Jim McGlynn, longtime high school cross country, track and field coach on Long Island, dies at 73

Jim McGlynn was always up for a good challenge.

Friends and family say that’s what drove him to build high school track programs, grow businesses and change the lives of student-athletes.

McGlynn, who coached cross country and track and field on Long Island for nearly 50 years, most recently at East Meadow High School, died of prostate cancer on Oct. 3 at Central Island Healthcare in Plainview, his family said. He was 73.

“He was a great brother and he loved track,” McGlynn’s brother, Kevin, said. “He made such a positive impact on those kids.”

As an athlete and coach, McGlynn won everywhere.

Born in Brooklyn on Oct. 15, 1949, McGlynn moved with his family to Bethpage when he was young. In the late 1960s, McGlynn starred on Bethpage High School’s football team as a quarterback and kick returner, and as a sprinter in track and field.McGlynn earned all-state and all-county honors in the 220-yard dash and was on Bethpage’s winning mile relay at the 1967 Penn Relays. He attended Yankton College in South Dakota on scholarship to play football and run track.

“I ran track, but I wasn’t as good as Jimmy,” Kevin said. “Back in his day, he was the fastest.”

McGlynn studied physical education in college and returned to Long Island. He started as a substitute teacher, and landed his first coaching job in 1974 at Bethpage High School. He later coached at Bay Shore, Lawrence and Syosset. McGlynn’s Bay Shore boys team compiled a dual meet record of 205-2.

Seeking a challenge, McGlynn took over the East Meadow High School track and field program in 2007. The school had never won a boys team championship. In his 16 years at East Meadow, McGlynn’s teams won 26 titles and five relay teams earned All-American honors.

“He had the ability to make athletes believe that they were better than they were,” said Michael Ringhauser, who coached with McGlynn at East Meadow. “And then the kids would get into these moments and would achieve things that you would’ve never thought they could have.”

Ringhauser said he learned a lot from McGlynn.

“There were so many things that I came in thinking that I knew,” he said. “Then after some conversations with him, I completely changed a lot of my philosophies because he was just that good.”

McGlynn was also a bartender at various establishments on Long Island. Longtime friend and bar owner Rich Degnan said McGlynn was the first person you’d want to hire if you were opening a new place.

“Jim McGlynn would only work for you one night a week,” Degnan said. “He’d ask for your slowest night and made it a moneymaker, and he did it all the time.”

McGlynn entertained his customers, telling jokes and performing magic.

McGlynn’s college roommate was former NFL great and Super Bowl champion Lyle Alzado, and McGlynn often hung out with Alzado and his teammates.

“He was that guy. People just wanted to hang it out with him,” Degnan said. “When he walked in your door, you knew you were going to have a great night.”

“He was very laid back, easygoing,” Ringhauser said. “He wanted everybody to be comfortable around him.”

McGlynn requested those attending his wake (held Oct. 8) and funeral (Oct. 9 at St. Martin of Tours Roman Catholic Church in Bethpage) wear Hawaiian shirts because he thought dressing up would be too formal. And that’s what people did.
“He got a standing ovation at his wake,” Kevin said. “The stories that we heard, me and my sister, we were just so proud of him.”

“His wake was like nothing I’d ever been to in my life,” Ringhauser said.

“His funeral was probably the most fun funeral I’ve ever been to,” Degnan said. “I’m going to miss talking to him. The last few weeks he was alive, you’d walk in and he’d have a joke for you.”

In addition to his brother, of Franklin Square, McGlynn is survived by his sister, Anne Kublicki of Saratoga.