In
a press release issued this morning, Calvert Hall has announced the
resignation of long-time head basketball coach Mark Amatucci, who won
389 games and a national championship over the course of 19 seasons
with the Towson school.  Those 19 years were spread over two stints
with the first beginning in 1977.

The release mentioned no reason for the decision, but in an article in today’s Baltimore Sun
Amatucci was quoted as saying, “I need to get away from it after 32
years.  There have been a lot of twists and turns and in my point of
view this is a good time to step down.”

Amatucci’s association
with Calvert Hall actually began as a student and he graduated from the
school in 1970.  From there he attended Juniata College (PA) and played
basketball, but he returned to Calvert Hall, after his college
graduation, as a teacher and a coach.  He led the school’s freshman
team for one year, the junior varsity for one year and took over the
reigns of the varsity team prior to the 1977-78 season.

In his
third season, Calvert Hall won its first Baltimore Catholic League
basketball title under Amatucci and his 1981-82 squad went 34-0 and won
the mythical national high school championship.  His first departure
from Calvert Hall came after that magical season and ironically this
move comes following a season in which the national championship team
reunited at Calvert Hall to celebrate the 25th anniversary of its
historic achievement.

His second stint at Calvert Hall began in
1993 and included 272 wins over the last 14 years.  His teams produced
41 players who went on to play college basketball and two â?? Duane
Ferrell ’84 and Juan Dixon ’97 – who would go on to play in the NBA. 
Ferrell was a member of the national championship team and after
brilliant college career at Georgia Tech, he went on to play more than
a decade in the NBA.  Dixon, of course, led the University of Maryland
to a national championship and is in his fifth NBA season.

In
all, Amatucci won three BCL regular season titles, three BCL
tournaments, two championships in the Maryland Scholastic Association
and the 1995-96 MIAA A Conference title, the first one ever awarded.

In
1983, Amatucci became the head basketball coach and assistant athletic
director at Loyola College and in his second season he turned a
perennial Division I loser into a winning program and earned ECAC Metro
Coach of the Year honors in 1984.  However, the difficulty of
attracting top recruits and maintaining success at a mid-major program,
in that era, eventually wore on Amatucci and he left the school after
just six seasons.

After three years out of the game, he
resurfaced at Anne Arundel Community College, as head coach in 1990 and
led that program for two years.  In 1992, he spent one season as an
assistant coach at Washington College in Chestertown before returning
to Calvert Hall in 1993.