Legendary Case Western Reserve University Coach
Bill Sudeck was 28 years old when he was hired by the Case
Institute of Technology back in 1954.
Sean
McDonnell
|
Nearly 60 years later
the man who has taken over
Sudeck's office as men's basketball coach is the same age.
Unfortunately
Sudeck, who died in 2000 after coaching at the university for
over 40 years, and new head coach Sean McDonnell
never met. But a lot of people who coached and played under
Sudeck probably feel the same way about the Case legend as
McDonnell feels
about his two college basketball mentors.
"I have been real lucky about my two bosses," McDonnell
said. "Jim O'Brien at Ohio State University and Dave Paulsen
at Williams College have both been national coaches of the
year-great people to have learned from, like I'm sure Sudeck
was."
There is one significant difference between McDonnell,
his former bosses and even Sudeck. McDonnell didn't play basketball
at the collegiate level.
"Not playing in college is not something
I brag about, but it's also something I am not ashamed of," McDonnell
said. "I
made a choice not to play in college."
McDonnell played three years of varsity basketball
at Clinton Central High School in Clinton, N.Y., but upon graduation
in
1992 made a choice that, ultimately, has taken him to where
he is today-the new head coach of the Spartans.
"I look back on my times as an undergrad,
often thinking I may have had a more fun experience if I had
played," McDonnell said. "At
the same time, there is no way I would be a head coach right
now had I done so. I can't look back and wish I had done something
else because there is nothing I'd rather be doing then coaching
at Case."
As a student-athlete, McDonnell was recruited
by a number of NCAA Division III schools in upstate New York
but instead rolled
the dice and went to Division I Boston College (BC). He said
he thought maybe there would be a place for him there, and
there was-just not as a player.
"I played with the players all fall and
knew right away that I could play with them, but I was not
good enough to play for
them," McDonnell said.
By attending practices, McDonnell
got to know BC's head coach, O'Brien, and assistant coaches.
The assistants ended up asking
McDonnell if he wanted to stay involved with the team by helping
them coach. Needless to say, he took them up on their offer.
So,
at age 18 McDonnell began learning the collegiate coaching
ropes in one of the country's top programs in one of the nation's
best conference, the Big East.
"At BC there were six guys that went on
to play in the NBA (National Basketball Association) that I
was lucky enough to coach," McDonnell
said. "And some of the assistant coaches I worked with
have gone on to become head coaches as well."
McDonnell
now enters his fourth season as a college head coach, and
he hopes to help turn around a Spartan program that hasn't
posted a winning season since 1998-1999 (17-9 under Sudeck).
The
new Spartan coach became only the third head coach in Case
history last fall, replacing Adam Hutchinson, who left
the
university for another head coaching position.
McDonnell's
previous coaching record speaks for itself. While at Hiram,
his teams made two North Coast Athletic
Conference
(NCAC) tournament appearances, and he developed and coached
two All-NCAC players.
Before Hiram, McDonnell served as
an assistant men's basketball coach at Williams College in
Williamstown,
Mass., and at
Le Moyne College in Syracuse, N.Y. While McDonnell
was on staff,
Le Moyne made a trip to the NCAA Division II Tournament
in 1997 and had a 20-win season in 1998.
