NJCAA Men's Basketball Coaches Association inducts three
Charlotte, NC – The NJCAA has announced three honorees to be inducted into the NJCAA Men's Basketball Coaches Association Hall of Fame. Two coaches and one contributor have been selected to join the honorable 2024 class. Read below for more on Paul Cisek, Kevin O'Connor, and Ed Janka.
Paul Cisek | Coach | Brookdale Community College (NJ)
Paul Cisek is in his 33rd season as the Head Coach of the Brookdale Community College men's basketball team. He currently has an overall coaching record of 660-284 with a .700-win percentage and in 2018 amassed a perfect 34-0 season with the Jersey Blues, the first ever in program history.
Cisek has been awarded the Garden State Athletic Conference Coach of the Year 12 times, Region 19 Coach of the Year eight times, NJCAA National Coach of the Tournament two times, and NJCAA Division III Men's Basketball Coach of the Year once. He has led the Jersey Blues to six NJCAA national tournament appearances with three National Championship titles in 2013, 2018, and 2023. He has coached several National Players of the Year, All-Americans, and Conference Players of the Year throughout his career and in 2021 was inducted into the Upstate New York Basketball Hall of Fame.
Prior to Brookdale, Cisek coached at Paul Smith's Junior College where he also served as Director of Student Activities and was named Mid-East Region 4 Coach of the Year. He was also the assistant coach at Potsdam State University and Oswego State with graduate assistant positions at Wagner College and Monmouth College.
Kevin O'Connor | Coach | North Platte Community College (NE)
Kevin O'Connor has served 38 years at North Platte Community College taking on the roles of athletic director, coach, and mathematics instructor. In his role as head coach of the men's basketball team, O'Connor has led the Knights to two NJCAA national tournament appearances. The Knights have advanced to the Region 9 semifinals 11 times while advancing to the championship games four times. With 22 Nebraska Community College Athletic Conference (NCCAC) championship titles, O'Connor has been named NCCAC Coach of the Year over twenty times, Region 9 Coach of the Year four times, and in 2013 was named the Omaha World Herald's Male College Coach of the Year.
O'Connor currently holds the record at North Platte for the best winning percentage with his 1989-90 team who went 28-4 on the season with an 87.5 winning percentage. In the 2018-19 season, O'Connor became the all-time leader in Region 9 men's basketball history and currently holds a coaching record of 732-420.
Outside of coaching, O'Connor serves as the Region 9 Men's Assistant Director and serves on the NJCAA Division I Men's Basketball Committee and the NJCAA Division I Men's Golf Committee. He is also a member of the National Association of Basketball Coaches.
Ed Janka | Contributor
Ed Janka experienced great success in his time as a coach. With coaching positions at Marquette, John Carroll, Oberlin, and Fairfield, Janka continuously pursued his love of basketball. During his extensive coaching career, he also had an international coaching stint in Italy.
In 1974, Janka began running coaching clinics with the hope of educating coaches and players on the game of basketball, and in 1985 began working in Nike's college basketball marketing department where he met Michael Jordan, whom he would later run several fantasy camps with. He was influential in helping the NJCAA Men's Basketball Coaches Association host their All-Star game in Las Vegas in conjunction with his Nike Championship basketball clinic for over 10 years as well as the Hall of Fame banquet. Janka also played an integral role in introducing the Coaches Association to Nike, which has provided apparel and gear for the All-Star game.
In 2016, after over 45 years of coaching basketball, Janka, with the help of his friend Bob Brown, published "I Never Had a Bike" a collection of 40 anecdotes and photos that he accumulated over the course of his coaching career.
