Profile of Tom Brennan on Famous Like Me

Tom Brennan was the head coach of the University of Vermont Catamounts men's basketball team from 1986 to 2005. Raised in Phillipsburg, New Jersey, Brennan graduated as the all-time leading scorer at Phillipsburg Catholic High School. Brennan graduated from the University of Georgia in 1971, where as a senior he received the men's basketball team leadership award. Brennan is often said to be Vermont's most famous personality, even more so than former governor and presidential candidate Howard Dean.

He began his coaching after graduating in the fall of 1971 as a graduate assistant at Georgia under Ken Rosemond. Sandwiched around a year as head basketball and baseball coach at Division III Fairleigh Dickinson University in Madison, New Jersey, Brennan was an assistant under college basketball legends Rollie Massimino at Villanova, Bill Raftery at Seton Hall and Bruce Parkhill at William & Mary. In 1982 he was named head coach at Yale where he crafted a four-year record of 46-58 including back-to-back seasons of 14-12 and 13-13. At Yale he coached players such as Butch Graves and NBA veteran Chris Dudley.

In his 19 years of coaching at UVM, Brennan has never lost a Vermont native via scholarship to another Division I school.

Tom also co-hosts a morning radio show in Burlington, Vermont called the "Corm and the Coach Show" on WCVP-FM 101.5. The show scores higher ratings than both Howard Stern and Don Imus. Brennan delivers Saturday Night Live-style sports reports and weighs in on basketball, politics, entertainment, local news and psychology. The Coach’s repertoire also includes live, pre-dawn wake-up calls to his players and coaching colleagues. In 1996 and 2000, his radio show received the Vermont Associated Press award for the state's top radio sports feature. In the 2003 and 2004 off-seasons, he also was a co-host on several ESPN national radio shows. The radio show has made Brennan among the most recognized and popular personalities in all of Vermont.

Accomplishments

-Led team to a defeat of Syracuse in the first round of the 2005 NCAA tournament
-2004 America East Champions
-2003 America East Champions
-2002 America East Regular Season Champions
-2004 Collegeinsider.com Final National Mid Major Poll- 24th
-2004 Associated Press Final National Poll- also receiving votes
-2002 Collegeinsider.com Final National Mid Major Poll- 24th
-CollegeInsider.com National Outstanding Achievement Award, 2002
-America East Coach of the Year, 1991, 1998 and 2002
-NABC District I (New England) Coach of the Year, 1991 and 2002
-All-Time Leader in Games Coached At Vermont
-Second All-Time in Victories At Vermont
-His 19 year-tenure is the longest of any coach in the history of the America East and he is tied for the longest current stint at one school among New England Division I programs.
-2000 Doggie Julian Award for Distinguished Service in New England College Basketball (N.E. Coaches Association).
-Of the 56 head coaches who began with their school in 1986-87, just three—Brennan, Jim Calhoun of UConn and Fang Mitchell of Coppin State—were still at the same program in 2004-05. In 2003-04, Brennan was one of just 18 of the current coaches to serve at the same Division I school for 17 or more seasons.

Family

Brennan and his wife, Lynn reside on Lake Champlain in Colchester, Vermont. He has two children: Kelly, who graduated from UVM in 1993 and is married to Brady Frost, a former Catamount standout pitcher; and Brian who was a standout guard at Indiana (Pa.) University, which reached the NCAA D-II Elite Eight in 2000. In the winter of 2002-03, Brennan became a grandfather and now has two grandsons, Brennan and Caleb.

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