City/Suburban Hoops Report Coach of the Year: Marist's Brian Hynes

There is a short list of programs that warrant the dubious status of the best to have never reached the IHSA State Finals.

The list has shrunk by one. Marist is no longer on it.

Marist basketball has been a consistent winner, particularly over the past 35 years, dating back to coach Ken Styler’s teams in the 1990s and coach Gene Nolan winning six regional championships and averaging 22 wins a year from 2004-2018.

Even before this season, current coach Brian Hynes had won 24, 29 and a school record 31 wins with a pair of regional championships over the past three years.

All that winning — over nearly four decades worth — ultimately ended in sectional losses. The RedHawks just could never quite get over the hump.

There was the sectional overtime loss to Thornton in 2004.

The dramatic 2012 run included postseason wins over bitter rival Brother Rice in the regional and beating the No. 2 and No. 3 seeds, Curie and Bogan, before running into Jabari Parker and Simeon in the sectional final.

It was Simeon again as the sectional roadblock in 2017 and 2018.

And last year it was the heartbreaking defeat to Rich when the Redhawks, who led by 15 points at one point, fell 86-85 in the sectional semis.

As an assistant under Nolan from 2007-2018, Hynes said he had a good perspective on what the program faced in breaking through.

“As an assistant for so long with such a good head coach and such great teams, I have an appreciation for just how hard it is once you get into the sectional type of stuff in that particular sectional,” Hynes said.

Hynes admitted that once he became the head coach, it did become about winning a sectional. It became a focal point, to the point where the current team locked in on rewriting the history.

“All of these high school gyms, including at Marist, you see all the banners listing all the championships in all the different sports,” Hynes said. “At Marist it has this lonely 81 up on the wall for basketball sectionals.”

Hynes said there were a couple of team meetings after practice during the early stages of the state playoff run where the team took time to look up at the banner in the gym. Together they discussed adding a number to the 1981 sectional championship on the banner.

“Putting that number next to that 81 up there was a big deal to me,” said Hynes, whose brothers and his own kids attended Marist.

Hynes indicated he felt the sectional weight as the RedHawks fell short last year. It would only intensify as the hype for this year’s team continued to build in the preseason. And he is self-aware enough to know some scrutiny can come with how Marist lost last year.

“When you’re up 15, then up five with a minute to go, and then lose in overtime with a talented team like we had,” said Hynes, reflecting back to last year’s sectional loss to Rich. “If you are a basketball fan, and you see a lead lost like that, you do sometimes look at the coach. I looked at myself in that one.”

Hynes said the relief he felt when beating Rich in the regional this season was “enormous.”

“I felt it on my shoulders, I do know that, especially when I felt like I had a big part in why we lost to Rich the year before,” Hynes said.

That win over Rich set the tone for the remainder of the postseason, including far surpassing what any Marist team had ever done before.

The RedHawks not only won their first sectional championship in 45 years, but they reached the State Finals for the first time ever, taking down East Suburban Catholic Conference nemesis Benet to capture a state championship.

As a result, Hynes is the 2026 City/Suburban Hoops Report Coach of the Year. And the standard of Marist basketball has been raised.

“You talk with kids about how everything in life is on the other side of hard,” Hynes said. “We practiced hard. We prepared hard. These players got to feel that if I work hard, life can be really good. It doesn’t always work that way. We worked hard last year and faced some pain in that loss. But for them to be able to experience what they did after all the hard work is what is so satisfying.”

The work Hynes put in was a huge part as well.

He nurtured a team while figuring out who needed an arm around them or a kick in the butt, who was feeling too good or not feeling good enough. There was tinkering and toying with what was a very talented and experienced team, including a new-found higher level of defense and toughness.

He not only navigated injuries and starters being out in the middle of the season, but also took on the weight and pressure of the monkey on Marist basketball’s back. Bundle all that together with high expectations and the haunting loss of last season, and it was a lot.

Then there was the rematch with Benet, a team that appeared to be a runaway train and hadn’t lost a game in three months.

Marist allowed a whopping 77 points in a home loss to Benet in the final week of the regular season. They then held the defending state champs and top-ranked team to just 28 in the 4A title game a little over four weeks later.

Marist felt it needed to scheme differently. Hynes and the RedHawks took what he called a “completely different approach” to defending Benet in the second matchup.

In Champaign, Marist refused to let Jayden Wright beat them, taking him out of the game as much as possible by trapping the high ball screen. Then the speed, size and athleticism from Stephen Brown allowed Marist to defend 7-footer Colin Stack on the roll.

“These guys just came together, executed,” Hynes said. “Over the last month of the season, I kept thinking how I didn’t want it to end because they are such a great group of kids.”

He knows, recognizes and appreciates the past. He is fully cognizant of how Marist basketball was built to be a state champion.

“I do think about Gene Nolan,” Hynes said of the former head coach who is now running the Naperville North program. “He put his heart and soul into this place. He laid the foundation of something that I was able to capitalize on.”

But now Hynes’ perspective will need to shift again, and he knows it. Hynes doesn’t want the program to be a flash in the pan.

“I also don’t want it to be that we peaked,” Hynes said of the program. “We want to be there at the top. We all just learned how hard it is to get there and the amount of work it takes to get there. You don’t get a 10-point advantage next year because you won a state championship. But this buzz will end.”

Spoken like a true Coach of the Year.

“I think with state championships, it’s probably even more appreciated a decade from now, when you can look back and it’s still there,” Hynes said. “These kids and the Marist community will have this forever.”

Past City/Suburban Hoops Report’s Coach of the Year

2026: Brian Hynes, Marist

2025: Conte Stamas, Brother Rice

2024: Tom Kleinschmidt, DePaul Prep

2023: Jim Thomas, Downers Grove North

2022: Jason Opoka, Glenbard West

2021: Tom Kleinschmidt, DePaul Prep

2020: Tai Streets, Thornton

2019: Mike Oliver, Curie

2018: Mike Ellis, Evanston

2017: Mike Healy, Wheaton South

2016: Gene Heidkamp, Benet

2015: Phil Ralston, Geneva

2014: Tom Livatino, Loyola

2013: Mike Taylor, Marian Catholic

2012: Robert Smith, Simeon

2011: Scott Miller, Glenbard East

2010: Gene Heidkamp, Benet

2009: Ron Ashlaw, Waukegan

2008: John Chappetto, Richards

2007: Pat Ambrose, Stevenson

2006: Gordie Kerkman, West Aurora

2005: David Weber, Glenbrook North

2004: Roy Condotti, Homewood-Flossmoor

2003: Bob Curran, Thornwood

2002: Rick Malnati, New Trier

2001: Conte Stamas, Lyons

2000: Dave Lohrke, Glenbard South

1999: Gene Pingatore, St. Joseph

1998: Mark Lindo, Naperville North

1997: Gordie Kerkman, West Aurora

1996: Rocky Hill, Thornton