Bob O’Connor, the veteran St. Joe’s coach who took the Marauders football program to new heights, has announced his retirement, the school reported Friday.

The decision was made prior to a 2009 season that saw the Marauders exceed expectations by advancing to the Monsignor Martin Athletic Association League AA championship game. The team’s success put O’Connor on the short list of coach of the year candidates, an award that he has won at the conclusion of four previous seasons.

“We are extremely proud of and grateful for all that Bob has accomplished during his three-plus decade tenure at St. Joseph’s Collegiate Institute,” said Robert T. Scott, president/principal of St. Joe’s. “His name has become synonymous with St. Joe’s football and, most importantly, he has had a profound impact on the hundreds of young men who have played for him over the years that cannot be measured in wins and losses.”

A 1965 graduate of St. Joe’s, O’Connor became the head football coach in 1981, taking the reins of one of the most storied programs in Western New York as a relative unknown with seven years of assistant coaching experience. Twenty-nine years, 169 wins and 13 league championships later, O’Connor is stepping down as the winningest football coach in the school’s 149-year history.

He began as an assistant at Neumann High School six years after graduating. He joined the staff of iconic St. Joe’s coach Tucker Reddington in 1975 and was handed the keys to the program in 1981, quickly establishing his own legacy. 

With O’Connor’s “spread” philosophy in tow, St. Joe’s morphed into one of the area’s most consistently prolific offenses, overmatching opposing defenses on its way to a No. 2 ranking in Western New York by O’Connor’s second season at the helm.

The football team would be ranked as one of the area’s top five teams four separate times in a seven-year span during the 1980s. In 1983, O’Connor’s Marauders won their first of 17 straight games over archrival Canisius, a winning streak that would factor significantly into his incredible 26-8 career record versus the Crusaders, who defeated St. Joe’s twice in 2009, once during the regular season and again in the title game.

St. Joe’s would continue its dominance over the rest of the Monsignor Martin League in the 1990s under O’Connor, culminating in 1998, when the Marauders were the top ranked team in Western New York with a 10-0 record, and featured the Connolly Cup winner and Western New York Player of the Year in running back Sandro DeAngelis.

In fact, individual player accolades were nearly on par with the immense team successes that the Marauders experienced during O’Connor’s tenure. Along with DeAngelis — who is the reigning most valuable player of the Canadian Football League’s championship game — O’Connor also coached tight end/linebacker Kevin Deakin to Western New York Player of the Year honors in 1985, while Naaman Roosevelt, like DeAngelis, captured Western New York Player of the Year and Connolly Cup awards following his senior season (2005).

Matt Rosenhahn, the senior quarterback who accounted for over 2,000 yards of total offense this season, is a finalist for the 2009 Connolly Cup, which will be announced on Dec. 5.

Several others have gone on to successful collegiate and professional playing careers, most notably recently-retired NFL offensive lineman Vaughn Parker and current Kansas City Chiefs tight end Sean Ryan. Roosevelt is expected to be selected early in this year’s NFL draft as well.

O’Connor himself has been the recipient of numerous awards, including the WNY Football Coaches Association “Coach of the Year” (1998, 2005, 2006), the WNY High School Sports Joe Foyle Award as “Coach of the Year” (1996, 1998, 2005), the Buffalo Bills “Coach of the Year” (1998), and, in recognition of his 62-30-1 mark during the 1990’s, the WNY High School Sports Large School “Coach of the Decade.”

The St. Joe’s football program has continued to advance in the 21st century, winning at least a share of the league title four times, and earning the #1 ranking in Western New York in 2005.

In light of the accomplishments throughout his incredible career at St. Joe’s, O’Connor was selected as the 2009 recipient of the John D. Burns Award, which recognizes individuals from Western New York for their continuous dedication, loyalty, commitment, contributions and service to high school football. The award is presented by the WNY Certified Football Officials Association.

“Coach O’Connor was integral in transforming a very good football program into an excellent one,” said St. Joe’s Athletics Director Peter Schneider. “While his contributions to St. Joseph’s Collegiate Institute are, quite frankly, irreplaceable, we will now turn our attention to identifying a candidate who will build upon the foundations established by Coach (Joseph) Brown, Coach (William) Fitzhenry, Coach Reddington and Coach O’Connor, and leave his own distinguishable imprint on the legacy of St. Joe’s football.”  

O’Connor was a special education teacher at Amherst High School for 32 years, chairing the department for 25 of them, before retiring in 2006. In 2004, he was named Amherst High School’s Outstanding Educator of the Year.

St. Joe’s will begin a comprehensive search for a successor to O’Connor immediately.