Direct Rays: Tough Love Works
There are some varsity coaches who transcend local sports; Lakeland field hockey/lax Coach Sharon Sarsen and Somers’ football legend Tony DeMatteo, to name a couple. Ossining girls basketball coach Dan Ricci can be safely added to that list after winning the Pride’s third consecutive NYS Class AA girls’ basketball championship last Saturday at Hudson Valley Community College in Troy, NY, where state-ranked (No.1) Ossining manhandled No.5 Rush Henrietta, 76-54. Those same Royal Comets were the only other team in state history to accomplish this rare feat, doing so from 2006-08.
In the eyes of opposing fan bases, Ricci has gone from public enemy No.1, to among the most respected basketball coaches in New York State, having won five consecutive Section 1 Class AA basketball titles and six overall since 2004. His players run through walls for him.
“I’m just glad I was able to play under Coach Ricci because without him I wouldn’t get half of the awards I have received,” said Hartford-bound Pride MVP Jalay Knowles, who scored 45 points (not a misprint) and collared 16 rebounds (normal stuff, for her).
That sounds eerily similar to something former Pride All-American Saniya Chong once told me after she became the first Ossining player to win Slam Dunk, Section 1 and NYSPHSAA tournament MVP awards; a feat matched only by Knowles last Saturday.
The brash and unabashed Ricci, now in his 24th season at Ossining (404-139), has been known to stir the pot, illicit emotion and get under the skin of opponents with his fiery bravado, but he’s done so in a manner that one has to admire; through tough love and mutual respect. He’s earned the right to bark along the sidelines like a rabid dog because he truly cares about Section 1 basketball and its representation on the state’s grand stage. Watch him at the County Center: He’s there for every coach and player seeking to advance the game he loves.
At a time when a girls lax coach is getting sucker punched at Mahopac for allegedly cutting a player (see our news story), Coach Ricci defies the new-school mentality, still toeing a hard line and marching with the last bastion. As scores of vicarious, modern-day parents seek to ruin varsity athletics, turning the evolution of sports into a “Deviloution” (disrespect with no shame); take a good, long look at his Ossining basketball program, which Ricci built from the ground up, and has the support of an entire town and school district.
“I think it’s the tradition of our upperclassmen teaching the young bloods the ropes,” said Ricci, still nutty at his core.
Tradition is where it starts, just like it does in neighboring Yorktown when it comes to lax. The message out of these places is simple: Let the coach, coach, and use athletics for teachable moments and valuable life lessons; like it was back in the day. There’s a lot of tough love going on at Ossining, and the kids there are better for it.
Ray has 33 years experience covering and photographing local sports in Westchester and Putnam counties, including everything from Little League/Travel Baseball to varsity high school prep sports and collegiate coverage. He has been a sports editor at Examiner Media since its inception in 2007.
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