{"id":3692,"date":"2017-12-15T18:40:56","date_gmt":"2017-12-15T18:40:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/willistonblogs.com\/athletics\/?p=3692"},"modified":"2017-12-15T20:03:31","modified_gmt":"2017-12-15T20:03:31","slug":"athletic-director-conroy-named-to-coaches-hall-of-fame","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/willistonblogs.com\/athletics\/2017\/12\/15\/athletic-director-conroy-named-to-coaches-hall-of-fame\/","title":{"rendered":"Athletic Director Conroy Named to Coaches’ Hall of Fame"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Coach Mark Conroy<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

You could make the case that Mark Conroy\u2019s career began in second grade when he started playing organized football. Throughout his school days, he played the game, captaining his team at Middlebury College, where he earned All East honors and a nod as Honorable Mention All American.<\/p>\n

Conroy\u00a0has spent 33 years coaching (mostly football but also basketball and baseball) at boarding schools, 30 of those serving in the Athletic Director role, as he has at Williston for the last 18 years. He stepped down as football coach at the end of the 2015-16 school year, continuing on as AD. As a fitting\u00a0tribute to a career devoted to inspiring excellence and modeling leadership for young people, Conroy has been elected to the NEPSFCA Coaches’ Hall of Fame.<\/p>\n

As a result, one of the seven NEPSAC championship football bowl games, which are named for hall of fame inductees, will be named the Mark Conroy Bowl.<\/p>\n

\u201cI arrived at Williston in the fall of 2000 stepping into the very big shoes of Rick Francis who was the longtime AD and football coach,\u201d Conroy said. Francis started at Williston in 1958. \u201cThanks to Rick\u2019s leadership, Williston had a very rich tradition and it was always very important to me to sustain this legacy of football here.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Coach Conroy on the gridiron<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

As Williston\u2019s football coach, his record was 84-46 with 3 bowl berths. However, to him, the experience was bigger than the numbers. \u201cFor me it was less about the win-loss record and more about what I like to call the magic of football\u2014the relationships that were formed and the life lessons that were learned playing this great game.\u00a0I never ceased to be amazed at what transpired over the course of 10 weeks in terms of relationships, many of which will withstand the test of time.\u00a0I loved playing football but I always felt that I loved coaching it even more because I had the privilege of sharing this experience with coaching colleagues I liked and admired, as we aspired to provide our boys with the most positive football experience possible.\u201d<\/p>\n

That commitment to mentoring youth is evident to all who work with Conroy, including those who played football for him.<\/p>\n

“There weren’t any bad days playing for Coach Conroy,” said Noah Clack ’18. “Not only was he a great coach, but everything he did was done with pure class.”<\/p>\n

“There’s not a better man,” said current football coach and college counselor Tom Beaton. “Although he’s a fantastic coach, his players would say he’s a teacher and role model first and a coach second.”<\/p>\n

\u201cMark Conroy embodies the highest standards of coaching,\u201d said Head of School Robert W. Hill III. \u201cHis 17-year tenure as Williston\u2019s football coach, while remarkable for the record he amassed, was even more noteworthy for the life lessons he bestowed on countless young men.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

You could make the case that Mark Conroy\u2019s career began in second grade when he started playing organized football. Throughout his school days, he played the game, captaining his team at Middlebury College, where he earned All East honors and a nod as Honorable Mention All American. Conroy\u00a0has spent 33 years coaching (mostly football but … Continue reading Athletic Director Conroy Named to Coaches’ Hall of Fame<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":111,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"_s2mail":"yes","footnotes":""},"categories":[45,371],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3692","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-athletic-awards","category-coach-profile"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/willistonblogs.com\/athletics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3692"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/willistonblogs.com\/athletics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/willistonblogs.com\/athletics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/willistonblogs.com\/athletics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/111"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/willistonblogs.com\/athletics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3692"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/willistonblogs.com\/athletics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3692\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3697,"href":"https:\/\/willistonblogs.com\/athletics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3692\/revisions\/3697"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/willistonblogs.com\/athletics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3692"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/willistonblogs.com\/athletics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3692"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/willistonblogs.com\/athletics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3692"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}