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Casey Stitzel- Millersville University Head Men’s BB Coach: interview
 

Casey Stitzel- Millersville University Head Men’s BB Coach: interview

Written by: Dell Jackson on April 2, 2020

 

Ed note: Coach Casey Stitzel, MU Head Coach, took some time to answer LLhoops questions- another first for LLhoops in snagging an interview with an NCAA D2 Coach. Coach responded very quickly, and we are proud to share his thoughts.

Enjoy!

 

 

1) You are our first NCAA College Coach interview for llhoops! Can you give our followers a brief background of your coaching career?

Graduated from Widener University (2005) then went on to Philadelphia University as the top assistant from 2005-07. After that I went Perkiomen Valley as the Varsity Head Coach 2007-08. I then moved on to Delaware Valley University as the Head Men’s Basketball Coach from 2007-16. I am now the Head Men’s Basketball Coach of Millersville University and just completed my fourth season.

 

1B) Tell us about your current staff.
I have two assistants Chris Conway and Casey McMasters. Chris played at York College of PA for four years then moved on to Albright College as a part time assistant from 2016-17. Chris just completed his 3rd season on staff and is now my full-time assistant after serving as a graduate assistant for his first two seasons.

Casey McMasters just completed his first season on staff at Millersville. He is a local Harrisburg Central Dauphin graduate. Casey came here after serving as the top assistant at St. Leos in Tampa Bay, Florida.

 

2) MU has been getting better since you have arrived. What are the keys to this progression?
Recruiting the right student athletes not only good basketball players but even better people. We were not looking for the quick fix but for the long-term goal of a successful college program. We have added the right mix of high school kids and the right transfers to our recruiting classes. It’s been great to allow players to play as freshmen in our program and allowing them to gain experience by failing. Having recruiting connections in the Virginia and the DMV area has allowed us to create our own niche in getting the right student athletes. We try to recruit very tough, hardworking kids to our program. We have also been blessed to not only have a good staff currently but have had some great coaches who have worked for me previously during the rebuild.

 

3) What do you look for when deciding to recruit a high school player?
We look for kids that are tough that have a winning mentality and hard working on and off the court. We play very fast offensively and look to speed teams up defensively. We look to get guys who are athletic and that take pride on playing defense. Overall, we look for winners not only on the court but off the court and that can take that mentality in to everything they do in life.

 

4) How are you dealing with the cover19 crisis? Both at MU and at home?
We are trying to do as much connecting as possible. We are doing individual meetings on facetime, film sessions using zoom and monitoring guys as much as we can academically with the semester now being online. We are also trying to have team meetings on zoom just to continue building the relationships on the team. 

At home the only positive is that I get to spend time at home with my wife and two sons Mason and Jackson. During this time of the year I am typically very busy finishing up recruiting, spring workouts and making sure members of the team are finishing off the semester strong academically. It’s been a blessing in disguise to be able to spend the time I am with family.

 

5) What plans do you have for the future of MU basketball? 
We would like to continue to build a program and reach our goals of winning the league and reaching the NCAA tournament. We have a very strong recruiting class coming in that features transfer wing Talek Williams. We return 4 all PSAC players including all PSAC guard that missed season due to injury this past year in Jaden Faulkner.

 

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