Wednesday, January 07, 2015YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio -- Growing up around the basketball court in the early 1980s, Jonathan Bentley could have tried to emulate any number of names widely known in basketball: John Wooden, Red Auerbach or Bob Knight.
Instead, Bentley, an assistant coach for the East High School boys’ basketball team, looked a little closer to home. Or rather, someone in his home.
“My father was an educator and a coach, so I grew up in it. I was born into it. I grew up going to practice with him in the early ’80s when he coached for the original East High School Golden Bears,” he says. “He was always one of my biggest inspirations. That was my inspiration for coaching. I grew up watching everything that happened beyond the court.”
Outside the gym, Bentley saw the influence his father had on the lives of his players.
Often, the younger Bentley says, players joined the family for dinner and sought advice from his dad. Events like that, Bentley continues, are what drove him to enter coaching.
“Not everything involves X’s and O’s in this game,” he continues.
“They [the players] need help with their game. But they also need help for things like learning to tie a tie or learning how to interact with the public. It all comes down to learning the game of life as opposed to just learning the game of basketball.”
And having played basketball in high school, Bentley has an extra platform from which to relate with those kids.
Mike Latessa, Cardinal Mooney High School vice president of institutional advancement and an assistant football coach, says that his experiences -- playing football for the Cardinals before playing at Youngstown State University -- has helped his ability as a coach.
“When you have your first team meetings and meet the kids, you let them know that you’ve been in their shoes. For me, it’s special to coach and work at a school I played at. I can relay my stories about the same opponents, the same experiences to them,” he says.
“They can think, ‘This guy has been where I’m at. He’s not just telling me things because it’s the right thing to say.’ ”
Latessa has the same philosophy as Bentley about providing players with lessons beyond the game. Being a coach, he says, is a segue from sports to everyday life. The two men are among the 2015 25 Under 34 honorees who will be recognized Feb. 5 during the annual awards event at Stambaugh Auditorium (READ STORY).
“Oftentimes, you need to flip a switch. If your practice time is for a certain two-hour period, you’re focusing specifically on that sport. But then you need to clock out and have interactions with them outside of practice,” Latessa says. “I see them in school and they’ll ask questions and look at you as a mentor, as someone outside of the education process.”
Bentley, executive director of the city of Youngstown Human Relations Commission, says when he tells people he coaches on the side, they don’t always see how working in government is consistent with coaching. They see it as an unconventional fit, he explains.
“For me, it’s a perfect fit. I train future leaders. One of the things that’s lacking in this area is leadership and young people can get left behind,” he says. “We need to tell them, ‘You can be a leader in this city,’ or ‘You can make a living in this city.’ They get to see me make a good living and make a positive impact by doing positive things beyond the game.”
Playing sports, too, affects the skills the athletes will use once their careers in sports are over, both agree.
What’s helped Latessa the most from playing and coaching, he says, is making better decisions, especially on deadline.
“If something comes up at 9 and you need a resolution by 10, it doesn’t stress you out. You know you can do it because you’ve been through the situation before. In sports, you have 25 seconds to make a call or put in a sub, so you’re used to making quick decisions,” he relates.
“You’re used to reacting quickly. You may not always make the right decision, but you can react and move on.”
Whatever lessons are taught, the two agree that sports and, perhaps more important, being part of a team, have an impact that can last for the rest of a young student-athlete’s life. Bentley focuses on getting his players to think about enrolling in college before deadlines pass.
When they’re in ninth and 10th grade, Bentley encourages them to start thinking about the schools they would like to attend and their majors.
Once his players graduate and enter college, Bentley does what he can to ensure they continue their success, often out of his own pocket.
“The two years I accepted a contract, I donated that money to pay for somebody’s tuition and someone else’s books once they went to school. Normally, I don’t accept a contract. But when I do, it all goes back to the kids,” he says. “They may need books paid for. They may need help transitioning from high school to college because it isn’t just books and tuition. There’s incidental expenses to actually make it there.”
For Bentley and Latessa, the opportunity to coach -- especially after being away from the sport as they were -- proved to be among their more fulfilling moves.
“I was in a good field, a good profession with good opportunities, but I wasn’t passionate about it. I’m passionate about this place and these kids and these opportunities,” Latessa says.
“It allows me to use all of my skills instead of just one particular set. In a roundabout way, had I not gone back to coaching football, I probably wouldn’t have followed the path that I did.”
Pictured: Ready for the next jump ball during basketball practice at East High School are players Jovan Mixon and Darion Taylor, coach Jonathan Bentley and player Kyreese Dixon.
EDITOR'S NOTE:
The Business Journal has published our annual "25 Under 35" extra edition, which contains stories and biographical sketches about the honorees. CLICK HERE to order a copy of this special publication.
Copyright 2015 The Business Journal, Youngstown, Ohio.
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