Meet the Agostinos: A basketball family through and through

The Agostino brothers have long been a staple  of Long Island boys basketball.

Amityville coach Jack Agostino, 62, was the first to get involved in coaching and is a local hoops legend with nine Long Island titles, four state public school titles and two state Federation titles. Agostino, who has won 529 games in 32 years as a head coach, has spent 30 years at Amityville (1987-2014, 2022-present) and two years at Bay Shore (2021, the COVID season, and 2021-22).

Anthony Agostino, 60, has 253 wins. He coached at Islip for seven years and Newfield for 22 and is an assistant at Amityville with Jack.

Chris Agostino, 54, coached  Oyster Bay for two years and Harborfields for 10, winning three Suffolk titles, two Long Island titles and the 2012 state Class A title. He now is the athletic director at Bay Shore.

The youngest brother, Mike, 50, has been the coach at Smithtown West for 13 seasons,  leading  his teams to postseason play  every year. He  notched his 200th career victory on Jan. 31.

The quartet's pedigree has helped mold a next generation of coaches, too.

Jack’s oldest son, Joe Agostino, 34, is in his fourth season as Miller Place’s coach. Christian Agostino, 24, Chris’ son, is a Miller Place assistant. Jack’s youngest son, Jonathan Agostino, 25, is Newfield’s junior varsity coach. Jordan Agostino, 28, Anthony’s son, is Mike’s scorekeeper at Smithtown West.

“I think the most interesting thing is that we take it for granted,” Mike said. “Until you actually say it out loud, I had never really thought about it. And I think that’s how it was with the brothers when we all got started. We never really stopped and said, ‘Wow, we’re all coaching.’

“But now with this next generation, I guess the most special part about it is that it’s so ingrained in ourselves, in our culture, that coaching and being part of the game, being around the game — either as a scorekeeper, assistant coach, head coach — is something that everyone does just naturally.”

With the Suffolk playoffs  gearing up, this year’s postseason will have a profound Agostino flavor with all three active coaches in the hunt for a title.

In the Class AA quarterfinals on Feb. 26, No. 5 Amityville visits No. 4 Bellport and No. 3 Smithtown West hosts No. 6 Half Hollow Hills West. In Class A, No. 4 Miller Place hosts No. 5 Sayville in a quarterfinal on Feb. 25.

The brothers, four of nine siblings, were not born into a basketball family; their father, Tony, was a truck driver. But they have created a rich basketball history on Long Island — with more to come.

Brotherly battles

It was March 2, 2011, and Chris was confused when he saw his mother behind the Amityville bench. It was the first of what would become three consecutive Suffolk Class A championship games between his Harborfields team and Amityville.

Special T-shirts were made, half in Amityville red and half in Harborfields green, so the large Agostino contingent did not have to declare an allegiance.

“At halftime, she made the switch to come over to my side because that was her plan,” Chris said. “My mother hated the games. She hated us playing each other. She only went to one of them. She didn’t go to all three of them . . .  but my father loved it. It was the happiest moment of his life to see his two boys in a county championship.”

Chris  won that game, 67-62, which he said “was probably the time that I was no longer Jack’s little brother.” He  beat Jack again the next year, 68-64. Amityville wound up on the winning side in 2013, a 53-41 triumph.

Jack also won two regular-season games and Chris won a  playoff game, leaving them at 3-3 against each other in their coaching careers, according to Chris.

“It’s hard to believe that, but maybe we [did],” Jack joked as he reminisced. “I don’t know.”

Anthony estimates he   has coached against Jack's teams  26 times, earning one win when his older brother was at Bay Shore. Anthony’s Newfield team and Mike’s Smithtown team were in the same league for years, and Mike was always struck by how well prepared Anthony’s teams were. Jack said he is 0-3 against Mike.

“It’s never about coaching against your brother,” Anthony said. “It’s your team against the team. We never say, ‘Oh, my brother this’ — it’s never that. It’s always the kids.”

It would require wins over higher-seeded teams, but Jack and Mike could meet in the Suffolk Class AA final this year.

“Of course I’ve thought about it,” Mike said. “And I’m not going to lie, it’s definitely a little source of stress. There’s an added weight to it playing against your brother, and especially your older brother.

"It’s a whole different dynamic being the youngest. I have to really tread lightly a lot of times on things that I say and the way that I behave. I have to make sure I kind of give that respect to them regardless of what I feel.”

Win or lose, the Agostino camaraderie prevails. When one goes upstate for the state championship, everyone follows.

The night before Chris won his state title in 2012, Jack raised the possibility of Lucas Woodhouse — Harborfields’ eventual 2012 Newsday Long Island Player of the Year — getting in foul trouble.

“We’ve never had that incident,” Chris said. “Luke was always very savvy enough to play through fouls. And sure enough, in the championship game, Luke gets three quick fouls on him . . .   But it was actually a great question because it had me thinking, ‘All right, well, who do I go to?’ ”

Harborfields ultimately won, but maybe not without the plan the brothers helped set up beforehand.

Next up

The win that Jack said “put Amityville on the map” happened on Dec. 30, 2001: Amityville 84, St. Vincent-St. Mary (Akron, Ohio) 83.

A.J. Price, Jason Fraser and company stunned LeBron James’ high school squad on James’ 17th birthday.

On the bench was young Joe, then a ball boy for Amityville. It was a pivotal milestone for Jack and is one of Joe’s favorite memories. 

Fast-forward 20 years to Joe’s first season leading Miller Place. It wasn't an easy beginning.  The Panthers won only one game in each of Joe’s first two seasons. The third started with five consecutive wins but ended at 5-15.

During the 2024-25 regular season, the Panthers went 12-8 overall and 8-6 in Suffolk League VI, a monumental turnaround.

“It’s super-rewarding,” Joe said. “You got to have good players. We got a bunch of kids that are bought into it. They love to be there. They work hard. They put a lot of time in in the offseason. And that’s how you get your program [to succeed] — you got to get the kids to be motivated to do that. But you got to have good players, and we have some good players this year.”

Jack and his brothers beam with pride talking about the job Joe has done.

“I am happier for him than my son [is], because I know it’s not easy,” said Jack, whose Amityville team beat Miller Place in the lone regular-season meeting between father and son on Dec. 7, 2022. “ . . .  I don’t think there’s a day [that] goes by he doesn’t send me something or we talk or something about basketball. It’s like he has a million plays. I have like 14, which is way too many for Amityville right now.”

Said Chris: “I’ve watched Joe truly grow as a coach this season in particular. I’ve watched him over the last couple years coaching, and I said the kid’s got some promise. But this was the year that he really did a really nice job with his team. His demeanor is perfect, like he just knows how to communicate to the kids. He has great relationships with them. His knowledge of the game has grown tremendously.”

Chris noted the difference of his “fiery” coaching style versus Joe and Christian being “very even-keeled.”

“[Joe’s] such a good big-picture X's-and-O's guy,” Christian said. “And so it’s just been super-interesting to just get the texts throughout the day of just his thought process, and then implementing it later on in the day, and then going through and researching and sending stuff back and forth. It’s just . . .  it’s such a cool experience.”

The Agostino lore will add another wrinkle next season, when Amityville and Miller Place will be league opponents.

“It’s crazy to see now just this whole new aspect of like, yeah, there was this huge Agostino influence, and it’s not necessarily ending,” Christian said. “It’s just like the torch is being passed.”

By Ben Dickson

benjamin.dickson@newsday.com@bendickson__

Ben Dickson joined Newsday’s high school sports staff in 2023 after graduating from Maryland, where he covered several of the Terrapins' teams.