Joe Brennan owes his career at Niles West to his wife, Barbara who quite coincidentally graduated from Niles West. She convinced him that it he was ready for a change after two years teaching Spanish and being a varsity basketball assistant at St. Francis H.S. in Wheaton. In addition to becoming part of a first class foreign language department, Joe was excited at the prospect of learning from legendary basketball coach, Billy Schnurr. In a strange twist of fate, Billy ended up as Joe’s JV coach in the boys soccer program.
Joe couldn’t have imagined all the experiences that would open up because of his involvement with Niles West soccer. After two seasons as a boys assistant with Peter Zorn, Dr. Mannos approached him about coaching a joint West/East/North girls soccer club in the spring of 1980. That club, along with three other area schools, quickly grew into an informal north shore league that prompted many other schools to offer girls soccer In just a few short years there were enough girls teams playing that athletic director Jerry Turry decided we should host an unofficial state tournament. After a couple of those unofficial tournaments and a little prodding from Dr. Mannos, that was all the IHSA needed to sanction the sport and award Niles West the first official tournament in 1988. The girls job led to being offered the head boys position for that fall and inheriting a team that would win the conference. In 1983 the Niles West boys team won the Illinois High School Soccer Coaches Association Myro Rys Sportsmanship Award and the girls team was honorable mention for the same award a few years later. Additional involvement with the IHSSCA included being the first association vice-president for girls soccer, organizing the first all-state team and awards banquet, and later on being named Soccer Person of the Year in 1993. Joe was invited to coach the scholastic girls team for the first Prairie State Games and then coached the women’s team to a bronze medal a few years later. He also got to work for and with the Chicago Sting for many years in the penalty box and on the scoreboard for indoor games, doing clinics with players and bringing players in to speak to foreign language classes. He also served as a protocol ambassador/host for both the men’s and women’s FIFA World Cup soccer games and events in Chicago.
Special thanks go to Dr. Nicholas Mannos - firm believer in interscholastic sports and staunch supporter/initiator of girls’ programs; Peter Zorn - fellow coach, foreign language colleague and teammate; Brian “Doc” Katzman - trainer and constant sideline support even at Illinois’ summer Prairie State Games; and, of course, Jerry Turry - athletic director who did his level best to keep this chronically disorganized coach organized and masterminded our unofficial girls state tournaments as well as the first two official state tournaments.