Mount St. Dominic turns to “Essex guy” Dorflaufer as next girls basketball coach

• Updated: Aug. 07, 2024, 7:58 p.m.
• |Published: Aug. 07, 2024, 6:10 p.m.

Brian Dorflaufer is the new girls basketball coach at Mount St. Dominic

Brandon Dorf Photography

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• Jason Bernstein | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com

As a self-professed “Essex County Guy,” Brian Dorflaufer is aware of the past success Mount St. Dominic’s basketball program has experienced.

Armed with that knowledge along a resume of working alongside several accomplished coaches as an assistant, Dorflaufer is set to try to return the Lions to their winning ways.

Dorflaufer was formally announced as the next Mount St. Dominic head girls basketball coach on Wednesday in a press release sent out by the school.

“It’s just a storied program,” Dorflaufer said. “You have the 1994 Tournament of Champions run and afterwards what Coach (Jerry) Aquino built in the 2000s. There’s a lot of tradition here.

“The Mount is an attractive place to play. It’s got phenomenal facilities and our administration, our athletic director do an outstanding job to give us the support we need.”

The 31-year-old Livingston High School graduate comes to The Mount with more than 12 seasons of high school basketball coaching on his resume, highlighted by a two-year stint (2021-23) as the head coach of Verona, where his teams went 31-21.

“We’re excited to have Coach Dorflaufer on board here at Mount St. Dominic,” said Athletic Director Lornezno Sozio. “He comes with a tremendous amount of high school coaching experience at all levels.”

Last season, Dorflaufer served as an assistant coach at Randolph to Mark Cacciacarne. More than a decade earlier, Dorflaufer’s coaching career started under Cacciacarne when the latter was the head boys coach at West Orange.

Cacciacarne is one of multiple head coaches that Dorflaufer worked under and says helped influence him as coach, a list that includes Hall of Fame boys coach Greg Tynes as well as Todd Hartman, Liam Carr and TJ Jones.

“I’ve seen a lot. I’ve seen what successful programs look like,” said Dorflaufer, thanking Sozio and Mount St. Dominic Principal Karen D’Avino for the opportunity. . “It’s a long resume, it’s one that’s bounced around, but all the guys, I take a bunch from each of them and they’ve all shown me what it takes to build a successful program.”

Since Aquino stepped down in 2016 after more than 300 wins, Mount St. Dominic has struggled to return to its previous success. The Lions have enjoyed a winning record just two times in the last 11 seasons and haven’t reached the semifinals of the Essex County or Non-Public, North A tournaments since 2014.

Dorflaufer and this current group of Lions don’t need to look far however to know what type of success is possible at the school. Several members of last season’s 12-14 girls basketball team were contributors to one of The Mount’s Non-Public, North A championship teams in soccer and softball.

“At the school) we do have our pillars of success and what needs to be done on a day-to-day basis,” said Dorflaufer, Special Education and Technology teacher at Memorial Middle School in Cedar Grove. “And if you can succeed at Mount St. Dominic as a student, then you should be able to excel and be a different caliber athlete. Our softball team has shown that year in and year out, and our soccer team showed that last year. Our other coaches do an outstanding job.

“I can tell you my teams will play hard. We will compete, we will be physical and we will play the game the right way. We will respect the game, respect our opponents. I can guarantee, tooth and nail, that we will compete.”

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