Iuzzolino

Mike Iuzzolino’s first year as a head basketball coach has been quite a success.

The former Altoona, Saint Francis and NBA player leads Sewickley Academy (24-5) into the PIAA Class 2A championship game on Friday against Linville Hill Christian Academy (23-5) at the Giant Center in Hershey (2 p.m., PCN).

Although Iuzzolino spent 18 years as an assistant at the college level, including the last eight at Robert Morris and three as the Colonials’ associate head coach, the Sewickley assignment was his first in the high school ranks and his first as a head coach.

“I can’t be more proud of the effort and work that Mike has put into the entire season,” Sewickley Academy athletic director Mike Scerbo said. “He’s been a tremendous leader for our kids and gone beyond teaching them basketball but overcoming adversity and developing them as young men.

“He’s exceeded every expectation.”

Sewickley was the WPIAL’s second seed behind Jeannette but came from behind in the PIAA quarterfinals and semis to defeat Our Lady of Sacred Heart and Greensburg Central Catholic to advance to Hershey.

“We’ve really grown up from the Jeannette game (45-25 loss) when we got down and weren’t able to fight back,” Iuzzolino said. “We haven’t played down much of the year. I think that game helped us to grow.”

In the PIAA semifinals vs. GCC, Sewickley fell behind 9-0 early and 24-10 before controlling the second half to win 52-48.

“I’ve been around a lot of great coaches, and he’s one of the best technicians I’ve been around,” Scerbo, who knew Iuzzolino from working together at Duquesne, said. “With his knowledge and acumen, he’s been able to make the adjustments necessary and find a way to spark the team. His ability to adjust is second to none.”

Sewickley features mostly underclassmen so Iuzzolino tried to simplify his approach.

“It’s been really rewarding,” he said. “I don’t know if a lot of people expected this team, being so young, to be in this position. I think the thing that helped was we just focused on getting better every day in practice. We didn’t focus on state or WPIAL championships. We just had to take it one day at a time and get better every day.”

Iuzzolino, 57, said the biggest difference between coaching at the high school level is “you don’t have a lot of time with these guys. In college, you have all day with them.”

He has been watching film of Linville and said, “They’re really good — a lot of senior shooters.”

Iuzzolino was glad to see Saint Francis make the NCAA Tournament for the first time since he played there (1991) and also took an interest in Robert Morris winning the Horizon League.

He said he’s been in touch with both Rob Krimmel and Andy Toole.

“Rob has grinded it out and put his heart and soul into that program and university,” he said. “It’s awesome for the school and for him and those guys. They did a great job — beating the No. 2 and No. 1 seeds on the road. It’s so hard in a one-bid league.

“And I recruited a lot of those guys at Robert Morris so the connection was very personal for me. Andy and I have a phenomenal relationship. I know how great of a coach he is so it was exciting after five years to have success in the Horizon League.”