St. Joseph's of Brooklyn head coach Joe Cocozello talks to his squad during a timeout.
Bad news in the sports pages is so abundant these days it seems it sometimes threatens to squeeze out space needed for the actual scores of the games.
Too much room being gobbled up by the antics of out-of-control coaches, like Mike Rice at Rutgers, is one issue.
The Scarlet Knights basketball coach came to New Brunswick via Robert Morris University in Pittsburgh, and in less than three full seasons has managed to get himself into so much hot water with his temper that he is presently sitting out a three-game school-imposed suspension and getting $50,000 lopped off his 2012-13 salary in the form of a personal fine.
Rice will have to take time out of his anger management classes, we guess, to balance his checkbook.
He is not alone, of course.
Not even close.
There is a personal line out there for everyone — bankers, cops, teachers, hedge-fund managers, and, yes, college coaches — and the Rutgers head man is just one of many who can’t seem to stay on the correct side of that invisible barrier.
One problem among college coaches is the perceived pressure of their jobs, I guess.
BARGAIN HUNTER
The college game has become such a big business with outsized salaries — not to mention egos — and with so much money on the line for the institutions, some folks look at it as life and death.
That’s why it’s so refreshing to consider a guy like Joe Cocozello.
Just like Rice, Cocozello, who is the head coach at little Division III St. Joseph’s College in Brooklyn, has money problems. But they lean to things like trying to get the right price for airline tickets to a holiday tournament in Florida.
“We couldn’t find the kind of bargain we needed this year, so we just didn’t go,” said the 39-year-old West Brighton native.
Freshman Michael Megafu has been a dominant presence inside for the Bears.
The Bears did go on the road to the Gallaudet Thanksgiving Tournament in Washington earlier his year, 12 kids and three coaches on the road for an overnight.
“We even took a walk around the White House,” said Cocozello, who played at St. Peter’s HS and is a former point guard at St. Joe’s.
That’s a big trip for St. Joe’s, which plays, and often practices, at Brooklyn Tech because the Bears’ gym on their Clinton Avenue campus is too small and outdated to be of much use.
The Hudson Valley Athletic Conference member school has a basketball budget that is probably no more than half of what Rice is paying back to Rutgers for his tantrums.
STRONG CONNECTION
As for salaries, well, let’s just say what Cocozello and his assistants get paid barely covers their daily commutes to the Fort Greene school.
“If it was about money, obviously none of us would be here,” said the 11-year head coach, whose real job is that of teacher at Our Lady of Mount Carmel-St. Benedicta grammar school on Clove Road, just a few blocks from where he was raised.
All the assistant coaches, including West Brighton’s Chris Olaskiewicz, are also graduates of St. Joseph’s.
“We all have a connection,” said Cocozello. “We love the place.”
Sophomore David Louison has come up big inside.
The Bears, with a roster filled with kids from Brooklyn, Queens and Staten Island, have six players under 6-feet tall and just one from outside the city limits.
They are also 8-3 to begin the season, and top D-3 in field goal defense. It’s a season which, by the way, halted on Dec. 10 with a 65-56 road win over Lehman College and won’t resume until Jan. 7 at Drew University.
“We take a break for finals,” explained Cocozello nonchalantly, as if that is the way of the college sports world, “And for the holidays.”
That doesn’t mean the Bears aren’t serious about success on the court against opponents like Sarah Lawrence, Brooklyn College and even the Culinary Institute.
“I still lay awake at night when we lose,” Cocozello smiles.
THINKING BIG
Hopes are high at St. Joe’s this season.
The Bears currently have a pair of players among the Top 10 in Division III in rebounding in 6-foot-4 sophomore David Louison (12.8 ppg, 12.5 rpg) and 6-2 freshman Michael Megafu (13.4 ppg, 12.1 rpg).
St. Peter's HS product Vernon Maddox has given the Bears key minutes.
And they get big minutes from 5-foot-7 guard Vernon Maddox, a St. Peter’s HS product who often commutes with fellow Islanders Kevin Alesi (Tottenville) and Thomas Karasinski (New Dorp).
Maddox, whose older brother Ervin also played for St. Joe’s, admits he played before bigger crowds in his high school days.
That factor, however, in no way dampens the sophomore’s enthusiasm for his new environs.
“This has been a great experience for me so far,” said Maddox, who averages 8.3 points per game. “Most of the guys commute from around the city. They live in different places, and we all make an effort to spend time with each other and get to know each other’s lifestyles.”
Cocozello is hoping there’s a Hudson Valley Conference title down the road at the end of this season. And he dreams that someday his team may even find itself as part of the Division III NCAA Tournament, the way the College of Staten Island was last March.
Until then, he has a job to do.
“Our goal is to always try to represent the school the right way, and make the people here proud of what we do.”
The college sports world in general would be a far better place if everyone involved boiled their hopes down to that basic aspiration, now, don’t you think?