Big Words start conversations and open doors to new places.
Author: anwaryusef
Anwar Y. Dunbar is a Regulatory Scientist. Being a naturally curious person, he is also a student of all things. He earned his Ph.D. in Pharmacology from the University of Michigan and his Bachelor’s Degree in General Biology from Johnson C. Smith University (JCSU). Prior to starting the Big Words Blog Site, Anwar published and contributed to numerous research articles in competitive scientific journals reporting on his research from graduate school and postdoctoral years. After falling in love with writing, he contributed to the now defunct Examiner.com, and the Edvocate where he regularly wrote about: Education-related stories/topics, Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM), Financial Literacy; as well as conducted interviews with notable individuals such as actor and author Hill Harper. Having many influences, one of his most notable heroes is author, intellectual and speaker, Malcolm Gladwell, author of books including Outliers and David and Goliath.
Anwar has his hands in many, many activities. In addition to writing, Anwar actively mentors youth, works to spread awareness of STEM careers, serves on the Board of Directors of the Friends of the David M. Brown Arlington Planetarium, serves as Treasurer for the JCSU Washington, DC Alumni Chapter, and is active in the Dave Ramsey Financial Peace Ministry at the Alfred Street Baptist Church. He also tutors in the subjects of biology, chemistry and physics.
Along with his multi-talented older brother Amahl Dunbar (designer of the Big Words logos, inventor and a plethora of other things), Anwar is a “Fanboy” and really enjoys Science-Fiction and Superhero movies including but not restricted to Captain America Civil War, Batman vs. Superman: Dawn of Justice, and Prometheus. He is a proud native of Buffalo, NY.
Some of the key focuses of my blog are Financial Literacy and Money, and both Business and Entrepreneurship. A major key to running any business or organization is recruitment and retention of talent. A major part of talent retention is creating an optimal work environment. This contributed post is thus entitled; How You Can Start Allowing Your Staff More Flexibility Today.
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Allowing your staff more flexibility can be a fantastic way to build a better company reputation, make it more enjoyable for your staff to come to work, get a higher quality of work, and much more. It’s far more modern to allow your staff to work flexibly these days, as we all lead busy lives and may have appointments to keep up with, or may want to work from home for whatever reason.
Flexible working doesn’t just mean working from home. It can mean making the most of the commute and working from there, coming in a little later and making the time up later on in the day, doing some work in a cafe, and much more. Working flexibly can mean different things for different people. It won’t suit all businesses, but it can definitely help a huge number of businesses to move forward and get better results. Below is a quick rundown of what flexibility can mean for different businesses:
• Flexible arrival and departure times
• Full-time work from home or location independence
• Choice and control in work shifts
• Part-time work from home
• Compressed shifts or workweek
• Opportunity for sabbaticals or career breaks (e.g., extended time off)
• Unlimited paid time off
• Caregiving leave
Staff who can work flexibly tend to take less sick days, feel happier and more productive at work, and become advocates for your business. They also feel more loyal to you and you should find you improve employee retention. Below are some ideas to help you implement more flexibility today:
Speak To Your Employees
Speak to your employees and see what they think about working flexibly. How do they think it could help and how would they like to do it? Getting their opinion will give you an insight into what they really want.
Start Using The Cloud
Using the cloud means your employees will be able to access data any time, anywhere. If you’re not currently using it, you’re already behind! What would you do if you lost important data, or there was a natural disaster? Cloud Migration Services can help with this, whether your employees want to start work on the commute or whether they’d like to do it from home.
Make Everybody Play By The Same Rules
Having flexibility in the workplace is great, but it can’t be one rule for one person and one rule for another. For example, you’ll find in many workplaces parents are allowed to leave early to pick up their kids, go to a school play, or take time off and have benefits for other family related things. Single people and those without kids should not be treated any differently! Have the same rules in place for everybody.
Allow More Flexibility Within The Workplace
Don’t have the mindset of ‘employees must be at their desks from the hours of 9-5’. Let them take breaks. Let them play games. Let them talk. Heck, even let them take naps. Make the workplace fun and flexible and you’ll seriously benefit.
Make A Gradual Transition
Do these things gradually so it’s not a shock to the system. What can you implement today to make the workplace more flexible?
Two of the focuses of my blog are Financial Literacy and Money, and Business and Entrepreneurship. A key aspect of running any business is putting preventative measures in place to protect against unforeseen disasters and issues. The following contributed post is thus entitled; Unexpected Disasters: Preventative Measures For Your Business.
Business owners tend to spend a lot of time creating an enterprise, however only a small portion of this planning to protect the business they have built. The examples to follow feature likely disasters that could occur when you least expect it, accompanied with solutions on how to avert these eventualities.
Power Cut
The lights cut out, pitch black fills the office, the familiar whirring noise from your PC’s slows down to a halt, complete silence ensues, you’re experiencing a power cut. What do you do now? The right answer is to prevent this situation from happening in the first place. Power cuts are destructive to a business’s livelihood. Hours of no power for your PC’s, lighting and equipment could prevent several of your employees securing sales deal, contacting new customers, submitting new stock orders, etc. Without power, your business is disconnected from a world that thrives on remaining connected by technology. Attempting to rectify this scenario without a plan in place is highly stressful for you and damaging for your company.
Prevent your business practices coming to a halt when the likely event of a power cut takes over. Instead, think about purchasing a backup power outlet to provide your company with a few hours of electric to keep your business running smoothly. In addition to this, hire a technology company who are experts in situations such as these, giving you an additional safety net when the lights go out.
Cyber Crime
Cybercriminals may wreck the progress and reputation of your business, steal your customer’s bank details and personal data, take private company information or just choose to cause havoc on your system. Protecting confidential information with a password is no longer a sufficient defense mechanism for shielding your business’s intel online. You owe it to yourself and your customers to avoid a cyber attack at all costs and maintain the relationships and integrity amongst customers you’ve worked so hard to gain. Although some business owners feel the event of an attack is unlikely because they’ve only just set up their business online recently, statistically, 30,000 websites are hacked every day. Some of which by using sophisticated software to assess the webs most vulnerable sites. This is one of the reasons why you need to seek adequate protection to suit an ever-changing cybersphere. A company such as Red Key Solutions can help to identify and defend your company from a cyber attack.
Natural Disaster
In consideration of yourself and your employees first and foremost, this affects more than your business livelihood, it affects lives. The safety and security of your employees is your duty as an owner and manager to ensure health and safety regulations are met.
Never assume your plan for a natural disaster is adequate. Consistently invest in improving your program by practicing your safety regime for different emergencies and strive to educate employees of any new policies or procedures to follow in the name of safety.
After the safety of your employees, your business is at stake. For instance, if a fire were to occur, how would your recover burnt documents? If there was a flood, how would you plan to fix a waterlogged server? If you’re unsure of the answers to these questions, there may be gaps in your disaster recovery plan. Consider options for backup servers located away from the building, storing information in cyberspace to protect your data. You could also apply for business insurance which includes safeguarding your business in the event of a natural disaster.
Extensive preparation for a likely catastrophe is just as necessary as the time and effort you invest in your business’s growth. Failing to prepare for the unexpected events could leave you without a company altogether, which is why it’s detrimental to implement a strategy to save your business from future harm.
Two of the focuses of my blog are Financial Literacy and Money, and Business and Entrepreneurship. When building a business, it’s critical to protect your company’s reputation as companies often grow and falter based upon public opinion. The following contributed post is thus entitled, How To Keep your Company’s Reputation Intact.
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There are few things related to your company’s reputation that is easy. They take years to build, yet they can be damaged in an instant. And once you’ve lost your good standing with the public, then it can be difficult to get back. So part of your job as an entrepreneur will be to work hard to make sure that all the news coming out of your business is positive. But how do you do that? We take a look at five ways to keep things looking positive, always.
It would be nice if everything were always moving in the right direction for your business, but that’s not going to happen. Stay in business long enough, and you’re going to make mistakes. Literally every company in the world makes mistakes! The important thing isn’t to avoid making errors in the first place; it’s to ensure that you’re handling them in the right way. A business that tries to cover up their mistakes will raise doubts with the public. Of course, if you’re only apologising for mistakes once you get found out – like Facebook – then it’s time to consider whether you’re doing something fundamentally wrong.
Tackle Disruptive Issues
You’re not always going to hire employees who are team players, or who have the greater good of the business at heart. From time to time, you’ll have an employee that seems to create an endless amount of troubles for your venture. While you’d like to ignore these problems, you can’t – employees have a lot of power to cause your business harm if the problems aren’t resolved peacefully. If an employee threatens to spread malicious, untrue bad press about your business, then work with a law firm; the services from George Birnbaum, for example, include settling employment-related disputes. It’ll be your best hope for limiting the damage that a disgruntled employee can do.
Stay Friendly With Other Businesses
When you’re a business owner, it’s not about striding out there all on your own. It’s about building bridges between yourself and your client and other businesses. If you’re constantly trying to climb over other companies on your way from the time, then you’re not going to make any friends. So don’t bad mouth your competitors. It might feel good for a moment, but trust us, you’re the one who’ll come off worse for all your talk.
Work with PR Firms
Sometimes, you’ll be hit with bad press that seems difficult to overcome, even if there’s not a grain of truth to it. If that happens, then you’ll be well-served by working with a PR firm to make sure the situation is handled carefully. It’s always possible to get the truth out there, but not always on your own. If you want to help yourself, you can look into hiring someone with experience in public relations, like Gayle Pohl.
When In Doubt, Stay Quiet
Finally, remember that there’s much value in staying quiet! If you think that your mouth might cause your company harm, then keep it shut – it’s better to say nothing rather than something that’ll get you in trouble!
Two of the focuses of my blog are Financial Literacy and Money, and Business and Entrepreneurship. When building a business, it’s important to know when your operations are growing in size and scope, and how to properly adjust. The following contributed post is thus entitled; Moving, Money and Marketing: Boost Your Business from Small to Mighty.
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When it comes to growing and expanding your business, you realise there are a million different options available to you. You want to ensure you make the right decisions when it comes to creating a bigger and better business. You want to be successful, no matter what, but you realise it is going to take time and patience to achieve. Whether you want to move office buildings, reassess your budget or widen the spread of your marketing campaigns, you can truly transform your business from small to mighty gradually over time. Use the following ideas as inspiration and get on the right track today.
The Big Move – Get Real with Real Estate
Moving your business from a small and poky home office to a brand spanking new building is a huge step to make. Investing in business real estate might be the way forward for you, in which case you should explore your options online today. You need to make sure you have the money, legal representation and necessary plans in place before you choose to grow your business in this way.
Choosing to boost your budget and start spending more on your business is another possibility you might want to explore. If you find yourself with extra income each month then think of effective ways in which you could spend this money. Whether you hire more employees, branch out on your product line or improve the quality of your product components.
Magic Marketing Methods
Improving your marketing methods is another excellent way to grow your business. Reaching a wider audience or targeting more of your demographic could bring your business huge successes. As long as you entrust the work with a reputable digital marketer, you will be able to see results in a short space of time.
Great Growth
There is nothing wrong with having a small business, but there are many ways in which you can grow your business for the better. Hiring more employees will take the pressure off you a little bit or outsourcing some of your tasks to external companies. Choose the growth method that is right for your business and stick to your guns.
Terrific Timing
Timing is everything when it comes to expanding your business and transforming from small to mighty. Make sure you have the money, support and time to make everything work. Waiting a little longer might just help you to gather more of the essentials you need.
So give your business the power to move up and grow over time. You don’t have to make huge life changing steps just yet, but if you lay out the potential plans you will find it much easier to make the move. Whether you want to relocate your offices, grow your workforce or take your time to make the correct decisions, you need to do what is best for your company. As long as you have people on hand to advise and help you along the way, you will find the journey smooth and seamless.
Two of the focuses of my blog are Financial Literacy and Money, and Business and Entrepreneurship. When starting a new business, particularly if you’re a novice in terms of the whole process, some mistakes may be made early on by nature. If possible, it would advantageous to avoid those mistakes you can see them coming. The following contributed post is thus entitled; Common Mistakes Many Entrepreneurs Make When Starting Up.
Starting a small business isn’t always easy. In fact, it very rarely is. There are just so many decisions to make, things to think about, and things to do, and all of this results in pressure that can cause a lapse in judgment. Mistakes in business are opportunities to learn, but risky ones at that. While some errors are simple to resolve, other could ruin your company before it really begins. To stay safe, here are some common entrepreneurial mistakes that you should avoid.
1. Skipping The Planning Phase
Once you’ve decided to launch your own startup, the idea of researching and planning can seem incredibly boring and tedious. Despite this, it’s an essential first step toward business success. Without a rough plan, you’ll be operating in the dark, which will like result in many more mistakes later down the line. Make sure you consider every area of your company and set realistic targets.
2. Insisting On Working Alone
A common misconception about entrepreneurship is that every business owner does everything on their own. Thankfully, this is far from realistic. Even attempting to work completely by yourself will lead to stress, wasted time, and exhaustion, all of which will leave you of no use to your company. Instead, you should learn to delegate effectively and focus on the most important work.
3. Pricing Products Too Low
Being a new business doesn’t mean that your product is less valuable than others on the market. In fact, if you’ve played your cards right, yours should actually be worth much more. With that in mind, you should make sure that you price your products fairly, instead of giving them a massive discount As long as your product lives up to the cost, there’s no point in going cheaper.
4. Assuming You Know Everything
No one ever knows everything about business, especially first-time entrepreneurs. With that in mind, you may want to find yourself a mentor or consultant to offer their wisdom and advice. Ideally, you should opt for someone with experience in a number of successful startups, like Jos Opdeweegh. You should also keep up with business news by reading blogs and newspapers.
5. Providing Poor Customer Service
Your product may be the best on the market, but, if you or your employees treat your customers poorly, they’re going to stop buying from you. This can ruin large and established businesses, so you can guarantee that your small company would see some damage. To prevent this, you should constantly aim to improve customer service, by asking for feedback and suggestions.
6. Neglecting Your Marketing Strategy
Unless people actually know who you are, they can’t buy from you, and your business will be over before it’s even begun. For this reason, you need to dedicate some time and money coming up with a killer marketing strategy. This should start to target potential customers before your startup even launches, ensuring you have customers on your very first day.
Mistakes are made every day in business, but, to keep your new startup safe and successful, should try to avoid those listed above.
Two of the key focuses of my blog are Business and Entrepreneurship, and Technology. In today’s digital world, it’s important to know that right mix of: technology usage, marketing, and knowing when to outsource to make your business competitive, whether it’s small or large. The following contributed post is thus entitled; Reach For The Stars; Don’t Limit Yourself.
It’s easy to think that small and large businesses are like chalk and cheese, and your small or home-based business is nothing like the larger firms of the world. However it’s simply not the case- you both have the same aims and objectives; you all want to turn a profit and provide a product or service to consumers that they’re currently missing. Sure, a bigger company will have lots more departments and processes in place, but there’s plenty of things that they do that you can also take advantage of in your small business. Don’t be limited or put obstacles in your way, don’t feel as though you’re not able to utilise certain methods just because you’re not a bigger business. Here are some examples.
Utilise the right tools and software
If you’re running a small or home based business, the temptation is there to save on software and do tasks manually. While this may be possible since you’re on a smaller scale, you’ll actually be losing out on money rather than saving it. Business software is something that can be utilised by firms of all sizes- you’ll boost productivity, reduce human error and save time too. This is time you could be spending doing something else, whether it’s in your business or in your personal life. You can find software for any department of your business these days, from accounting to legal software, customer relationship management, email management and much more. If you have room in your budget, you could even have bespoke software designed specifically for your business. On top of this, there are all kinds of tools that you could (and should) be using, regardless of the size of your firm. You can discover SEO rankings when using the right tools, PPC keywords and much more which will enable you to adjust your strategy for the best effect.
Market your business
Marketing is essential for businesses of all sizes. Even if you’re a small, local business who doesn’t sell online, you should have a marketing strategy in place to promote yourself. You will still need to be visible in search engine listings for when people search for local companies like yourself, and so a good website is essential. If you don’t sell online, your marketing will likely have a strong focus on things like flyers, posters and billboards so that people in the local community get to hear about you. Social media marketing is excellent also. If you do sell online, you’ll need to focus your efforts on further out- blogger outreach, Google ads and video marketing all might be options. Your marketing is important, don’t overlook this just because you’re not a huge company.
Outsource
If any of the tasks above sound like they’re out of your depth, there’s no need to worry. You can outsource anything these days, from entire departments of your business to single tasks. For example, you could outsource your marketing to a professional third party company who specialises in this. You could utilise freelancers to create content for your blog, or design your app or website. There are so many talented companies and individuals online who you can hire to run or tackle any area of your business. This ensures that everything is done to the best standard, and if you want to remain a sole trader it means you can get work done without having to hire staff. Many smaller companies believe that outsourcing is something that only big companies take advantage of, but you can outsource work regardless of the size of your business. And best of all, it could save you money too. While there will be a fee to pay the company or person, as they specialise in that area they have the knowledge and tools to be able to do things far more quickly than you. This boosts productivity and therefore profits. It frees up your time for you to tackle the elements of your business that you’re comfortable with and enjoy.
Don’t limit yourself, or believe that you’re any different to other businesses out there. No matter what the size, you all have the same objectives and there are tools that suit, or can be suited to any type of firm. Do your research, and don’t let the size of your company limit you! It’s completely possible to make a fortune right from your own home if that’s what you choose to do, as long as you go about things in the right way.
Two of the key focuses of my blog are Business and Entrepreneurship and Technology. With so much business being conducted online these days, every business must be aware of how their online presence impacts their ability to do business, and to continue to thrive. The following contributed post is thus entitled; How Your Online Presence Could Make or Break Your Business.
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Running a business isn’t simply about coming up with winning ideas and providing excellent services to your clients, you need to have a strong online presence in order to be noticed. Nowadays if you don’t have a killer website and stunning social media strategy you might as well leave your business at the door. Using social media correctly is so important to every business owner, so you need to brush up your skills right now and make sure your online presence doesn’t let your business down. There are many mistakes that you could be making on a regular basis which jeopardises your business, so be aware of these ups and downs.
Wasted Money on Advertising
If you aren’t quite sure of your advertising strategies then you mustn’t try to do it all yourself. You could waste a tonne of money on useless campaigns that will never attract any leads. Look into reputable advertising companies who can assist you with all of your marketing needs. You will be able to hone in on your target audience and discover exactly how you can bring them in. Discuss your options with an agency and you can be sure you won’t be wasting any money on your marketing methods.
You could deter somebody from your business straight away if your social media platforms aren’t up to scratch. You could have posted controversial content online which sparked a heated discussion or you might not be using the correct language to suit the demographic of your target audience. Make sure your spelling, grammar and facts are all thoroughly checked over otherwise you run the risk of giving off an unprofessional vibe. You want your potential customers to trust you and want to invest their money in you so give them every reason to.
Website Glitches
When a customer goes online and wants to buy one of your products or services, there is nothing more frustrating than being greeted with glitches in the system or slow loading times. Keep your website running smoothly and seamlessly so that your audience have no reason to click away from that checkout page. There are websites that will check the loading times of your individual pages; if you are waiting for more than three seconds, the chances are that your potential shopper will lose interest. Keep your images as small as possible and this will help to lessen the loading time.
Invisible to Search Engines
Improving your search engine ranking should be very high on your priority list. If you can’t be found online then you aren’t going to get many sales. Do everything you can to improve your SEO strategies so that you start ranking higher on popular search engines such as Google and Bing! This could involve tweaking your keywords, starting a blog and reassessing your website descriptions.
So pay close attention to your online presence, website and the way in which you operate your social media, as it could be the make or break element for your business.
The first principle of my blog is “Creating Ecosystems of Success”. As a part of a book project I’m working on regarding my high school basketball experience and what it taught me about life, success and failure, I was granted an interview with Western New York coaching legend, Pat Monti who was the Architect of the LaSalle basketball dynasty. My book project is entitled, The Engineers: A Western New York Basketball Story. I’ve already published parts one and two of the interview, but Coach Monti blessed me with enough material for one more piece. His was unlike any interview that I’ve done up this point, in that during the interview, he told numerous ‘stand-alone’ stories in addition to the question and answer portion of our interview.
The following are the numerous stories Coach Monti told about his coaching career and the LaSalle basketball program – stories which were too long to publish in parts one and two of our interview, but which also were too valuable to not share. I hope you enjoy them as much as I have. The pictures in this interview come from an archive of Western New York basketball assembled over the years from issues of the Buffalo News, the Rochester Democrat & Chronicle, and Sections V and VI playoff programs by my first Coach at Hutch-Tech High School, Dr. Ken Jones. Other pictures were generously shared by Coach Pat Monti himself. Click on any of the images to enlarge them.
The Syracuse Parochial Schools
Back in Syracuse we had what we called the “Parochial” league which were ten small Catholic schools. You went to school and right across the street was a church. All we had was basketball and baseball as our sports. It was an unbelievable basketball league – phenomenal. We used to beat up on all the public schools. I went to St. Patrick’s High School in Syracuse, but there was also St. John the Baptist, the Evangelist, St. Lucy’s, Cathedral, Assumption – there were ten and none of them exist anymore obviously – they just got devoured and private education was taken over by a couple of bigger Catholic schools.
The 1975-76 Explorers – Coach Monti’s First LaSalle Varsity Team
First off, a little background how I landed the Varsity job. As you know I graduated from Niagara University in 1968 but being from Syracuse and not being local, there were politics like everywhere else, and I was unable to get my foot in the door as a coach even though I was teaching in the district. So, in 1968-69 I landed the Freshman job at St. John Neumann under Johnny McCarthy, former Buffalo Braves and Canisius College Coach. I did that for one year, and then the late Bob Laurrie who was the Varsity Coach at Bishop Duffy which became gave me a job as his Junior Varsity (JV) Coach for the next three years from 1969-72 which was great because I was close to home and LaSalle where I taught. By the way Niagara Catholic just closed its doors this summer.
Finally, after applying for years, I got hired as the LaSalle JV Coach from the 1972-73 season thru the 1974-75 season. At 29 years of age, I then landed the Varsity job at LaSalle replacing legendary coach Matt Mazza for the 1975-76 season. After coaching those previous three years as the JV coach, if memory serves me we had records of 15-3, 12-4, and 16-2. The Varsity team with most of those kids I coached on the JV were struggling big time. They lost their last seven games of the 1973-74 season and then went 0-18 in 74-75. I guess the administration had had enough after the 25-game losing streak and hired me for the 1975-76 season from a pool of quality applicants.
So obviously going into my first season I had nothing to lose, and we went 8-10 and became fairly competitive. Our starters on that first team were led by: Co-Captain Edwin Keith Ridgeway and “Buckwheat” Harris at the guards, Kevin Downey and Keith Taylor at the forwards, and Wayne Gould at center. Co-Captain Mike Roberts was the ‘sixth man’ and became the starter with Ridgeway when we lost Harris to grades. The rest of the squad was comprised of: Chris Hyla, Ricky Williams, Dan Ciszek, Mike Amato, Dan Coombs, and Alan Valentine!
We went 8-10 that first season and almost made the Sectionals under the leadership of seniors Ridgeway and Roberts – two very solid players and really great kids who almost immediately bought into what I was trying to accomplish with the program. With Downey and Taylor, two outstanding very strong forwards returning and many of the returning players who were juniors that first year, we went 9-8 the following season including going 8-7 in the regular season, and then winning in an upset at Amherst – the first sectional win for a LaSalle team in many years! Back then you had to qualify for Sectionals with a 0.500 or better record! We beat Amherst on the road in that 1976-77 season on a buzzer beater from Alan Valentine on a great pass from Billy Clingersmith who had come over from Niagara Falls High School that year.
It was a HUGE upset and the kids went crazy it was as if we won the Sectional Title instead of simply a first-round game! Well that was the start of it all, and the players the following years started understanding that it was all about: fundamentals, no nonsense and structure. Things at LaSalle turned around and by the 1979-80, and the 1980-81 Michael Freeney-teams, we won consecutive Niagara Frontier League (NFL) titles – the first and second of our 13 league championships. LaSalle High School basketball had arrived on the scene in Western New York after many years of mediocrity!
LaSalle’s Late 1980s matchups with Christian Laettner and The Nichols School
During Christian Laettner’s (pictured) junior year which was 1986-87 – they beat us twice – both times were single digits – six to seven points, and we hung right there with them. After not losing a game his junior year, they won the Class C state title. The next year 1987-88 was his senior year. We went to Nichols’ little dingy gym in late December and I don’t know if they took us for granted which would’ve been crazy because we had everyone back, and they lost their point guard, even though they still had Laettner.
You can look back at my teams, especially when we got really good starting in the early 1980s all of the way up until the school closed – my teams were really run and dominated by guard play. We never had any size to speak of, and that year Eric Gore was probably our best player. I had to use him inside at 6’4” though he ended up playing the two-guard position in college down in Texas. We went down to their gym and blew them out. We turned their guards over and took Laettner out of the equation because their guys couldn’t get him the ball the way they needed to and I think we beat them by 17 points.
We then went on a run where we were 19-0 and they were 18-1 – we were ranked the top ‘Large School’ and they were ranked the top ‘Small School’ in the Buffalo News, and they came into our gym for the last regular season game in the Niagara Frontier League. It was unbelievable – a zoo. If you were a Junior Varsity (JV) player, you had to be crapping in your pants. The JV game started at 6 pm, and if you didn’t get into the gym at quarter to five, you didn’t get a seat – our gym held well over 2,000 people.
Everyone was there – Mike Kryzewski (Duke) and Digger Phelps (Notre Dame) – all the bigtime coaches. It was a game for the ages. I can still see it as if it was yesterday, and it was 1988. Nobody led by more than four – they didn’t take us for granted this time – they were very well coached.
It was back and forth, back and forth – just an incredible high school basketball game. I think that with about a minute or so left, we might’ve been up four. They came down, scored, called time out and cut it to two. I only had one time out left and I’ve always taught my young coaches to save your time outs for the fourth quarter. If you know, you’re going to be in a tight ballgame, don’t waste time outs. It’s amazing how simple it sounds and how important it is in coaching.
They obviously knew us inside and out, and I should have been smart enough to change our ‘press-breaker’ but I didn’t, and they pressed us. They double teamed my point guard Michael Starks – great player – 6’1” or 6’2” – really smart with the ball – a good decision maker. His brother Frank was a 6’2” 210 lb. rebounding machine but didn’t handle or shoot the ball very well. They took Michael away and Frank had the ball coming up the right side of the court across from the benches. I couldn’t get my timeout fast enough and it was so loud that the referees couldn’t hear me. I could see it coming but it was too late.
Laettner left Gore and Frank Starks is dribbling the ball above his waist – it looked like he was dribbling a beach ball. Laettner stripped him clean and went in for what would have been a thunderous dunk which would have sent the game into overtime – there were 20 seconds left at the time. He was the only guy across half court now. He looked up just as he crossed near the foul line – I think to see where he was with relation to the basket, and he kicked the ball out of bounds believe it or not.
So, I called my final timeout and drew up a different press-breaker. At the time I didn’t give it a name, but since then I called it my “One-Breaker” where my point guard takes the ball out of bounds. Because we’re leading the game, they must go trap the ball. We got the ball back into Michael Starks’ hands. He got fouled and made both shots – we beat them by four 61-57 – we went on and went 20-0, we won the Class B Sectional pretty easily, went to Rochester and won that pretty easily, and then we went to Glens Falls and beat some really, really good teams – the state’s ‘Public School’ part of it.
The 27-0 1988 Class B State and Federation Championship Team
We beat a local team out of Gloversville that had two brothers – stars and both great basketball players – one was a quarterback who I think went on to play at Boston College – one of the Boston schools for football. But they were local – right outside of Albany in the Glens Falls area. I don’t know if you’ve ever been to Glens Falls to watch basketball, but the Civic Center is a beautiful venue for watching basketball – very unencumbered, no pillars in your way. It holds about 7,000 people and the place was a sea of red – Gloversville fans galore and the game went back and forth, back and forth. We ended up beating them in a tightly fought contest in overtime.
It was funny because we used to play the semifinals on Friday nights and the finals on Sunday – later in my career it was Saturday and Sunday. On Saturday, our kids would go and watch the Cs, the Ds and the As, and the talk all over the Civic Center, and even the local newspapers was, “How is little LaSalle going to handle this Nottingham team out of Syracuse with Dorsey Levens?” – the great running back who would go on to star for the Green Bay Packers. He was a tremendous basketball player.
Jason Buchanan went on to star at St. John’s as a point guard. They had won something like 45 straight games, they were the defending state champions, and they were undefeated as we were so you had two great teams. We ended up beating them and people were talking as though they were going to blow us out of the gym by 30 because we barely beat Gloversville 61-60 who was good, and they crushed a team from Section XI on Long Island by 35 points.
But what they didn’t see was the real Eric Gore because he was scoring 27 points a game, and I hate to say it but against Gloversville it was a ‘home job’ – a setup, and the poor kid couldn’t breathe without being called for a foul – it was ridiculous. He finished the semifinal game zero points. He got his third foul at the start of the second quarter. I joke with my old assistant coach who is still works in the Niagara Falls school system Frank Rotundo, who coached for a while at Niagara County Community College.
Frank came down to me with about five minutes left in the game and we were up by six against this great Nottingham team out of Syracuse coached by the legendary Jim McGrath. Coach Rotundo said, “Look at Eric. His head is down at the end of the bench.” I said, “We’re doing okay.” We had Elon McCraken who played at Niagara who stepped in as a junior at Eric’s spot for me and we were handling them with no problem.
Coach Rotundo asked, “Would we be here without Eric?” It gnawed at me and gnawed at me, so I put him in. We had the game basically won. We had no shot clock back then and I ran a really good “delay and strike” game back then where we could kill the clock and surprise you with a back-door layup every once and a while.
I shouldn’t have put him back in, but I listened to my assistant whom to this day I jokingly say to Frank, “You know that’s the last time I ever listen to an assistant.” Eric having such a bad performance got in the game, turned it over, took a couple of bad shots and before you know it, here we are tied in a game that never should have been like that. It ended up going into overtime and Eric fouled out in regulation anyway.
We were down three to Nottingham with ten seconds play in regulation. We had just fouled Dorsey Levens. It was a ‘one and one’, and I called one of my timeouts. I told my players, “Okay remember the power of positive thinking,” hoping it happens but never expecting it to.
They had just instituted the three-point line. If Dorsey missed his shot, we’ll fire up the court and if we don’t get a good shot, we’ll call a time out, draw up a play and get the ball in Michael Starks’ hands. He misses it, and Frank Starks his brother gets the rebound – the player who turned it over against Laettner and Nichols. We never let him shoot it beyond eight feet because he has no touch at all. He pulls up right in front of our bench – it was almost an NBA three – nothing but net, we go into overtime and we win the game going away. It was an incredible game.
That week after we won the State Championship for the public schools, we had to go back and play for the Federation Championship. We played two really good teams out of the Public School Athletic League in New York City – Samuel Gompers and then Nazareth out of Brooklyn who had Robert Phelps who went on and started at Arizona. We beat both of them and ended up 27-0 and I still think that’s a Western New York record. We had successes before then but nothing like that.
The Closing of LaSalle Senior High School and Retiring
Don’t get me wrong, Niagara Falls High School was built in the 1920s and it needed to be replaced, but if it were up to me, I would’ve built Niagara Falls a new high school downtown somewhere on Main Street to try to revitalize the inner-city area there. Leave us alone and let us have the 1,200-1,250 kids like we had. That was another amazing thing in New York State – you had some of these Class A schools who had 3,000 to 4,000 students, and we had 1,250 kids when we would go to Glens Falls and play some of these schools from around the state, and some of the New York City schools.
To me building that one big mega-school with the four towers was crazy. You had teachers who didn’t like each other. You had students who didn’t like each other because of the rivalry and that’s when I retired. Niagara Falls High School has only won one New York State title in 18 years with twice the enrollment since the two schools combined in 2001. That was the year they had Paul Harris and Jonny Flynn amongst other Division I players.
Coaching at Niagara Catholic after the closing of LaSalle Senior High School
“Coach I know you’re not going to the new high school. Would you be interested in helping us out at Niagara-Catholic?” When they tore LaSalle down in 2000, that was it for me, and because my wife was still working, the President of the Board of Trustees at Niagara Catholic Judge Bobby Restino reached out to me. I was down here vacationing in my condo in Naples, FL at the time during Easter when LaSalle was closing.
“You just hired a young guy who graduated from Niagara last year, and he did an okay job for the amount of talent that he had,” I said.
“Well if we can get a Pat Monti, we’d love to have you come in,” he replied.
“You know what, when I get back from Naples Judge, I’ll sit down and talk with you,” I said.
“Your gym is atrocious. You have to renovate it,” I told him – I had some demands.
“It’s in the budget for next year,” he said.
“Well if it can be done this year, I might consider it. Plus, I’d have to bring my assistant Frank Rotundo with me, and Modie Cox,” who was helping us at the time I continued.
“Let me bring it up to the board’s attention,” he said and did, and they agreed.
We were the little guy and I’ll never forget our first time playing St. Joe’s. We had some great run ins with St. Joe’s when I was at LaSalle, but I didn’t have that kind of talent when I was at Niagara Catholic. The year before I want to say that St. Joe’s beat Niagara-Catholic by 54 points. My first year at Niagara Catholic, we lost by two and it was like we had won the freaking NCAA championship and we lost the game.
I coached there three years while my wife was still working and had a lot of fun building up the Niagara Catholic program. Matty Clingersmith who is the really good Baseball Coach at Niagara Community College now. He’s taken them to the National Junior College Tournament just about every year – last year they lost in the National Championships. He was a junior the year before I arrived and sitting the bench at Niagara Catholic. We turned him into an All-Western New Yorker his senior year – he led us in points and rebounds and I want to say that we probably went 15-5 – the year before they might’ve gone 6-14.
The only schools we lost to were the big schools. That was the last head coaching I ever did. Even though in name I’m not the Head Coach, I’ve really called a lot of the shots most of the years I’ve been coaching down here. My system is in place – a lot of the ‘gimmick’ defenses I used to use to shut down big-time scorers, we still use down here. So, I did that at Niagara Catholic and I see this year they had a really good year.
Coach Monti on what should’ve been his first State Final Four team
I’ll be honest with you, what I thought should’ve been our first Final Four team in Glens Falls was our 1983-84 LaSalle team. I had an unbelievable team I thought – no tremendous size. Joe Etopio played at the University at Buffalo (UB) – a 6’4” kid with monster hands (pictured to the left in the middle). If you got him the ball inside, he either got a layup and got fouled, or he just got fouled. I had a really good point guard, “Rockin” Rodney Ingram (pictured above to Joe Etopio’s right). That should’ve been a Final Four team but unfortunately, we just had a bad break.
We played in “The Aud’” (Buffalo Memorial Auditorium) and we were leading South Park who was heavily favored by 15 points in the third quarter. Joe Etopio goes down with a horrendous “charley horse” cramp where he couldn’t even bend his leg so obviously I couldn’t play him. So, they worked on him, and worked on him, and little by little, South Park whittled the down the lead and towards the end they started fouling us – we missed so any freaking front ends of one and ones. It ended up becoming a one-point game with 15 seconds to go. I called a time out, and I asked Joe, “Do you think you can go back in and just throw a pass?” He said, “Yeah Coach I can do that.”
So just inside half court, I drew up an unbelievable ‘big box’ play with some ‘misdirects’. One of our non-scorers was Darnell Bones – a tremendous rebounder on that team and the least likely scorer out of the five starters. I ran a middle misdirect where they thought my guard was going to get the ball, but my guard basically threw a screen while my two big guys cleared out underneath. I had Joe Etopio throw a baseball pass from half court right to the rim to Darnell Bones.
To this day I can see this because there was no three-point shot at the time and I knew that if we got the ball in the backcourt they would foul us, and I didn’t want that the way we were shooting one and ones. I decided to get the three-point lead and the game would be over. With about 15 seconds to go, Joe threw a beautiful pass, the lane was totally cleared out – Rodney threw a beautiful screen on Bones who curls around, catches the ball and goes up.
Back in the day the expansions came off the floor – they’re not bolted to the ceilings the way we do it high school – they’re a little ‘loosey-goosey’. Darnell goes up and who knows why to this day – he was a strong kid at 6’2” – but instead of just laying the ball up, he slaps the backboard and the ball rolls arooound the rim and comes out. One of South Park’s many big guys – they had a big team, threw a full court pass down the left side, and this kid from South Park, their best player catches the ball on the left corner, fires it up on the buzzer and it freaking banks in and we lost by one! That should’ve been the first team to go.
On when the program became successful and point guard Tim Winn
Little by little each year, the persona of the team changed – everything was built around all of our point guards, and it culminated in the last two with Timmy Winn – he’s one of the kids we brought up as a seventh grader, an eighth grader, and then halfway through his ninth-grade season he was on the Varsity team. We went to Glens Falls all four years he played Varsity ball – I don’t know if anybody has ever done that. He played in Glens Falls four years in a row, and he was the MVP of the state tournament his junior and senior years.
He was a tremendous ‘lock down’ defender, and a scorer. His scoring was overshadowed by his defense, and he had a phenomenal career at St. Bonaventure. People think that he went to a little school – St. Bonaventure was a big-time basketball school. He was recruited by a lot of big schools. Bobby Cremins from Georgia Tech at the time which I called ‘Point Guard U’, they wanted him badly and that’s where I wanted him to go because I thought it would give him a better opportunity to play at the next level. He opted to go to St. Bonaventure because of Rob Lanier who played back in the day in Buffalo – Bob Lanier’s cousin – he’s the top assistant for Rick Barnes at Tennessee now.
He used to be with him at Texas, and I think Rob might’ve had a little coaching stint at Siena, but Timmy fell in love with him after he recruited him for Jim Barron who ended up going to Rhode Island. Timmy just like the proximity and being close to home – people could come and see him play in the “Atlantic 10 Conference” which is a good league, and Tim is now in their St. Bonaventure Hall of Fame. He played overseas, and in the old Continental Basketball Association and now he’s in Charlotte with a nice job at Wells-Fargo he’s got a nice family and is doing well.
As a matter of fact, I got inducted in my sixth Hall of Fame last December. I never even knew that Section VI had started a Hall of Fame, but somebody contacted me and said, “You know you’ve been nominated for the Section VI Hall of Fame.” I said, “What the hell are you talking about?” The person replied, “Oh about two to three years ago, they started a sports Hall of Fame and you’re going to be inducted on December 8, 2017.”
I couldn’t believe it, but Timmy drove up that morning from Charlotte to be there. Several of my former players showed up. The last year before the school closed, Dewitt Doss who starred at Canisius – a former gym teacher and now the Athletic Director in the Baltimore Public School System now – he also drove up from Baltimore to be there.
If I had my choice, I’d say give me a great point guard over a big man any day of the week at the high school level and you’ll win. That’s your coach on the floor. Point guards just step up and do the job! I saw in your article with Jason Rowe that we played Buffalo Traditional, but Timmy came up with a severely sprained ankle, and we still gave Traditional a heck of a game because of Jody Crymes and Terry Rich. I think they ended up beating us by three. At that time, those two kids were by far the two premier point guards in the area – Tim and Jason.
On Coaching and Teaching
There’s so much talent down here in Florida and I watch it and there’s no shot clock, but you can put in a 10 second shot clock the way that some of these teams play. It’s like being at the YMCA, it’s crazy – there’s hardly any real coaching going on – they just let them do what they want to do. I never allowed that. We did drills every day in practice – drill, drill, drill and drill again.
Whatever offenses or defenses we ran, we did it again, again, again and again until it became second nature. It was homework and I’d tell the kids, ‘This is what you need for tomorrow. This is your homework.’ I always used to say, ‘This is my classroom – the classroom after the classroom!’
I teared up at one of the hall of fames I got into – it might’ve been the Niagara Falls Sports Hall of Fame – one of my buddies who has since passed away, he was my presenter and the last thing he said before he called me up for my award was, ‘People probably don’t know this, but Coach Monti is a better classroom teacher than he is a basketball coach.’ That really resonated with me – it gave me goosebumps honest to God.
That’s probably why I never went to coach at college where I had some other coaching opportunities – nothing to blow your socks off, but I enjoyed the class room as much as I did the court from a teaching standpoint and that’s why I’m still doing it 50 years later – because I really enjoy sharing what I’ve learned and what I’ve been taught with these young coaches and these young players – teaching them the right way to play the game.
A special thank you is extended to Coach Pat Monti for taking the time out to discuss his story and the LaSalle basketball program. I’d also like to thank Coach Monti’s Wife Kathleen for proofreading this three-part series and polishing it up for us. In case you’ve missed them, see parts one and two of my interview with Coach Monti. Also see my interviews with legendary LaSalle point guard Tim Winn, legendary Buffalo Traditional point guard Jason Rowe, some of my personal basketball stories surrounding my book project, and a piece I wrote up regarding former college and professional basketball player Chris Herren who now tours and speaks about substance abuse and wellness for teens:
I intend to create more promotional/teaser pieces for The Engineers: A Western New York Basketball Story, both via print and video as I journey through the final steps of completing the book. I created a page on Big Words Authors for the purpose of giving a background of the book and grouping all the promotional pieces, such as this in one, for interested readers.
The Big Words LLC Newsletter
For the next phase of my writing journey, I’m starting a monthly newsletter for my writing and video content creation company, the Big Words LLC. In it, I plan to share inspirational words, pieces from this blog and my first blog, and select videos from my four YouTube channels. Finally, I will share updates for my book project The Engineers: A Western New York Basketball Story. Your personal information and privacy will be protected. Click this link and register using the sign-up button at the bottom of the announcement. If there is some issue signing up using the link provided, you can also email me at bwllcnl@gmail.com . Best Regards.
Two of the focuses of my blog are Financial Literacy and Money, and Business and Entrepreneurship. Henry Ford was one of the great ‘Industrial Titans’ whose visions laid the groundwork for the modern automobile industry and literally helped shape modern America. A lot can be learned from how he built is empire. The following contributed post is thus entitled; What Henry Ford Can Teach Us About Being An Entrepreneur.
Everyone should know who Henry Ford is and why he’s famous. He was the mastermind behind the giant corporation Ford, and his legacy lives on to this day. But, what a lot of people don’t know is that his journey was extremely rough. It’s certainly not a story of some young buck having a bright idea and shooting to success right away.
No, Ford went through plenty of hard times, which is why he’s the perfect person to study as an upcoming entrepreneur. If you’re thinking of starting a business – or have started one that’s failed – then you should pay attention to Ford’s story. Here are a few things you can learn from what happened to him:
Persistence Is Key
Unbeknownst to many, but Ford actually failed twice before he managed to successfully launch his Ford Motor Company. The two previous times, he struggled with juggling finances and promoting the business. Both times, he ended up losing money and had to file for bankruptcy.
Did this stop him? No! He came back a third time and look at what happened. The moral of the story is that persistence is vital. If you have an idea that you believe in, then don’t give up. Don’t let your failings take over and make you feel like you can’t succeed. Try again, learn from your errors, and you may end up getting it right.
Bankruptcy Offers A Second Chance
There’s a stigma surrounding the concept of bankruptcy, and it’s been around for years. Personally, I blame Monopoly! When you’re made bankrupt in that game, you lose all your money and are out of the game. So, we grow up assuming that this holds true for real life; file for bankruptcy, and that’s it, game over.
In reality, as Henry Ford has shown, bankruptcy can be helpful in some situations. As it explains on NY-Bankruptcy.com, it’s a debt solution to help you pay off creditors and get them off your back. Yes, there are plenty of hard times that come when you’re bankrupt. However, it doesn’t mean you’re left with no money and no home/job. A lot of the time, it can be used to give you a second chance. So, if your business ever fails and you’re made bankrupt, don’t take this to mean your chances of success are over in life!
Marketing A Business Is Essential
During his second attempt at starting a company, Ford had most things nailed down pretty well. He managed to balance the finances well, and the actual product was excellent. The issue was that people didn’t understand what it was, because he hadn’t marketed it correctly.
So, we need to learn from his mistakes and ensure we always market our businesses as effectively as possible. Ensure the consumer knows what you offer, and how it can benefit them. There is some handy advice on entrepreneur.com that can help you improve your marketing skills and promote your company.
The overall thing to take from Henry Ford’s success story is that good things don’t happen overnight. It will be a grind, and you may fail more than once. But, learn from your failures and don’t let them dictate your passage in life. If at first you don’t succeed, try, try, and try again.
Two of the key focuses of my blog are Business and Entrepreneurship and Technology. With so much business being conducted online these days, it’s important to understand how to best to protect your customers during online transactions. The following contributed post is thus entitled; Guaranteeing Customers’ Security When They Shop Online With You.
Online security used to only really apply to big-time businesses, as small businesses tended to operate through brick and mortar stores. They could simply accept cash payments and not worry about the technological world. But nowadays, increasing numbers of small business owners are taking to the web and operating online. No matter how small your business may be, if you are operating online, you really need to take customer safety seriously when it comes to taking payments. There are all sorts of individuals out there with bad intentions who would happily take a customer’s payment details and use them to purchase goods for themselves, or sell them on to others. However, if this is unfamiliar territory for you, you may feel a little bit lost when it comes to guaranteeing customer safety when processing sales and transactions online. But not to worry. Here are the basics that you need to know when it comes to protecting the individuals who choose to shop with you!
Using a Reliable Payment Gateway
One of the areas where customer information is most commonly leaked, or most commonly hacked into, is through a payment gateway. A payment gateway is a service that authorises credit and debit card payments, deducting funds from a customers’ account and depositing them into your account. In order to authorise this transaction, customers have to input their personal details (including name and address) and banking details (such as a card number, an expiry date, and a security number) into the payment gateway. By using a secure gateway, you can ensure that this information is safely collected without interference. Consider using a reliable service like BlueSnap. BlueSnap can work through both online and mobile devices, guaranteeing a positive experience for all of your customers. BlueSnap also keeps customers within your webpage when taking payments. This removes the need to redirect customers from your page to a separate payment page, reducing the risk of interference from cyber criminals along the way.
Accept Credit Card Payments
Many small businesses are reluctant to accept credit card payments, as you are likely to be charged more in order to process this transaction. This, of course, dips into your overall profits. However, many customers feel a lot more secure paying via credit card, as many credit companies offer to reverse charges for fraudulent transactions without a quibble. If you value making your customers feel safe and secure, it’s worth fronting the extra costs that come hand in hand with accepting credit card payments. Alternatively, you could pass the charge on to the customer (adding a set fee to credit card transactions). This means that you don’t make any loss, but the customer still has the choice to use this kind of payment method.
These are just a couple of different ways to guarantee your customers’ safety when they choose to shop online with you. Keep them at the forefront of your mind at all times and consider implementing them into your business plan in the near future!
