New Hyde Park resident Bernie Hintz’s 326 career high school coaching victories will carry him into the National Soccer Hall of Fame next week.
“Stunned, shocked amazed and extremely honored” were the reactions the former Wheatley School coach said he had when he received the news recently.
For Hintz, 62, his life-long passion for soccer was sparked the first time he saw a match.
He was nine years old when his father brought him to see a game at the Met Oval near their home in Ridgewood, Queens. A Little League ballplayer up until then, he immediately traded his glove and bat for a pair of soccer cleats after the entrancing experience.
“After seeing the soccer players and watching the game, that sealed it for me. I thought I’d love to be doing that,” HIntz recalled “I had never seen soccer at all. It was a brand new experience for me.”
His father, Julius, became his first coach on a youth team of the Brooklyn Sports Club. The first year, his team failed to win a game, but quickly turned things around, topping their league two seasons later.
“We went from winning no games and to winning the state championship,” he said.
Hintz became a standout player as a teenager in Brooklyn’s German-American League. He never played for his high school team because he said some of his prospective teammates were “mortal enemies” on the league squads. He attended Queensborough Community College and played on its soccer team until the day former Adelphi University coach Bob Ritcey saw him score five goals in a match.
Ritcey told Hintz he thought he could get him some scholarship money to play at Adelphi, and Hintz transferred.
His soccer coaching career began after he graduated Adelphi Unviersity and took a job as a physical education teacher in the East Williston School District.
“At that time, if you were hired as a phys ed teacher, you were going to coach one or more teams in the school,” Hintz said.
So he started coaching varsity soccer at Wheatley, along with junior varsity baseball and wrestling. His career as a soccer coach got off to a undistinguished start.
“I had a losing record for the first nine years of my coaching career. I had athletes who could run, but they didn’t have the skill level,” he recalled.
Then the Albertson Soccer Academy started training kids in the area and by the early 1980s, Hintz was fielding teams that had already mastered the basic skills of the game.
“We started having winning records in the early 80s,” Hintz said.
That led to his first state title with a 1983 Wheatley squad that lost only one match – to a team that won the state championship in another division. In 1984, with a Wheatley team Hintz still believes was his strongest, a 2-1 loss in the state semifinals ended their run. He would coach one more Wheatley team to a state championship in 2004. His coaching record also includes seven Nassau County titles and three Long Island titles.
Hintz coached three players at Wheatley who went on to have pro soccer careers, including Carlos Mendes, a former New York Red Bulls player who now plays for Major League Soccer’s Columbus team, Michael Masters, who played for the Long Island Rough Riders and Roy Messing, younger brother of Hall of Fame goalkeeper Shep, who played in the short-lived North American Soccer League.
Hintz coached his last six seasons at North Shore High School in Glen Head before deciding to retire with his 326 coaching wins – a record for Nassau County soccer coaches.
“I’ve experience the thrill of victory and definitely the agony of defeat,” he said.
Being inducted into the National Soccer Hall of Fame in ceremonies at a dinner in Middletown on Nov. 17 would cap his career in a special way. The former home of the soccer hall of fame in Oneonta closed closed in 2010, reportedly for financial reasons, but the organization continues to add members and hopes to eventually reopen.
“When you realize other people recognize you for what you’ve done, it’s a very great feeling,” he said.
Hintz’s wife, Betty, who he describes as his “biggest fan,” opposed his decision to retire last year. Hintz said he misses working with the kids, but added that he no longer had the same “burning desire” that he formerly felt.
He said he feels best about the legacy he’s left with kids he coached who’ve kept playing or coaching in later life. That includes Patrick Leary, the Lawrence varsity soccer coach and president of the Nassau County Soccer Coaches Association, who Hintz coached on the ‘83 Wheatley team.
Hintz’s son, David, who had his first lessons at home before playing at Great Neck South, continues to play in adult leagues today. Hintz also taught the game to his daughter, Alexandra, who also continues to play in a senior women’s league today.
“That’s the biggest tribute to me, that someone you taught the game still wants to play,” he said.
For Hintz, the pure challenge of coaching what is popularly known as “the beautiful game,” has enriched his life.
“You have to put eleven guys together to play as a unit. Tactically and intellectually, it’s on a higher plane that other sports,” Hintz said.
