Q&A with Tom Rooney

During this period without sports, I talked with 2019 CHSAA Class A Coach of the Year, Tom Rooney of St. Dominic’s High School the defending CHSAA Class A defending Champions. We discussed the possibility of a 2020 catholic season, what he’s been doing with his teams since March, and some of his hobbies off the field.

Nicholas McEntyre: You coach in the Catholic League, they made an announcement saying, sports will resume only if school is back in session. Has anything changed with that?

Tom Rooney: Nothing’s changed; the only thing they did was extend the date to where we can possibly play. Our season is usually over much earlier, but they extended the season, the end date being June 30.

NM: Have you been keeping in touch with your players and giving them work?

TR: Yeah, we’ve done three or four Zoom meetings, where we have everyone on, we watch film, we had a Q&A just trying to be keeping up with everyone. We check-in, I give them workouts, so we’ve been pretty engaged. My philosophy has been we have a season until they tell me we don’t, so we’re trying to prepare as if we are going to have a season.

NM: How have your players been, especially your seniors?

TR: They are struggling with it, to be honest. They are nervous that there is a possibility they may lose the season. They ask me a lot of what I think, and we talk a lot about controlling what we can control and control whether or not we have a season. We can only control preparing. I’m lucky cause I have six seniors who are going on to play college lacrosse, and I only have eight seniors all together, so those six guys, I’ve said to them you’re either preparing for a spring season or you’re preparing for fall lacrosse in college so either way you have to work.

NM: You are one of the directors at Shore2Shore (Director and Head Coach 2023 Originals and 2025 Hawks) has anything been affected with that or have you been doing Zoom meetings with the teams?

TR: We’ve been doing a lot of stuff with them, a lot of Zoom meetings we’ve had wall ball challenges, a push-up challenge we ask them for videos of them doing workouts, we’ve done Zoom workouts where they’ve worked out with a pro like Rob Pannell. So, we’ve been really active with them, they are younger kids, so they need that connection a little more, so we’ve been pretty active with them.

NM: Not to be pessimistic or anything, but do you see any tournaments or games happening over the summer?

TR: It’s hard to say, I think there is definitely a possibility for games, I don’t know the large events or large tournaments will be allowed, I don’t know how quickly they’ll be letting us go to the large gatherings but I certainly see us phasing in a different amount of people that are allowed to gather, whether it is 10-15 people where we can gather and practice with the kids then maybe a group of 25, we can do a team practice and then groups of 50 where we can play games against another team. You won’t have the big crowds or a tournament, but we’ll be able to play some games. I see it going in that direction and that’s what we are preparing for, we think we will definitely be playing this summer.

NM: Now, how did you get into coaching in the first place?

TR: I’ve played college lacrosse (Scranton) I went to school as a history major, and then I went back to school to be a teacher and it’s something I’ve always wanted to do. I was a three-sport captain as a high school athlete, captain of my college team so I was always a kind of a leader in athletics, so it came naturally to me. I broke in, in New Jersey where I coached for a few years before we moved to Long Island and I’ve been coaching here on Long Island for the last 21 years.

NM: You are currently at St. Dominic’s and before that you were at Port Washington and Syosset.

TR: Yes, I coached as an assistant at Syosset for about 12 years and then I went to Port Washington as the head coach for four years and then head coach at Half-Hallow Hills West for two years before I went to St. Dom’s, this is my third year here.

NM: You are also a Salesperson for Lincoln Land Services?

TR: Yeah, I do a little work on the side for a friend of mine who owns the company. As a teacher, you try as much as you can to make a little extra money.

NM: Doing all these different jobs do you have time with your family to do stuff with them?

TR: Yeah, my two older boys played for me at St. Dominic’s, they play college lacrosse now, they are very good players, my daughter goes to St. Dominic’s she plays three sports there, my younger son, I have five kids, plays with the Shore2Shore system he’s an athlete. We keep it busy with doing all this stuff the family is always involved.

NM: Do you have hobbies on your own days off or are you more involved with your kids and work?

TR: It’s mostly, days off would be stuff with St. Dom’s or a day at Shore2Shore, I’ve coached high school football and basketball for many years and I love all sports and I’ve done a lot of other stuff like coaching my kids, CYO basketball and that kind of stuff.