Prosser was one of us
by Frank Giardina
For the Daily Mail
Print StoryEmail StoryCollege basketball lost a good coach, and an even better man last Thursday. As most painfully know, Wake Forest's Skip Prosser, died suddenly in his office of a heart attack at age 56.
It is a great loss for college basketball. It is an excruciating loss for Wake Forest University.

I have a daughter, Mary, who ran track and cross country at Wake Forest. I know the athletic community there. It is a small school that plays big-time athletics. The athletes on campus all know one another and it is an incredibly close-knit community.

Prosser's passing is also a painful loss for all of us in the sports community in West Virginia. He was one of us.

I know he did not coach at a state university. In fact, he coached against West Virginia in one of the Mountaineers all-time greatest wins -- a 111-105, double-overtime, second-round 2005 NCAA Tournament win in Cleveland that propelled Mike Gansey and John Beilein to greatness in our state, and the Mountaineers into the Sweet Sixteen.

Prosser was still one of us.

Prosser cut his coaching teeth in West Virginia and his impact and place in our state's basketball history is enormous. A native of Canevin, Pa., Prosser worked his way through the coaching ranks the old-fashioned way.

His first coaching job was with the freshman team at the old Linsly Military Institute in Wheeling. It is no longer a military school, just a private school. He coached the freshman team from 1971-76. He then coached the Linsly junior varsity team in 1976-77 and the varsity team from 1977-79.

He accepted the Wheeling Central Catholic High varsity job the next year and the Maroon Knights program never has been the same. Prosser coached there from 1979-85 and won a Class AA state title in 1982, beating Sissonville, 86-57. Tulsa Coach Doug Wojcik was a starting guard on that team.

It is Prosser's teams that lost in the State Tournament that burn a permanent image in my mind.

Reflect back to 1981, when the boys' State Tournament returned to, what was then, a sparkling, brand new Charleston Civic Center. The national story in all of high school basketball that year was in the coalfields of McDowell County.

The Northfork Blue Demons were on their quest for a national record eighth consecutive state title. They were expected to walk through the State Tournament into national glory.

In the semifinals, they ran into a buzz saw in an undersized junior-dominated Wheeling Central team. Central led late into the fourth quarter but eventually came up short. Northfork narrowly avoided the upset and would go on to beat Dunbar in the state final.

But, for those of us sitting on press row at that State Tournament, it was our first look at a Prosser-coached team. We were duly impressed. Interestingly enough, I still remember Northfork Coach Jennings Boyd shaking Prosser's hand, smiling and tapping his chest saying, "Your team almost gave me a heart attack."

At the time, no one knew how ironic those words would be.

Another Prosser memory also involved a loss to Northfork. His 1984 team lost in the Class AA finals to the Blue Demons 71-58. During the awards ceremony, the entire building was touched by the scene of Prosser's then young sons, Scott and Mark, about ages 7 and 6, going down the Northfork bench nattily attired in coat and tie, shaking hands with each Blue Demon player.

That was Prosser. Taking advantage of the moment to teach a lesson in life and in class to his young sons.

Also, Prosser's coaching staff at Wake Forest is filled with West Virginia guys. Associate head coach Dino Gaudio followed Prosser in 1986 as the head coach at Wheeling Central. Another assistant coach, Jeff Battle, played at Marshall in the 1980's and was a guard on the Herd's NCAA Tournament teams in 1984 and ‘85.

His son, Mark, nicknamed Duke, is one of the outstanding young coaches in the country and is an assistant at Bucknell. Like his dad, he also won a state championship at Wheeling Central. As a high school junior, he was the star player on the ‘96 Maroon Knights team that defeated Clay-Battelle 62-56 in the Class A title game.

In this state, we are proud of our basketball legacy. We have the NBA logo in Jerry West. Another of the NBA's all-time top 50 players in Hal Greer. We have one of the NBA's top executives in Rod Thorn. We have the NBA's best coach in Mike D'Antoni.

Skip Prosser is, and will always be, one of us, and he will always be a part of the excellence in our basketball legacy.

I saw that. It was a very good article. Coach Prosser has gotten some great memorials from several sports websites too. I'm sure his family appreciates the sentiments.