Patch Coach of the Year: Rodger Blind

Years from now when people look back on the greatest basketball season in Millburn history, they'll think of Alex Rosenberg and Joe Kizel as one of the best one-two punches in the county's history. They'll think of the 12 game winning streak to start the season, wins over Newark-Central, Delbarton and Ridge. They'll think of getting within four points of the first state sectional basketball title ever.

What they won't think of is the hours of watching film, game planning, scouting time and hours in the practice room, even before the season started, that helped to make Millburn's magical season possible.

Millburn head boys basketball coach Rodger Blind sat at the helm of a very good team that went on to do great things this season. The 23-4 record shattered the old wins record of 19. By reaching the state sectional finals, they've made surpassing the new standard of greatness for Millburn basketball a very difficult feat.

"We certainly were very optimistic and won 13 games the year before," Blind said of the expectations heading into this season. "I don't think anyone thought we were going to win 23 games."

After wins in the second and sixth games of the season over Central and Newark Academy respectively, the Millers surprised everyone but themselves with a 6-0 start, which included those two quality wins. At 12-0, they were the last undefeated team in the county and were winning with a great offensive attack led by Kizel and Rosenberg. It was the team defense allowing a miniscule 41.1 points per game that really keyed the season opening winning streak.

While Kizel and Rosenberg were playmakers and scorers on their own, the ball movement and ball control philosophy led to better offensive numbers across the board inside the framework of the Princeton style offense run by Blind.

"He knows a lot about the game and he's very good tactically, drawing up plays and finding ways to defend the other team," Rosenberg said. "He'll do whatever he has to in order to give his team the best chance to win."

Their great start earned a fifth overall seed in the county tournament (the team's highest seeding ever) and earned them a first round home game. They were able to edge past Irvington by four points, but fell in the quarterfinals (also the first time in the program's history going to county tournament quarterfinals), Shabazz proved to be too much.

That marked the boys' third loss of the season and the last time they would lose until the state sectional finals. Perhaps the most remarkable thing is they only lost back-to-back games once during the season.

As the playoffs approached, the Millers were rolling and in somewhat unfamiliar territory: the second seed in the section, meaning that all playoff games until the final were going to be at home. The Miller boys hadn't played in a home state playoff game since the 2004-05 season.

In the first round Voorhees was no match for the Millers, who were able to dispatch the Vikings from states for the second consecutive season. In the next round they employed a double team of the West Morris standout James D'Angelo and won a dogfight of a game, closing the Wolfpack out with a 24-18 fourth quarter run. In the semis, Millburn outscored Carteret 30-14 in the second and third quarters to move on to the sectional finals for the first time in school history.

No one would ever say the Millers didn't have a chance to upset top seeded Mendham, which enjoyed an unbelievable home-court advantage. But Mendham hit five first quarter three-pointers, taking the lead immediately and never relinquishing. Millburn made it close a few times with the eventual Group 3 champs but could not get over the hump.

"You wouldn't be human if you didn't think about the game occasionally," Blind said of the loss. "Certainly I don't want anyone to think I'm agonizing over the game. It was a great game."

In his eight years with the team, this was by far the most success Blind had seen with any Miller ball club. He had a 16 win team in 2004-05, a 14 win team the year before and a 13 win club last season.

"We sort of got wrapped up in Millburn with the number of wins this season. I don't strive for numbers," Blind said. "I think what you try to do is make the program the best you can make it. If you do those things, the wins sort of take care of themselves."

Much of his success this season was due to the outstanding play of Kizel and Rosenberg, but much of it had to do with the play of the other members on the team like Andrew Spelman, Max Miller, Brian Brown, Adam Whitten and Tony Bai (who had to step in for Brown after a shoulder injury ended his season in the playoffs). The role players on this Millburn team benefited from the constant ball movement and great defensive schemes drawn up by Blind.

"He never stopped trying. He's never satisfied. That's what I liked about him because I'm never satisfied," Rosenberg said. "Just when we thought we were working hard in practice, we'd see that he was working twice as hard outside of practice."

The Miller coach and Millburn physical education teacher completed his 37th year of coaching this season. It all began for him in the mid 1970s when he got his first coaching job as an assistant to Tom Boland at Edison Junior High School. His first paid coaching job was at Parsippany Hills High School as a freshman coach in 1976.

One year later, he got a big break landing the junior varsity job at Seton Hall Prep. He also served as the junior varsity basketball and freshmen baseball coach while at SHP. In 1979, Ted D'Alessio Sr. hired Blind to be the head coach at West Orange Valley High School, where he remained until its closing in 1984.

From there he became the assistant basketball coach at St. Peters College, where he remained for 17 years, making the NCAA men's tournament twice as well as the NIT twice. As glamorous as the college coaching scene appears, the constant travel weighed on Blind and he wanted to get back into high school coaching.

In 2001, his hopes were answered, taking over at Millburn High School where he has been ever since.

"I still have players from 30 years ago that I'm still in touch with," he said. "It's the relationships that you form with players that's really special. What you enjoy most are the relationships, seeing the players grow and seeing a group come together."

He credits a lot of his knowledge of the game and success to coaches that he played for and coached under during his near four decades in basketball.

"I was very fortunate to have played for great coaches and to have met great coaches," he said.

Blind is a West Orange Valley High School graduate and an alum of Ursinus College in Pennsylvania. As far as his coaching future, he says he is taking it one year at a time but has no plans on leaving Millburn anytime soon. He added that most of, if not all, of his success this season was due to those around him.

"Whenever you receive a coaching award, it's about two groups of people: the assistants and the players," Blind said. "I can't thank them enough for the success and the type of season we had."