NEWARK, NJ – Two former Rutgers-Newark men's basketball graduate interns are headed to the NCAA Division I Championship Tournament after their current teams claimed conference titles.
Chuck Bridge, an assistant coach at Long Island University, and Nick Leonardelli, the manager of basketball operations at Bucknell University, helped their squads to tournament championships in the Northeast Conference and Patriot League playoffs, respectively. They were the first graduate interns under Rutgers-Newark head coach
Joe Loughran. They will join their teams on Sunday when the NCAA D-I Championship bracket is announced.
Bridge, the inaugural Scarlet Raider men's basketball intern in 2005-06, was LIU's manager of basketball operations from 2006-2008 before serving stints as an assistant coach at Trinity College and Dartmouth. He returned to the Blackbird staff this season to help LIU garner its third consecutive NEC Championship.
“Chuck comes from a basketball background as his father is a successful high school coach in Connecticut,” explains Loughran, “and Chuck was also a head coach at Wilbraham and Monson Academy prior to coming to Rutgers-Newark.
“He was hard working and dedicated to his job here at Rutgers-Newark and I knew he would be successful in moving ahead in college coaching. He is in a great position at LIU and working for head coach Jack Perri.”
A 2005 graduate of Springfield College with a degree in psychology, Bridge added a master's in social science from LIU in 2009.
Leonardelli followed Bridge as the Raider graduate intern in 2007-2009, helping the Raiders to their first-ever appearance in the NJAC Men's Basketball Championship game in 2009. After completing work on his master's degree at Rutgers-Newark in 2009, he went on to serve as an assistant at St. Lawrence University (2009-10) and St. Michael's College in Vermont (2010-11) before joining the Bucknell staff in 2011.
“Nick did an outstanding job for our program and was a tireless worker,” states Loughran. “Like Chuck, he comes from a very good basketball background. He played high school basketball for one of the most successful high school coaches in the state of New Jersey, Jim Bagland.
“And Nick was a solid player and a four-year letterwinner at Dickinson College. His great work ethic really rubbed off on our players because he was always working with our players to improve on their individual skill development. Nick also did a terrific job with scouting of opponents and, since he was from New Jersey, he had a really good understanding of how things worked with high school basketball.
“Like Chuck, I knew that Nick would move ahead in the business. He has found himself to be a great position working for Dave Paulson at Bucknell.”
