Eight Years of Coaching Completed By WACS Mentor Phil Young

Coach Phil Young, Dean of Coaches, has compiled eight years of coaching, interspersed with moments of defeat and frustration, as well as conquests and jubilations.Settled down in a comfortable chair with a cup of coffee in Coach Phil Young’s beautiful home, your sports editor interviewed the genial WACS Dean of Coaches on the highlights of his interesting and colorful sports career now going into its ninth year. Coach Young’s wife, Louise, was standing by to fill in whenever her husband became reluctant to talk about himself.

When asked why he chose a coaching career, Coach Young reflected for a moment and then commented that he loved sports and had a great desire to transmit his knowledge of sports to high school boys. This, he felt, would give him a tremendous amount of satisfaction.

It seemed logical to the writer that Phil would want to do this sort of thing, since he participated and excelled in the whole gamut of competitive sports at Mayville High School, such as baseball, football, basketball, track and field, bowling, volleyball, etc.

His team won the sectionals in basketball at the Buffalo Memorial Auditorium in 1948, ‘49,’50 and 51’. He was the County’s High Scorer in the County Championships won by his school in the “C” League.

Phil made all-conference three straight years in basketball, football and baseball.

About the time Phil thought he had mentioned all of his exploits during his high school days (graduated in 1951) Mrs. Young interjected a couple more of Phil’s athletic feats he had forgotten about.

At the age of 14, he played with the Moose Baseball team of Westfield which participated in the Wichita, Kansas, National Semi-Pro Tournament. Red Montfort was the Coach, “Chub” Holbrook was committee-man, and Clarence Mead was Business Manager of the Moose club.

Later in High School Phil played with the Moose against several semi-pro baseball teams in Jamestown and Corry. For his catching efforts Phil received gas mileage and sausages. Phil said “this was the link that kept me going.”

Apparently the Syracuse University Scouts were in the stands when Phil was cavorting on the baseball diamond showing off his backstop abilities.

Following his graduation from Mayville High School in 1951 Phil was offered a Grant-in-Aid baseball scholarship at Syracuse University. Phil was the No. 1 Catcher on the Syracuse Varsity Baseball team from 1951-1955. One of Phil’s duties was to sweep out the arts building on the campus. He took more tours in the arts building than any one person on the campus. In his senior year Phil was selected as the MVP (most valuable player) in baseball at Syracuse.

It came as no great surprise when he was offered a contract to play with the Philadelphia Phillies, following his graduation from Syracuse University. Phil signed the contract which stipulated a substantial bonus- part of which was used to purchase a new car.

The bonus bracket entitled Phil a slot on the Major League roster. He was farmed out to a club in South Carolina for spring training. Later he was assigned to Salt Lake City a AAA club. Phil played with Salt Lake for one year, but never got to see the Mormon Tabernacle.

Later in the fall between seasons Phil accepted a job at teaching Science and English at Jefferson Junior High School in Jamestown, N. Y. Come spring Phil went back to Salt Lake City for another season. From there he was assigned to a farm club in the Georgia-Florida league. It was here that the front office threw him a curve at Phil.

“I just couldn’t hit the curveball, so that ended my career in the Major Leagues. However. I met a lot of fine people and it was all worthwhile," said Phil Young.

At this stage Phil was offered a position as a Physical Education Director of a school in Long Lake, N. Y. a town with a congested population of 600. The school had an enrollment of 350 students. Out of the entire boys enrollment only 18 turned out for any given sport.

Note: (Now that Phil Young has become a coach we will refer to him as such for the remainder of the interview).

Coach Young related that a body of water was located next to the ball diamond and that whenever a game was played practically all foul balls were hit into the lake.

Long Lake’s coach knew that something had to be done about the situation, before the school went bankrupt buying new baseballs. He conceived the idea of docking a boat at the edge of the lake with a boy stationed in the boat while the game was in progress. The minute a ball was fouled into the lake the boy had five minutes to retrieve the ball before it sank. It worked.

While at Long Lake, Coach Young learned to be a jack-of-all trades in addition to his physical education program (kindergarten through grade 12, health education in grade 12, coaching basketball, football, volleyball, bowling, skiing, supervising the girls cheer leaders) he put up storm windows which seemed to weigh about a ton, last but not least he was the groundskeeper. At this stage most anyone would have to agree that Coach Young had valid grounds to resign from his multiple job operation after two years. He did just that. Resigned that is, in 1960. It was then that Coach Young was offered a position at WACS, coaching basketball, baseball and to serve in the capacity of Athletic Director.

In reviewing the highlights of Phil Young’s coaching regime, the genial mentor went on to say, “in baseball, we always had a winning season. We reached the sectional playoffs at Holland, N.Y., the Jamestown College Stadium and at Pine Valley. In basketball the only losing season we had was in 1964-65 at which time we did not make the playoffs. In 1965-66 I did not coach basketball.
In this span we racked up two League Championships out of six seasons of basketball. We were third in 1960, first in 1961 and 1962. In 1963 we placed fourth. The year 1964 was a lean year since we dropped to seventh place (eight teams in the league). Two years of absenteeism followed this juncture.

Returning to the fold in 1967 we placed second. The year 1967 was most significant, in that, we made the sectionals. We knocked Silver Creek out of the sectionals and lost a close one to Alleghany at Memorial Auditorium in Buffalo, landing us in second place, concluded Coach Young.

When asked if he was involved in activities other than coaching competitive sports, Coach Young replied, “Yes, we have put on some successful gymnastic shows at WACS, improved the Physical Education Program and Intramurals."

Phil has also been engaged in extra-curricular activities, such as having served as Youth Recreation Director for six years in the summer program at Welch Field. Last summer he worked at the new Long Point State Park in the capacity of beach master.

He organized the Booster Club and assisted in organizing a Citizens Committee who through their efforts and other organizations engineered the installation of lights on WACS football field last fall.
At this point, Coach Young was reminded by Mrs. Young that perhaps he should mention that he was honored by the Westfield Moose Club in 1961, by selecting him to bowl in the International Moose Tournament, held in Rochester, N.Y. Phil went on to win the singles championship in a tough field by rolling a 707 scratch with handicap 716. Phil established a new record here which still holds. He received two awards for his bowling feat-a clock trophy and a figure trophy, plus $100.00 in cash. “I considered this achievement as the highlight of my personal sports competition,” he said.

Conversation turned to a discussion on his present status of Coach Young’s 1968-69 basketball charges The Wolverine’s perennial problem has been lack of height and this year is no exception.
However, when he was asked about the strategy he employed in his team’s win over

Forestville, a team with superior height (all over 6 foot) WACS mentor replied, “I’ve made up my mind that height advantage can be counteracted by hustle and a good defense. I have analyzed the potential of each player and have exploited it to best advantage.

“Yes, hustle and defense are very potent tactics when used properly. I believe that basically I’m a defensive coach. We beat Silver Creek last year in the playoffs by using a full court press. This tactic forces your opponent out of a patterned offense. When you don’t have the horses, a good defense has a tendency to improve your offense.

“The key to the season is how fast the 10th and 11th grade boys will grow up, or become mature enough to cope with the tough competition we face ahead for the remainder of the season.

“For example, Sal Gambino was the high scorer last year on the JV squad. Frank Rosetto, Mark Orlando, Jeff Hunt, and Phil Newton are all newcomers to the varsity. When these boys start maturing we will be hard to beat. Basically veterans Steve Larson, Bob Gervasi, Kit Schimel, Ted Kouvatsos and Carl VandeVelde are holding the team together. A good first quarter lead in any given game is a most important factor towards gaining a momentum which will carry over through the rest of the game,” concluded Coach Young.

He predicted that in the near future all competitive sports will undergo a resurgence, especially football. There’s a lot of talent emerging at WACS.

When asked about the influence of sports on the lives of boys who face out-side competition after graduation, Coach Young readily answered, “Competitive sports build leadership and a competitive spirit which are prime requisites in facing completion in the outside world. They learn this proper mental attitude in sports, they don’t teach it. This attitude helps in all walks of life,” he concluded.