Kevin Brady has coached three varsity sports, including soccer and softball at East Brunswick. He notched his 1,000th career win on Sept. 27
According to Google, approximately 1,000 years ago, the world was characterized by the Islamic Golden Age, with the Holy Roman Empire playing a significant role in Central Europe, and Vikings from Scandinavia having traveled across the Atlantic and made landfall in North America.
One thousand.
In more modern times, East Brunswick High School girls soccer and softball coach Kevin Brady made his own history with the number 1,000.
The milestone was reached Sept. 27 in a 9-3 victory over Woodbridge at the GMC Soccer for a Cause festival. The girls raised more than $650 for a donation to the Marisa Tufaro Foundation.
A long-time coach in Middlesex County, at both East Brunswick and Spotswood high schools, Brady has accumulated 458 wins in girls soccer, 449 wins in girls softball and 93 wins in girls basketball
What does it mean?
“It means I’m getting old,” Brady cracked. “I don’t look at it as validation of anything. It means I’ve been very fortunate to coach in programs and places that value sports. I’m getting players who are highly polished and highly driven and highly supported by their families. It’s not like I have any magical dust.”
Brady began coaching youth teams and travel teams. An athlete at Madison Central in Old Bridge, he played soccer, baseball and tennis. A graduate of Rutgers, he majored in journalism, then got a Master’s in Education with a minor in English and political science.
With both parents working as teachers, the now-53-year-old was certain of one thing as a high school senior: “I would never become a teacher,” he says with a laugh.
Now he says, “I can’t imagine teaching without coaching.”
Brady took his first job at East Brunswick High School. As a teacher. And soccer coach. It was 1995. He continues to teach at East Brunswick -- current subjects being a college writing class, a sports literature elective, and a senior English class, focusing on sports and gaming.
And he still coaches soccer (458-136-37) and softball (449-224). From 2005 to 2010, he also coached basketball at Spotswood, going 93-58.
His 1,000 wins came with 391 losses and 37 ties. Among his victories have been 28 Division titles (18 soccer, 8 softball, 2 basketball), 16 Greater Middlesex Conference titles (14 in soccer, 2 in softball) and 5 sectional championships (1 in soccer, 4 in softball).
His record for most wins in a soccer season is 21 -- twice. His highest win total in softball is 26. Highest in basketball was 22.
Coaching three sports at once was certainly a grind. Especially basketball. He would watch the freshmen game at 4 p.m., then the JV at 5:15, then coach the varsity game. At home, he would watch film, look at the statistics, and he wouldn’t shut down until 11:30.
“I had a little more energy then,” he said.
His dedication to all three sports was evenly spread.
“The most similar thing,” he said, “is the way you organize your programs’ philosophies. Like, how do you treat the kids? What do you look for? What’s the level of commitment, expectations for your programs? The sports themselves can be entirely different. There were totally different challenges at a small school like Spotswood. A lot of the job was getting kids out to play, getting to youth groups and how to develop a rapport with the township, to get kids in fourth, fifth and sixth grade. Getting connections in the community was huge.
“At East Brunswick, that whole machine was already going in a lot of ways. Expectations were huge. Still, you are at the mercy of whoever walks in that door.”
One of them was Christine Noppenberger, a soccer player and daughter of long-time athletics director Frank Noppenberger.
“He was the ideal coach,’’ said Frank Noppenberger, now retired for several years. “His dedication was unmatched. The best compliment I’ve said often is I’m happy he coached my daughter. When you’re on the outside looking in, you don’t see the cool things he does (like you do) when your kid’s on his team.
“I always felt he never got the credit he deserved, as being a complete coach. Yes, we had talented kids, but he put them in the right spots, dealing with egos, and was very good at judging talent.”
Brady has also coached his own kids, now 13, 12 and 7.
“Coaching was a lot easier when I was younger,” Brady said, “Before I had kids. And that has been a very significant change in my life. My oldest daughter is playing soccer, and that’s given me a lot of perspective. I’m seeing that world from the perspective of a parent. You see what (coaches) are doing to your child on a daily basis and you realize that these are the kids you’ve been coaching the past 30 years; essentially kids and families who have made a lifetime of commitment.”
That includes his wife Laura, who has been the taxi for her three children, including getting them to activities when her husband is coaching, often on a bus to wherever and not home until dinner has long been cold.
That has certainly not been lost on the husband.
“She’s amazing,” he said.
Nor has the perspective of his labor of love all these years.
“I think there was a quote from the great Jim Valvano, something like, ‘These games mean nothing but they also mean everything.’” Brady said. “If you can get your kids to believe in that, these things that are fleeting and at the end of life are probably meaningless. But if you teach them to care so much about this journey you’re on together, you can really experience something together. That lasts in your heart forever.”
This article originally appeared on MyCentralJersey.com: East Brunswick coach celebrating 1,000 career varsity wins
Category: General Sports
