title game against Warren Harding.

Thomas was a smaller leftie guard with a smooth stroke. He may have been pretty high up on the schools scoring list, if I recall.

McCrory was a slashing swing 3/4. He was the first guy that regularly dunked around (thankfully never on) me in open gym nights.

I saw Thomas and McCrory play for South against Aquinas when I was well past high school, I think 82. We had to stand on the floor because the place was packed. Great environment for basketball. Josh Farrell was playing for Aquinas. Thomas was hard to miss. South Catholic played multiple times against Warren Harding in the state finals, winning some and losing some.

http://content.ciacsports.com/pdfs/champions_boysbasketball.pdf

Year-by-Year Register Boys' Basketball All-State Teams

www.nhregister.com