Bishop Canevin fires 1st-place boys basketball coach in middle of his 1st season

By: Chris Harlan
Monday, January 29, 2024 | 10:26 PM

The Bishop Canevin boys basketball team is close to clinching a section title, but the Crusaders will finish their season with a different coaching staff.

First-year coach Damien Cornish said he and his assistants were let go Monday after meeting with school administrators who told him “the player and parent experience wasn’t on the trajectory where the program wanted to go.”

Cornish said he understood their message to mean his coaching style was “too abrasive for them,” and acknowledged receiving a one-game suspension for throwing a water bottle. But Cornish said he also believed complaints from parents over playing time were a factor.

Bishop Canevin hired Cornish last summer to replace Tim McConnell, who resigned after one season.

“Some of the parents had issues, but parents are always going to have issues, especially when their kid is not the main focus or the star,” Cornish said. “They felt there was a disconnect there. In the first year with a program, you’re going to go through some things and learn by trial and error. But to not even get to finish the season is just shocking.”

Principal Michael Joyce and athletic director Dale Checkett did not immediately return messages seeking comment.

The basketball team is 8-8 overall but owns a 5-0 record in Section 2-2A that has the Crusaders alone in first place. The team’s next game is Friday at Propel Braddock Hills.

To replace Cornish, Canevin brought back former assistant Aaron McGee as coach. McGee was coaching as an assistant at Moon under Gino Palmosina, a former Canevin head coach.

“I’ve been playing sports since third grade and I’ve never heard of a grade school or high school coach being fired in the middle of the season unless it’s something super egregious,” Cornish said.

Cornish said the school’s administration suspended him one game earlier this month for throwing a water bottle during a game, but he had returned to the bench for a few games and believed the incident was behind him. Cornish said he was frustrated with his own “over-coaching error” when he threw the bottle.

“I had to call a timeout, and out of frustration, I threw a water bottle on the sideline,” he said. “On my end, it doesn’t look good doing that. … I had to do some training, wrote a paper and came back with a different approach for some things. I wear my heart on my sleeve. It’s no excuse, but I had a water bottle in my hand and I threw it. It wasn’t at anybody and didn’t hit anybody.”

Cornish said his bottle throw didn’t draw a technical foul, and later he apologized to the players, parents, staff and the athletic director. Now, Cornish said, he believed that incident might be used against him by administrators to justify his dismissal.

But Cornish said there was disagreement with some parents throughout the season over playing time.

“For some of the parents, their kid enjoying the season is them playing,” he said. “Not earning that right, but just playing, period, because they’re on the team. My biggest message before the season was, ‘Your playing is earned in practice.’ We have kids who constantly miss practice … and when you’re not in practice, you don’t know the plays and aren’t giving the best effort.”

Cornish said there was a sentiment among some Bishop Canevin parents that everybody on the roster was entitled to playing time, and he disagreed.

“Being at a small Catholic school, it’s even more so when the parent is paying money for their kid to go to school,” he said. “They feel like, ‘Hey, if I’m putting my money toward it, I want to see a return.’ That return, they feel, is playing time.”

Cornish previously coached at Propel Braddock Hills and said Monday he was hopeful to coach again in the future, but was concerned this dismissal would be viewed as a mark on his record.

“I have to try to protect my reputation,” he said. “No coach gets let go in the middle of the season, so that’s going to raise a red flag for people.”

Chris Harlan is a TribLive reporter covering sports. He joined the Trib in 2009 after seven years as a reporter at the Beaver County Times. He can be reached at charlan@triblive.com.

Tags: Bishop Canevin