Mark Cook of Dillard University in New Orleans will be the Lady Colonel’s ninth all-time head basketball coach; replacing current interim head coach Sue Sylejebeck. Cook, a native of Olive Bridge, N.Y., was at Dillard for 10 years, serving his first three years as a men’s basketball assistant and then as women’s interim head basketball coach (1998-2004). According to Cook, he and his squad had 140 wins in his six years as head coach and went to the National Association for Intercollegiate Athletics national tournament for four consecutive years.
“(One thing I’m most proud of) at Dillard (is) taking the program to national tournament,” Cook said. “We’ve done the Sweet 16 rounds two out of those four years.”
After graduating from Wichita State University in Wichita, Kan., in 1983, Cook served there as administrative assistant for two years. Cook then worked with the University of Missouri at Kansas City (1983-1984), Marist College in Poughkeepsie, N.Y. (1986-1989), and Mount Saint Mary College in Newburgh, N.Y. Cook returned to the South, coaching at Wiley College in Marshall, Texas (1989-93), and then Louisiana Tech University in Ruston (1993-1994) before his ten-year stint at Dillard.
Cook said as the women’s head coach at Dillard, he has had a 100 percent graduate rate, graduating every senior who has played for him.
Robert Bernardi, director of athletics, said the primary reason for choosing Cook was Cook’s success as head coach at Dillard as well as his national recruiting potential.
According to Bernardi, there were over 90 applicants for the position of Lady Colonel’s head coach, and of 90, the athletics employer search committee reviewed approximately 12 candidates. Bernardi said two of the 12 candidates were sent to him, wherefrom he chose Cook.
“The situation that (Cook) inherited at Dillard is not unlike the situation here at Nicholls in that there were limited resources both physically and financially,” Bernardi said. “He was able to overcome those and put together a really successful program. So I think of all the things, he was a really good fit for the situation that we’re in right now.”
Bernardi said he decided on Cook in early May but did not release the information until the end of the month in order to give Cook time to manage the situation with Dillard. According to Bernardi, Cook is currently waiting on approval by the University of Louisiana System’s Board of Supervisors, a regulatory procedure for all potential employees under the ULS, later this month before he will officially become the Lady Colonel’s head coach on July 1.
Cook said: “(I would like to) just move the program (at Nicholls) from where it is now, upwards. I look forward to the challenge of the program at Nicholls.”
Bernardi said: “I’m really excited about the direction that the Lady Colonels basketball team is headed. I (will be) excited to look at this program in two or three years down the road, and I think we’ll see a marked difference in the momentum of the team.
