Arduini leaves tradition of sportsmanship

By Wilson Bailey

Over 50 years ago, a senior at Albany Bishop McGinn suited up for the second game of the season against cross-town rival La Salle. Vince Arduini, captain and starting defensive end, was on his way to playing next year at the collegiate level for a Patriot League school.

Arduini’s childhood was defined by trips to the factory where, for 40 years, his father operated the press that manufactured baseballs; muddy games of tackle football in a Magic-Markered Frank Gifford New York Football Giants jersey; and playing pickup basketball against the nuns in his junior high school (“The nuns were notorious. They loved sports”).

Committing to play football at Holy Cross in Worcester, Massachusetts, was a dream years in the making.

And then, on one of his many quarterback pressures of the night, Arduini shattered his leg — and with it, all hopes of competing for a Division I program.

“The doctor said to forget about playing football in college,” Arduini said. “I told him that I wasn’t going out that way.”

Weeks later, still in a cast, Arduini met a coach from Norwich, a Division III university in rural Vermont. Despite his injury, the coach made him an offer, and Arduini jumped at the opportunity.

By the time his playing career ended, he had earned All-New England and All-American Honorable Mention honors and was eventually inducted into the Norwich Athletics Hall of Fame.

“That’s really where it all started,” Arduini said. “If a coach hadn’t taken the chance on me, who knows if I’d spend 47 years in athletics.”

After graduating with a business degree, Arduini briefly mowed lawns for the city of Albany before his old principal, Sister Teresa Murphy, caught wind that he was in town and made him an offer to teach and coach at his alma mater.

After 47 years in athletics, including stints at Harvard, Davidson and Kenyon Colleges, Vince Arduini is retiring. His 12 years were the winningest era in School history.

“Mowing lawns or coaching? The choice was obvious.”

With his teacher’s salary from Bishop McGinn, Arduini bought a used 1973 Monte Carlo, which accompanied him for the first half of his coaching career.

He returned to Norwich for a year to work as a graduate assistant before moving on to Davidson College in North Carolina where he split time between working as an unpaid defensive line coach and a paid job as a host at a snack bar called the 900 Room.

“My dad was an Italian immigrant. He worked in a baseball factory.” Arduini said. “He didn’t understand how I was working for nothing, but I loved it. I was stubborn.”

Arduini came back to Vermont as an offensive coordinator and head wrestling coach, the latter of which he had zero experience.

“The first wrestling match I watched was my first as a head coach of a college program,” Arduini said. “That’s when I really came to respect head coaches and other sports.”

In 1986, Harvard College head coach Joe Restic named Arduini the defensive line coach, making him the youngest member of the staff. Arduini spent 12 years with the Crimson, later becoming the recruiting director. Arduini credits Restic for instilling the values most fundamental to his coaching style.

“Coach Restic is who, subconsciously, I’ve tried to emulate the most,” Arduini said. “When he walked into a room, it was just class. He represented doing things the respectful way, the right way.”

Arduini moved to Ohio to become the head coach at Kenyon College in 1995.

“Recruiting became my life during those eight years,” Arduini said. “The team struggled, but we had a good staff of coaches.”

When he left Ohio, Arduini began his second act in athletics as an administrator. He spent a decade at Pine Crest School in Florida before coming to St. John’s in 2011. During his 12-year tenure as Director of Athletics, St. John’s has won more than at any time in the School’s history, and during that span, claimed more titles than any SPC team — an unmatched 55 SPC Championships and numerous Director’s Cups, honoring the top overall boys', girls', and co-ed programs.

“The championships — that’s all fine,” Arduini said. “It’s about being the standard bearer for sportsmanship and class in the SPC, and I think I’ve done that.”

Even though Arduini will be giving up riding around in his trademark golf cart, he says that he will continue to follow the Mavericks.

“I’ll still be around,” Arduini said. “My wife and I are planning on coming to a lot of games next year.”

True to form, Arduini will spend his “retirement” coaching offensive line for a football team to be named later.

“I thought I’d have some catching up to do,” Arduini said. “But at the end of the day, football is blocking at the line of scrimmage.”