Dunne ready to continue upward trek in third year at Marist

 

John Dunne began rebuilding with Marist last season, and now has pieces in place to move Red Foxes closer to contention in MAAC. (Photo by Bob Dea/Daly Dose Of Hoops)

When it comes to rebuilding programs from the ground up, very few coaches are as skilled at extracting pearls from the proverbial oyster as John Dunne.

What the affable 50-year-old coach did for a dozen years at Saint Peter’s bordered on miraculous, continually finding ways to keep the Peacocks relevant despite the least resources of any school in the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference. It was this resume that allowed Dunne to seek, and receive, a well-deserved step up at fellow MAAC program Marist, where he enters his third year in the Hudson Valley continuing his grinding work of building a winner.

The Red Foxes enjoyed a respectable year in Dunne’s first season at the helm, but the graduation of Brian Parker and several other seniors left one of the youngest teams in the nation last year, yet Marist remained close in a majority of its games, an encouraging sign from the man in charge of a return to heights not seen in Poughkeepsie in well over a decade.

“For us, it was a grinding, tough year,” Dunne reflected of Marist’s campaign, which was ended by a close loss to Niagara in the opening round of the MAAC tournament two days before COVID-19 claimed the remainder of the college basketball season in its tidal wave of destruction, one that has also deprived the Red Foxes of the chance to get back inside McCann Arena for individual and team workouts. “On a positive level, and I mean this wholeheartedly, we never wavered in our preparation to win, regardless of how difficult the season was moving along. The losses were piling up, but our mental toughness and preparation never wavered, and I think that bodes well for the future.”

“Last year, going in, we had no experience, and that made it difficult. We had a lot of winnable games in the non-conference — and we were leading in a lot of them going into the last few minutes — and we didn’t close them out. I think we’ll be better in that regard moving forward. But make no mistake, if we’re going to have success this year, our experience and our inexperience is certainly going to have to merge in a positive way for us to be successful.”

MAAC all-rookie selection Tyler Sagl transferred recently to be closer to his Toronto home, but the Red Foxes still have breakout potential behind two-way guard Michael Cubbage, sharpshooter Matt Herasme, forwards Jordan Jones and Braden Bell, as well as 6-foot-7 Victor Enoh, who sat out last season after transferring from Memphis.

“He’s going to have an ability to block shots,” Dunne said of Enoh, citing his athleticism and size as beneficial attributes to the Marist front line. “We were not a good offensive rebounding team last year. We need to pick up in that area, and our expectation for him is to give us toughness, give us rebounding, and finish around the rim when guards are feeding him. We’re not asking too much from him in creativity. We just need him to finish, rebound and be a presence on the defensive end.”

The pieces are in place and the potential is there going into a pivotal season, and Dunne, not one to take shortcuts in crafting a competitor, has reason to believe he will see a marked improvement from this group.

“We’ll maintain our defensive intensity and attention to detail,” he said. “But you can’t win without being efficient on offense, and we’ll be more efficient. Yeah, we’ll be inexperienced to start the year, and we understand that, but we’re certainly going to have an improved product on the court.”