MOUNT CARMEL - It's as simple as this: Go anywhere in the state of Pennsylvania, mention Mount Carmel, and a likely response will be, "Oh, yeah, Jazz Diminick."
That's the kind of influence Diminick, Mount Carmel's highly successful football coach from 1962-92, had on his community, school district and region.
Diminick died Wednesday at his home at age 86, surrounded by his immediate family. Members of his larger family spent Thursday reflecting on what the man meant to them as individuals, athletes, citizens and friends.
"I was with the family all day today, and for me it was almost the same feeling," said current Mount Carmel Area football coach Carmen DeFrancesco, who played for Diminick, was an assistant coach under him, and later had Diminick help him as an assistant when he became a head coach.
"I've known him ever since I can remember. Our families were close and I was exposed to this man and his way of life since I remember being alive. Gary (Diminick's eldest son) and I went to the games in their station wagon when we were kids and we'd drive right into the stadium and think we were big shots. I had a great growing-up experience.
"Other than my mother and father, no one has been more of an influence on my life personally and professionally than Jazz."
Jose Gonzalo didn't play for Diminick, but has been involved with the Mount Carmel program for more than 50 years, first as a student manager, then as a scout/coach and since 1976 as the team's statistician.
"I met him when he started here as a teacher in 1962," Gonzalo said. "All my involvement with the program is because of Jazz. He allowed this hanger-on fan to come around and hang around his team.
"I went up in the (coaches') box for a while when he needed some help and then in 1976, I became the statistician with his blessing. That was when Bob
Zavarick was doing great things, and I got interested in what other players had done. That research led to me doing the football guides, then the Ed Romance Hall of Fame.
"All of that was because of Jazz. That's how he touched me. Other guys, he touched in other ways. There are an awful lot of kids from this town who probably never would have made it to college if not for him."
Diminick had a record of 267-81-7 in his 31 seasons at Mount Carmel, and overall won 290 games as a scholastic coach, the most in the state at the time he finished his career. Diminick's teams won five Eastern Conference Southern Division championships and three overall EC titles, in 1969, 1972 and 1973.
His teams won 10 or more games 13 times, including three unbeaten 12-0 seasons. His teams produced eight first-team All-State players and 15 Big 33 players. From 1967-73, his teams had a 74-8 record, with five of the losses in one season.
Diminick also coached track and field at Mount Carmel for many years, and was widely known as a basketball and track official. He also coached basketball and baseball.
He has been inducted into the Pennsylvania Football Coaches Hall of Fame, the Pennsylvania Sports Hall of Fame, the Boston College Sports Hall of Fame and the National High School Federation Sports Hall of Fame. More than 200 of his players went on to college, many on full scholarships.
"When I first got into coaching, he was my hero," said longtime Berwick coach George Curry, whose teams have won six state championships and who now has 433 career wins, the most in state history. "He set the bar for all of us. He was my idol. He was the man. I had so much respect for him.
"I liked his style, that he was a disciplinarian and that he was always updating. When he had good quarterbacks, he threw the ball. When he had great running backs, he ran the ball. He knew how to use his kids. The man is a legend. He's a great man."
Former Mount Carmel and current Hazleton coach Mike Brennan agreed.
"I remember watching him run on the field when I was a kid," said Brennan, who coached at Mount Carmel from 2000-08 and guided the Red Tornadoes to PIAA championships in 2000 and 2002. "He was Pennsylvania high school football to a young kid like me. He maintained that success for three decades, and that's extremely difficult. If you think about it, he was the face of that community and that area.
"I remember the Bill Flynn (Pottsville)-Jazz Diminick rivalry. Charlie McCullough (former executive director of the PIAA) did (officiated) the game, and 10,000 people were in the stadium. That made me want to coach. Then to have a chance to coach at the same place, and get to know him, and have personal conversations with him every morning was tremendous."
Biggest legacy
Perhaps Diminick's greatest legacy to Mount Carmel football was the six sons he and his wife, Ann Louise, produced, all of whom played spectacularly for the Red Tornadoes, and all of whom went on to play college football. They and their families have produced 22 grandchildren and one great-grandchild so far.
DeFrancesco said one of Diminick's greatest strengths as a coach was in making his sons part of the team.
"The other guys that played appreciated the way he coached his sons," DeFrancesco said. "He made his sons part of us and treated them the way he treated us."
"It's a sad day for Mount Carmel in particular and for scholastic sports in general," said Mount Carmel Area Athletic Director Greg Sacavage, who played for Diminick in the late 1970s. "There is no doubt Jazz is a great influence on my life, as a coach and mentor, then as a friend and colleague. He used to have special colloquialisms. He'd say, 'Don't get your daubers down.' We'd scratch our heads and say, "What's a dauber?' That was his word for head."
Kevin Jones, former longtime mayor of Mount Carmel and a retired teacher and coach at Southern Columbia, said Diminick was a treasure to the entire community, not just the school district.
"Coach Diminick gave 100 percent of himself to the Mount Carmel area, and I say area with a small 'a'," Jones said.
DeFrancesco said he doubted his path in life would have been the same as it's been without Diminick.
"He made football important, something I cared about," he said. "I didn't like school much but I liked football and I wanted to play college football.
"I only went to college to play four more years of football. What kept me in college was football, but I had it all backwards."
Still, that love of the game kept him in school at Juniata College, even if it was something of a step down.
"Playing in Huntingdon, Pa., just down from State College, if Penn State was playing the same day, nobody came to see us," DeFrancesco said. "I didn't care, as long as my parents were there. That's how much I loved the game and Jazz gave that to me."
Later, Diminick spent much of his retirement helping DeFrancesco coach his teams at Cardinal Brennan, Danville, Shamokin and Upper Dauphin.
"He never pushed himself on me when he was helping me, but he respected my loyalty to him," he said. "He followed me all the way to Upper Dauphin, for crying out loud."
"Marvelous, marvelous" player
Former Coal Township and Shamokin Area head coach Ed Binkoski remembered Diminick as a colleague, an opponent and a good friend.
"We were good friends even during those days, and in our retirement years became really close friends," Binkoski said. "We went to see a lot of basketball games together. This is a very sad day for (wife) Nancy and me. I think of all those guys who played for him, and how he touched all their lives.
"He was really a special person here in the Coal Region. He did some magnificent things."
Binkoski said he remembered hitchhiking with a friend to Kulpmont to watch Diminick play as a high school player in the 1940s.
"They played on Thursday nights, so we could go watch," Binkoski said. "He was a marvelous, marvelous player, first there and then at Boston College."
Henry Hynoski Sr. played for Diminick during the glory days of the late 1960s and 1970s, then played at Temple University and with the Cleveland Browns. His son Henry is presently a member of the New York Giants.
"Next to my parents and family, there's probably no one as important (in my life)," Hynoski Sr. said. "I first met him at St. Ed's gym in Shamokin when we were playing basketball. Gary was playing for St. Ed's at the time and he was talking to my parents. I said, 'I know who you are. You're the new football coach at Mount Carmel.' I think he liked that. He knew my cousin Walt from playing."
Hynoski also noted how Diminick was ahead of the curve with his coaching philosophy.
"The game has changed considerably. He adapted his game philosophy to the talent he had available, rather than trying to make that talent adapt to his system," he said.
"Not too many people did that back then," DeFrancesco said. "When he had guys like Joe Buchinski and Greg Doviak, he threw the ball. My senior year, we beat Shikellamy 14-0 for the (division) championship and we didn't throw the ball one time."
"He always said respect all opponents but fear none. When my son made it in the pros, he sent me a congratulations," Hynoski said.
Diminick remained very active through his retirement. He was an avid golfer and runner, and continued to officiate in track and field up to this past spring.
"He was always Johnny on the spot if I was stuck for a track official," Sacavage said. "He came down for a junior high meet this spring when I needed him. He was always looking to help out and I didn't want to say no to him but it became very difficult at times. This spring was so cool and wet, and if Jazz came out, you could see it wasn't good for him."
Gonzalo said Diminick stopped by Community Pharmacy a couple of times a week to talk football and other things. He also talked about a recent project they had together.
"Dave McFee encouraged Warren (Altomare) and me to sit down with Jazz for several hours and just talk about his career in front of the camera," Gonzalo said. "Dave is still editing it and we're adding actual football footage from those years.
"I'm so glad we did it. We missed doing it with Jerry Breslin (the late former track and cross country coach) and we really wanted to do it with Jazz."Jazz Diminick file
A list of accomplishments Joe "Jazz" Diminick achieved during his coaching career at Mount Carmel from 1962-92:
- Compiled record of 267-81-7 in 31 seasons. His 290 wins overall were the most in Pennsylvania at that time.
- Won five Eastern Conference Southern Division championships
- Won three overall Eastern Conference championships ('69, '72, '73)
- Won 10 or more games 13 times
- Three unbeaten 12-0 seasons
- Produced 15 Big 33 players
- More than 200 of his players went on to play college football