Boston Globe/SPORTSWEST
July 11, 2004

Jamie Pinzino building a baseball team
By Marvin Pave, Globe Staff

Marlborough native Jamie Pinzino is a busy young man this summer, both as coach of the Northborough American Legion team and new head coach of the varsity baseball team at Assumption College in Worcester.

Oh, there's also his marriage to Cheryl Milligan on Aug. 7, which will celebrate the union of two varsity coaches. Milligan coaches the women's softball team at the couple's alma mater, Tufts University.

''Right now, I'm just starting to get into the recruiting process," said Pinzino, 29, a former basketball and baseball standout at St. John's High in Shrewsbury. ''I'm identifying promising players who will be seniors in high school this fall, and I just finished instructing at Assumption's summer baseball camp, which included about 100 youngsters from ages 8 to 16."

One of the fringe benefits of taking over the Assumption program is that Pinzino's younger sister, Sarah, is a senior at the college.

''I'm sure we'll be having a few dinners together and I'm looking forward to seeing her on campus," he said.
Sarah, who uses a wheelchair and leg braces because of spina bifida, has been an inspiration to her brother, who in 1997 helped organize a fund-raising effort that brought in more than $100,000 to provide an elevator at Hudson Catholic High School to make the facility handicapped-accessible. One of the fund-raisers was a softball game put together by Milligan that included Pinzino's sister Kate, a 2002 graduate of Wheaton College and an assistant softball coach at Tufts this past season on Milligan's staff.

Pinzino's sports resume is also impressive: He played for veteran coaches Bob Foley (basketball) and Bill White (baseball) at St. John's; both teams won Central Mass. championships his senior year in 1993.

''That was Coach White's first Central Mass. title, and one of my favorite memories was scoring the winning run against Holy Name in that game," he recalled. ''One of the local papers took a picture of that play, and I never get tired of seeing it."

White, now alumni director at St. John's, is a former Assumption College outfielder.

Pinzino, who won the Pioneer Award for his contribution to the baseball team while at St. John's, was a three-year starter at third base for Tufts and a four-year letterman. While with the varsity under coach John Casey of Milford, Pinzino played on three teams that won the Eastern College Athletic Conference championship and another (1995) that qualified for the NCAA Division 3 tournament. He was an assistant baseball coach at Tufts for the 2003 and 2004 seasons.

''It's been a goal of mine since I got out of school to become a head coach at the college level," said Pinzino. ''And getting the Assumption job is kind of like going back home. They only won eight games last spring, but they play in a tough league [the Northeast-10 Conference], and they've got some pretty decent players. And now it's my job to provide more depth and more pitching to the roster."   

Incoming freshman prospects at Assumption include pitcher Rory Ahern from Shrewsbury; pitcher-first baseman Jeff Ayers from Medfield; pitcher-infielder Paul Cherchia from Medway; pitcher-infielder Tony Coppola from Milford; outfielder Tom Goulet from Grafton; catcher Sean Kelly of Milford and Worcester Academy; and pitcher Chris O'Grady, a graduate of Bellingham.

''I loved the college game," added Pinzino, who won the Elias Memorial Prize Scholarship his senior year for his athletic, community, and scholarly . ''There was a great bond between the players, and my best friends today are the guys I played with at Tufts."

After college graduation, Pinzino was an assistant coach with the Westborough Legion before becoming head coach of the Northborough team, which has consistently played above .500 during his tenure.

In 1998, when Tufts assistant Paul Svagdis took the head baseball job at California Pomona-Pitzer, Pinzino was his assistant. A year later, Pinzino became an assistant baseball coach at St. John's in Shrewsbury, and in 2002 he was an assistant at Holy Cross College, where his friend, Craig Najarian of Westborough, was recently named head baseball coach.

''Craig was an assistant with the Westborough Legion and at Holy Cross with me, so I'm really happy for him," said Pinzino, who noted that Assumption and Holy Cross will play each other next season. ''Central Mass. is a real good area for baseball, and I've known a lot of the players who have gone on to the college ranks from there. Right now, the only pressure I feel is to get off to a positive start. My immediate goal is that whatever our record is, no team is going to outwork us."