Turgeon Adds Spinelli to Coaching Staff
Apr 16, 2007 | Men's Basketball
April 16, 2007
Veteran coach Scott Spinelli has been named associate head men's basketball coach at Texas A&M, first-year Head Coach Mark Turgeon said Monday.
Spinelli joins Alvin "Pooh" Williamson on Turgeon's A&M staff. Turgeon introduced Williamson at the press conference when he was hired on April 10.
"Coach Spinelli is a guy who lives to recruit ? he loves everything about recruiting and is really good at it," Turgeon said. "He will open up as lot of doors for us nationally and globally that will help us build an even stronger program at Texas A&M."
"I'm excited to be able to continue working with Coach Turgeon, who is undoubtedly one of the best young coaches in college basketball," Spinelli said. "I'm also thrilled to be back in the Big 12, which is one of the top conferences in the country. We want to continue to build on the recent success A&M has had."
Spinelli served one season as associate head coach under Turgeon last year at Wichita State. Prior to that, he was an assistant at Nebraska for three seasons, when he helped land two nationally-ranked recruiting classes. He was the Cornhuskers' associate head coach in 2005-06. Among the players he signed at Nebraska were All-Big 12 center Aleks Maric.
From 2001-03, Spinelli was an assistant coach and recruiting coordinator at Loyola University in Chicago. He helped the Ramblers to 32 wins over two seasons (2001-02 and 2002-03) - the program's most in a two-year span since the mid-1980s - including a berth in the championship game of the 2002 Horizon League Tournament.
Spinelli recruited and developed Paul McMillan, a junior college transfer who won the Horizon League's Newcomer-of-the-Year Award in 2003. His first recruiting class for the Ramblers also included Terrance Whiters, who was ranked among the top 70 overall prospects in the country and among the top 20 point guards nationally by ESPN.com.
Spinelli was recognized as one of the top 10 assistant coaches in the country by CollegeInsider.com in the Fall of 2002.
Before joining the Ramblers, Spinelli spent one year as a scout for the Philadelphia 76ers, evaluating players in the Big East and Atlantic 10 conferences, along with high school players from the Northeast.
Spinelli also served as an assistant coach for Cincinnati of the International Basketball League (IBL) in 1999-2000, helping the Stuff to an Eastern Conference regular-season championship.
Prior to his work in the IBL, Spinelli spent two years as associate head coach (1997-99) at American University in Washington, D.C., where he was responsible for two nationally recognized recruiting classes.
Spinelli's first collegiate coaching stop came at Wyoming in 1996-97.
He began his coaching career on the prep level in 1990 at the Mildford Academy, where he spent three seasons. In 1993, Spinelli started the basketball program at The Winchendon School in Winchendon, Mass., where he produced several Division I products. The school remains one of the top prep schools in the Northeast.
The Leominster, Mass., native earned his bachelor's degree from Boston University in 1989. As a student-athlete, Spinelli initially walked on with the Terriers before earning a scholarship as a point guard under Mike Jarvis, who went on to a successful stint as head coach at St. John's University.
Spinelli and his wife, Lynn, have three children, Gianna, Gabriel and Joseph.
