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Oct. 26, 2008

- Bob Lanier scored more points per game than any basketball player in St. Bonaventure history, but on this day, nearly 40 years removed from his All-American career, he was content to dish out a big assist.

At an alumni reception after the Bonnies' 2008 season-ending loss at Fordham, senior guard Tyler Relph grabbed the microphone to express his thanks to the Bonaventure community for its support during his rollercoaster career. One glance at his teammates and coaches left Relph choking on tears.

Relph steeled himself when Lanier offered a comforting pat on the back. Relph was able to finish his heartfelt words, sentiments he couldn't have imagined expressing when the season began in the fall.

Mark Schmidt meant that much - as a game coach, certainly, but perhaps more so as a charismatic leader for the team's embattled players and fans to embrace.

"It was great to have a coach who believed in you, one who was willing to give you a fresh start," said Relph, whose first two years were plagued by nagging injuries, ineffectiveness and fits of immaturity.

"From the first time he called me into his office, I just felt this aura about him. He's got the type of personality that will attract players here, the kind that will bring Bonaventure basketball back."

The obvious numbers from the 2007-2008 season - 8 wins, 22 losses - don't look much different than the numbers the Bonnies mustered since being slapped with NCAA sanctions (since expired) for recruiting violations unearthed in 2003.

But some underlying numbers - nine losses by less than 10 points, only five by more than 15, a 15-point drubbing of upstart Duquesne, and a 20-point win at Saint Louis - signified a step in the right direction for a program that's been an Atlantic 10 bottom feeder for five years.

"This is the first time (since 2003) that we have real hope. As an old friend from Bona's says, `The alumni are pumped,'" says Charlie Tarulli, class of '62, a longtime booster whose license plate has read BONNIES since 1994. "To talk to him is to love him," says Tarulli, who attended the post-game reception at Fordham and a New York City fundraiser for basketball in June. "I think Mark's the best X's and O's guy we've had in a long time, and he understands the passion that the community and alumni have for the team. I think he's a perfect fit for Bonaventure."

The feeling, Schmidt says, is mutual.

"Like any job, you never know if you've made the right decision until four or five months have passed," Schmidt says. "After four or five months, I knew this was the place for me. It's just been terrific."

Olean serves as the ideal intersection of Schmidt's career goals and family plans. The 45-year-old native of North Attleboro, Mass., can't imagine a better place for him and his wife, Anita, to raise their three young sons.

"I grew up in a small town just like Olean, maybe a little bigger," he says. "You were born there, raised there, died there. You did an honest day's work and came home to your family. For a family guy, Olean is a perfect situation. I mean, you read the paper ... "

Schmidt pauses for a moment and blurts out what comes so easily to him: laughter.

"You read the court docket and it says, `Johnny Smith broke into Julie's garage and stole her bicycle.' I love that. That's what Olean is. This isn't a big city with a murder every night. This is a great place to raise a family."

Schmidt knows too that Bonaventure can be a great place to coach basketball.

"One of the reasons I took the job was because of Bonaventure's tradition," says Schmidt, who played at Boston College in the early 1980s. "And I knew firsthand how passionate the fans were.

"My last year (as an assistant) at Xavier, in 2000 when the Bonnies went to the NCAA tourney, we were nationally ranked and had David West, who missed a shot at the buzzer (in a 65-64 Bona win). We were driving back to Buffalo after the game and I told Skip (Prosser), `Coach, that's the loudest place I've ever been, and I've played in the Carrier Dome and Madison Square Garden.' That place was unbelievable. When the Bonaventure job opened up, I thought about that game."

As he was pondering St. Bonaventure's offer last April, a surprising source reminded Schmidt of another game in the RC.

"I was talking to my point guard at Robert Morris, Derek Coleman, and he said, `Coach, I hear you're thinking about Bonaventure. I said, `Yeah, what do you think?' He said, `Coach, you've got to go. Don't you remember that place?' We played up there and lost by two when Marques Green went nuts at the end.

"Derek said, `Coach, you remember that atmosphere? Robert Morris will never be like that.'"

Good luck finding many coaches who would consult their players for career advice, but that's what Schmidt values: a collaborative leadership style that invites counsel from all corners.

"He's so inclusive, asking our opinions about everything, and he's completely honest with you," says Rhonda Monahan, secretary for men's basketball. "Mark doesn't have any airs about him. He's a wonderful guy to work for."

Schmidt's inclusive nature was a lesson learned from his most cherished mentor, Skip Prosser, who brought Schmidt with him to Xavier after their one-year coaching stint at Loyola (Md.).

"I've been really lucky to have played for two Hall of Fame coaches," says Schmidt, who played at BC for Dr. Tom Davis as a freshman and for current Maryland coach Gary Williams his last three seasons. "But Skip is really the guy who taught me the most."

Prosser's most important lessons didn't come from a dry-erase clipboard.

"Skip was the guy who taught me how to treat people," Schmidt says. "He always said the most important people in the athletic department aren't your athletic director or your assistant coaches. It's the janitor and your secretary. It's those people who can make or break you. You don't treat them any differently than you would treat the college president.

"Skip was all about relationships, about making sure that the kids that you coached respected you. But they also need to know that you love 'em, and not just because they are basketball players. You become their father in a way. He always used to say, `You can't endure them, you have to enjoy them."

"What Skip does for me ... "

He paused and glanced down at his desk, realizing he needed to be in the past tense.

Schmidt still has a hard time accepting that he can't just pick up the phone anymore to seek the advice of Prosser, the victim of a massive heart attack last July shortly after a morning jog at Wake Forest. Just 56, Prosser was preparing for his seventh year as head coach of the Demon Deacons.

"It was just a tragedy because Skip was such a great guy," Schmidt says. "Everyone in this business will always have some enemies because it's so competitive out there, but Skip didn't have any. He just did everything the right way."

No one will know if the strains of the job conspired to kill Prosser, but Schmidt admits that his close friend's shocking death has led many coaches, burdened by the pressure to win and then win some more, to take stock of their lives.

"Pat Flannery just retired at Bucknell, and one of the reasons was Skip's death. An event like that really puts things in perspective," Schmidt says. "It makes you reflect on what's truly important. You want to be prepared for games, prepared for practice, but there's overkill. There's a fine line between doing your job well and being a dad and a husband.

"Don't get me wrong. You want to work as hard as possible, to make people proud again, but this job can consume you. There are coaches who work 20 hours a day, who sleep in their office. I've told my wife and my assistants, if I ever start sleeping in my office just come in here and shoot me because I've lost my mind."

One of his assistants, Jeff Massey, not only coached with Schmidt at Robert Morris but played for Prosser and Schmidt at Xavier, where he averaged 19 points a game as a senior.

"One of the things I learned from Skip is something I see Mark carrying on with his players, that this is not a four-year relationship but a lifetime friendship," Massey says. "Mark is a guy that you can talk to about anything. ... These aren't just basketball players to him, they are people. They are his family."

That word comes up a lot when people talk about Schmidt.

"You really should see him interact with his kids. They're like magnets," Massey says.

Athletic Director Steve Watson can't say enough about the relationships Schmidt has forged in just over a year.

"He's really a family guy. All you have to do is see him around his children to know that," says Watson. "He treats his players like family, too. I see that relationship a little closer than most, and I see how his players look up to him.

"For Tyler to break down (at Fordham) talking about the relationship he developed with Mark in just one year says a lot about Mark and his ability to connect with kids."

Schmidt can't say enough about the seniors - Relph, Michael Lee and Zarryon Fereti - who spilled their guts for him his first year behind the Bonnies' bench.

"I can't even imagine what they went through for three years, to have people questioning if you're any good, or just flat out telling you that you stink," Schmidt says. "For them to be able to come back and have the years that they had was incredibly rewarding."

So was watching them flip their tassels at commencement in May.

"You want to have an effect on kids' lives. They come in here as young, innocent boys without a clue and leave here, hopefully, as mature adults who are going to take their place in society," Schmidt says. "When you see them walk across that stage to get their degrees, that's a great feeling. That's what you're in this business for."

Schmidt never planned on being "in this business" at all.

"My freshman year I went to my adviser in arts and sciences who asked me what I wanted to do," Schmidt recalls. "I said I wanted to make money. He said, `Well, then you need to get into business.' So I switched my major to business.

"Coaching was the furthest thing from my mind. I was tired of basketball when I got out of college."

But after 20 months of selling health and beauty aids, Schmidt says, "I realized how much I missed basketball. Sales is all about you. I missed the locker room and the camaraderie."

Schmidt took a substitute teaching job and coached several JV sports as he pursued his master's in business education, but the incessant clock-watching waiting for the afternoon bell to ring made him realize that he wanted to coach full time.

"I couldn't wait to get out to the practice fields, so I knew I had the bug," he says.

Tim O'Shea, his former roommate at BC and now the head coach at Bryant College, tipped Schmidt off to an assistant's job at St. Michael's in Vermont working for Barry Parkhill, brother of Penn State coach Bruce Parkhill.

Schmidt rode shotgun on a Coke delivery truck in the summer to supplement his $6,300 salary, and his mom had to pick up the payments on a VW Fox he couldn't even drive off the lot because he hadn't learned yet how to drive a stick.

After two years, Schmidt moved on to Penn State in 1991 before finally hooking up with Prosser at Loyola in 1993. Current Penn State coach Ed DeChellis, a PSU assistant with Schmidt in the early 1990s, was Prosser's best friend and encouraged Prosser to consider Schmidt.

Boston College teammate Mike Sinicki, now a lawyer in Binghamton, says Schmidt was "the last guy" on the team he thought would end up as a coach, but it doesn't surprise him that he's found success at every stop.

"My suspicion is that he's very honest with the people he's recruiting, and he's probably a guy you'd love to play for," Sinicki says. "He might be kicking you in the butt one minute and slapping you on the back the next."

Massey says that's about right.

"When you do something right, Mark is going to let you know. And when you do something wrong, he's definitely going to let you know," Massey says, laughing.

Schmidt certainly hoped more things would go right his first season, but since he only had four players at his first team meeting - and two of them raised their hands when he asked who was considering a transfer - he's fairly satisfied with the results.

"The first step," Schmidt says, "was to become credible again, to get us to play hard so that when people left the Reilly Center they could say, `Those kids might not be very talented, but they worked hard and gave us our money's worth. I think people who played us told others, `You better prepare for Bonaventure because they'll give you their best shot.'"

Schmidt and his staff will have to brush up on their chemistry lessons first semester as they try to get nine new players to gel in time for the team's Nov. 14 opener.

"It's exciting and scary, but my outlook always has to be positive," Schmidt says. "When I took over it was so negative, and negativity doesn't help anybody. It just brings you down further. The glass has to be half full. Have we arrived? Absolutely not. But we're making progress."

Schmidt scoffs at the notion that coming to Bonaventure might have been career suicide.

"This is not a graveyard. It's been a few years, but they've won in the past and can win again. Programs that have never won have a problem with their infrastructure, not their coaching," Schmidt says.

"The infrastructure here isn't the problem, so why can't we win again? ... Is it going to take some effort? No question. Is it going to take some patience? Some more money? Absolutely. But we're making changes and the only way we can go is up."

Of course, Schmidt says, "If I took the Bonaventure job to win the national title, well then it is career suicide."

Classic Schmidt: brutally honest, brutally funny - often in the same breath.

"Mark's like that all the time. He's so fun-loving," says Watson. "Mark and his staff work very hard, but they're also a lot of fun to be around and that's infectious. When people are enjoying themselves, people are attracted to that."

Sinicki, a former star at Union-Endicott, played golf with Schmidt in June at a charity event in Johnson City.

"Mark's just a guy you'd love to play a round of golf with," Sinicki says. "At the tournament, guys were suggesting all these nice restaurants to take him to afterward, but I said, `You know what? We're going to the Galley Tavern in Endwell, have a pitcher of beer and a pizza, and probably laugh for three straight hours.'

"He's such a bright, personable guy with a great perspective on the game and on life. Who wouldn't want to play for him?"