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Who Is This Famous Coach? Sam Budnyk/Cardinal Newman


OldSchoolLion

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No hs football coach in FL history has won as many games without a state title.   He spent well over 40 years at one private school and led them to 275+ football wins.   During that time, his teams only made it past the second round once.  Just shows that success is not always measured in titles....and that if this private school recruited, they did a really lousy job.:rolleyes:  As a coach, he also led his school to several state softball titles. 

He was a pioneer of minority and women's rights.  He was the first private school coach/AD to:

  • hire an African-American assistant coach in Florida
  • play an All-Black school in his county
  • allow a girl to run track in his county  

Who is this man and where did he coach?

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Damn, I knew this one cold... 
Always a shame that the FHSAA does not recognize the slow pitch softball state championships in their record books. Softball complex at Cardinal Newman is named after him as well.
I think I used him as one our Who is this Coach last year... took a while for people to know who it was.

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4 minutes ago, gatorman-uf said:

Damn, I knew this one cold... 
Always a shame that the FHSAA does not recognize the slow pitch softball state championships in their record books. Softball complex at Cardinal Newman is named after him as well.
I think I used him as one our Who is this Coach last year... took a while for people to know who it was.

That's actually how I knew it was because I remembered that discussion and as soon as he mentioned the 40 year part as well as softball it instantly clicked

 

Isn't something at football also named after him?

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I might be in the minority on this one, but I don't view a successful high school coach as a coach that won state championships. That might be the metric used to compare college or NFL coaches.

These days a team that consistently wins state championships is typically due to the fact they recruit the best talent in their area and in modern times it's quietly becoming the state and in some teams cases the nation.

I've always been of the impression since I was at St. Petersburg Catholic back in the very early 2000's that high school coaches are far more important to the development of young men. I imagine the players that played for Mr. Budnyk would consider him a champion even if he doesn't have a ring that says "State" on it.

I remember reading about Coach Budnyk in the Palm Beach Post in the mid 2000's before his retirement. Sounds like an amazing individual from a different generation that was able to adapt to the changing times.

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12 hours ago, gatorman-uf said:

Follow-up

What 20+ season professional football player started his career at Cardinal Newman?

Not many players can play over 20 years in the NFL and the most common position that somehow does it is kicker or punter because they don't take the same physical punishment that other positions have to face 

 

So I'm gonna go with one who played a long time and played in South Florida and i think he did play at Cardinal Newman

 

I'm going with John Carney, it's a shame that with such a long and accomplished career one of his biggest moments was missing a XP that spoiled what would have been one of craziest plays to potentially keep the New Orleans Saints slim playoff chances alive when they played the Jags

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1 hour ago, SPCjessica2004 said:

I might be in the minority on this one, but I don't view a successful high school coach as a coach that won state championships. That might be the metric used to compare college or NFL coaches.

These days a team that consistently wins state championships is typically due to the fact they recruit the best talent in their area and in modern times it's quietly becoming the state and in some teams cases the nation.

I've always been of the impression since I was at St. Petersburg Catholic back in the very early 2000's that high school coaches are far more important to the development of young men. I imagine the players that played for Mr. Budnyk would consider him a champion even if he doesn't have a ring that says "State" on it.

I remember reading about Coach Budnyk in the Palm Beach Post in the mid 2000's before his retirement. Sounds like an amazing individual from a different generation that was able to adapt to the changing times.


Attending High School in the Palm Beach area, everybody knew who Coach Budnyk was. A former Marine, no non-sense, who cared deeply about his players, didn't put up with anything from them. Some of my friends who played for him hated him because he wasn't a players' coach. He expected results. Others would still run through walls for the man if he asked them to. He used to help a lot I think the Lou Groza Award (Best Kicker in College which is presented by the Palm Beach Sports Commission) and the local version of it. 

Newman has never been a consistent powerhouse. They win games consistently against the lesser large public schools in the Palm Beach area, but not good enough to ever really make it. Many years ago, I went to a Cardinal Newman vs Pahokee game at Cardinal Newman back in 1998. Anquan Boldin was a senior that year and Cardinal Newman had a QB/S named Abram Elam (his son just signed with UF while playing at Benjamin School and his brother Matt Elam played for Dwyer/UF/Ravens). This was billed as a star power game, but nobody had any real doubts of the eventual winner (Pahokee). I wish I could say that Newman put up a good game, but I remember leaving early in the 4th quarter because of how lopsided the game was.  That is kinda how Newman has always been, one or two good athletes, a bunch of guys who just play with no real idea that they will play again after high school.  They are good enough to beat average big schools, but not great schools. As a result, 1st or 2nd round eliminations consistently.

 

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