East Meadow's John Danowski leads Duke to NCAA title

John Danowski, a former East Meadow resident, is a national champion.

Duke's head men's lacrosse coach guided his team to its first NCAA title. The Blue Devils defeated Notre Dame in thrilling fashion by beating the Fighting Irish 6-5 in overtime at M&T Bank Stadium in Baltimore on Monday afternoon.  

Danowski, previously Hofstra's head coach, took over the Duke job in July 2006. Since then, the Blue Devils have appeared in four national semifinals and two championship games. He has 285 career victories, and 66 of them at Duke. Danowski has mentored several All-America players during his coaching career. 

At Hofstra, Danowski guided the Pride to East Coast Conference crowns in 1988 and 1989, and he was honored as the NCAA Division I National Coach of the Year in 1993 after leading Hofstra to the NCAA tournament for the first time since 1978. The 1995 and 1996 seasons yielded North Atlantic Conference titles for Hofstra, and Danowski then led the Pride to America East Conference championships in 1997, 1998 and 2000. Prior to coaching at Hofstra, Danowski coached at CW Post. 

He was inducted into the Long Island Lacrosse Hall of Fame in 2001, and has received an array of honors for sportsmanship.

Danowski starred as an all-county lacrosse player for East Meadow High School. He is an alumnus of East Meadow's Class of 1972 and is a member of the high school's Athletic Wall of Fame. Danowski went on to play lacrosse at Rutgers University, where he graduated from in 1976. 

Danowski and his wife, Patricia, have two children, Kate, a former lacrosse letterwinner and 2005 graduate of Quinnipiac University, and Matt, a Farmingdale High School alumnus, a 2008 Duke graduate and former captain of the Blue Devil lacrosse program.