Donald Rowe was an American college basketball coach.
20 Facts About Dee Rowe
1.
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Dee Rowe coached for the UConn Huskies men's team and was a university Athletics Ambassador, fundraising for college athletic programs.
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Dee Rowe was born in Worcester, Massachusetts, and graduated from Worcester Academy in 1947.
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Dee Rowe quickly built the athletic program into a power in the New England prep school interscholastic athletics and, in addition, his basketball teams won the New England Prep School Championship nine times.
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Dee Rowe served as the director of athletics and the head coach of both the men's basketball and baseball teams for 13 years, from 1955 to 1969.
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Dee Rowe was named the New England coach of the year in both 1970 and 1976.
7.
Dee Rowe participated in the search committees that brought Hall of Fame coaches Jim Calhoun and Geno Auriemma to Connecticut.
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Dee Rowe played an instrumental role in the foundation of the Big East conference.
9.
In December 2016, the Basketball Hall of Fame announced that Dee Rowe was a nominee for consideration as a member of the Hall of Fame in the contributor category.
10.
In 2017, Rowe was awarded the John W Bunn Lifetime Achievement Award by the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame.
11.
In 1980, Dave Gavitt appointed Dee Rowe to be an assistant coach of the US Olympic men's basketball team.
12.
Dee Rowe continued his involvement with both the Worcester Academy and the University of Connecticut.
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Dee Rowe was unable to participate as assistant coach due to the US boycott of the 1980 Olympics.
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Dee Rowe had a framed picture of the 1980 United States Olympic men's basketball team hanging on his office wall.
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Dee Rowe remembered hearing it at the time, but the discussion didn't come up again until 2012.
16.
Auriemma could bring his team and staff members, but Dee Rowe was not part of the USA Basketball staff.
17.
Dee Rowe spoke to Warde Manuel, the Connecticut athletic director, and proposed that Rowe be named a university ambassador.
18.
The athletic director and Susan Herbst, the school president, supported the idea, so Dee Rowe was able to attend the Olympics in an official capacity.
19.
Dee Rowe married his college girlfriend, Virginia Bradford Reynolds in 1954.
20.
Dee Rowe had dementia and died from COVID-19 and Waldenstrom macroglobulinemia at his home in Storrs, Connecticut, on January 10,2021.