BY WAYNE WITKOWSKI
Staff Writer
Ron Gerlufsen, who built Brick Memorial’s boys basketball and boys tennis team into perennial winners during the six years he served as head coach, has resigned to take a vice principal’s position at the school.
Gerlufsen, who also oversaw the day-to-day operations as coordinator of the Brick Memorial athletic department under Bill Bruno, the athletic director for both high schools in town – Brick Memorial and Brick Township – has stepped down from those responsibilities as well.
“In our district, administrators are not allowed to coach,” said Gerlufsen, who completed his studies two years ago for a school administration degree from Georgian Court. “I recently was actively looking for an administrative position. I’m fortunate I have the opportunity to work in our school and know most of the faculty. And I’ll continue to follow both teams and offer help any way I can whenever it is needed.”
All three positions have been posted and Bruno said interviews for the athletic coordinator position are taking place this week. He said interviews for the boys basketball position will be conducted “soon, maybe as early as next week.”
Brick Memorial boys basketball comes off its greatest season ever, and Gerlufsen was named the Ocean County Coach of the Year.
“Actually, it should be program of the year for the help I got from my coaches and the parents and fans,” said Gerlufsen. “I’m fortunate that I had a group of kids who were dedicated to the sport with a willingness to put the team before themselves.”
With a knack for playing disciplined offense to minimize the number of turnovers, and tenacious defense to make up for their lack of height, the Mustangs won the Shore Conference A South title, a championship it shared the previous season, and made its first-ever advance into a sectional championship game in NJSIAA Group IV, Central Jersey. The Mustangs finished with a school record 22 victories and their first-ever championship in the prestigious WOBM Classic, held over the Christmas holidays at the Ritacco Center in Toms River. They also made the Shore Conference Tournament for the second straight year after years of struggling.
The team also had some superb individual talent led by versatile James Cherrick and the outside shooting and steady ballhandling of Jay Frank, as well as the determined inside play of Mike LePore. Their efforts helped overcome the loss of Colin Przybylowski, who missed most of the season with a stress fracture. His older brother, Pat, who plays for Franklin & Marshall, also played for Gerlufsen.
The tennis team also had four straight winning seasons under Gerlufsen that included berths in the NJSIAA and Shore Conference tournaments, and two seasons ago won 18 matches in the keenly competitive Shore Conference A South. Gerlufsen also helped develop individual talent as well, most recently with Przybylowski qualifying for the NJSIAA Singles tournament and getting as far as the Ocean County tournament semifinals two years ago. The team finished in fourth place in the Ocean County Tournament last season, its highest finish ever.
“The thing I like is how he carries himself,” said Przybylowski, who will be a senior this school year. “He’s seen so many games and players, he knows how to act. He has great charisma. He always keeps his cool.”
“We were able to get better athletes out who got interested and turned into better tennis players,” said Gerlufsen.
“He really helped me with the mental part,” said Przybylowski. “He always preaches that character is built when things are not going your way.”
The school is looking to fill the basketball position in the upcoming weeks, as well as the wrestling position after Dean Albanese stepped down and assumed the duties of assistant coach so he could devote more time to his family. The tennis position will be filled at a later date.
Bruno is expected to recommend Dan O’Cone, the head coach at Point Pleasant Beach, as head wrestling coach for approval by the Board of Education at its upcoming August meeting.
Gerlufsen said both assistant basketball coaches, Jason Bloom and Ed Sarluca, have applied for the head coaching position and he spoke highly of both to school administrators.
“I’m supportive of both who applied and I feel both did an outstanding job and merit consideration, but it’s a very tough decision to decide on one of them. I won’t do that,” said Gerlufsen.
Bloom also coaches Brick Memorial’s girl’s tennis team, which begins practices in a few days.
Gerlufsen said that he also expects his assistant tennis coach, Don McCarrick, to apply for the boys head coaching position. McCarrick also coaches the boys swim team at the school.
Bruno said he also has filled the girl’s lacrosse head coaching position at Brick Township High after Ken Lynch resigned. Christine Pike, an assistant varsity coach last spring and the freshman coach two years ago, was appointed head coach of the team that has struggled through its three seasons of existence and went winless this past spring.
“I’ve been around education for a long time and very few come close to Ron with the way he shows class, professionalism and being well-organized,” said Bruno of Gerlufsen. “He’s not a screamer but he’s a task master in his own way, and he let’s the boys know when he is displeased with their performance. He knows the game and has been an outstanding coach.”
Just like Przybylowski, Jay Frank agrees that Gerlufsen’s mental approach has been the cornerstone to his success.
“More than a coach, he’s been like a father figure,” said Frank, who is headed to the College of New Jersey to continue his basketball career this fall. “He really helped me when I struggled mentally or we’d struggle as a team. He helped me to be successful. I couldn’t ask for a better person as a coach.”
Gerlufsen, a Point Pleasant Beach resident, said by stepping away from the time-consuming responsibilities will free him up to follow the careers of his sons – Chris, an assistant basketball coach at the University of Hartford, and Kyle, a student at the Gunnery School, a prep school in Washington, Conn.
“I’ll miss the day-to-day practices and games,” said Gerlufsen. “Basketball and coaching have been a big part of my life. I’ll miss the direct interaction with the teams, but still being at Brick Memorial I hope to still give a positive impact.”
For Gerlufsen, it was a long and winding road over the last 30 years before he wound up at Brick Memorial. After graduating from East Stroudsburg University (Pa.) in 1971, Gerlufsen coached boys basketball and girls tennis at Manasquan High until 1981. He then spent 15 years as head coach on the college level, the first seven at the University of Massachusetts and then five years at Shepherd College, an NCAA Division II school in West Virginia, and three years at Savannah College in Georgia, which had just started a men’s basketball program.
“UMass was going through a losing streak of more than 40 games and we got to a competitive level,” said Gerlufsen, who remembers particularly a double-overtime victory over the University of Connecticut and a victory over St. Joseph’s University, which had just knocked off No. 1-ranked DePaul.
He coached Shepherd to its first championship in its 55 years in basketball at the West Virginia Intercollegiate Athletic Conference. Savannah, in his first season, went from winning two games in its young history to a 15-10 record.
“One thing that drew me back to the high school level was to get more rooted in the community [again],” said Gerlufsen, who coached for three years at Fort Myers High in Florida before heading back to the Jersey Shore area.
“I always enjoyed living at the Jersey Shore and I wanted to go back there,” said Gerlufsen.
And with his new position at Brick Memorial, Gerlufsen will be staying at the Jersey Shore for a while.