Marcus O’Neil: Why Most Kids Miss D1 Dreams

Coach Marcus O’Neil of Tilton School is back—and he’s got wisdom to share. With 15+ years at Tilton, a national prep championship, and a resume that includes NBA alumni like Wayne Selden, Nerlens Noel, Terance Mann, and Georges Niang, Marcus breaks down what really matters when it comes to prep school basketball and college placement.

In this conversation, we cover the real traits coaches look for in Division 1 guards, how Tilton balances academic rigor with elite development, and why player identity and off-court character matter more than ever. Coach O’Neil also discusses his return to Tilton, how he develops talent the right way, and what parents need to understand before making the prep school leap.

If you're a player or parent navigating this journey, you’ll find practical, honest advice here that cuts through the recruiting hype.

💡 KEY TOPICS

📌 Coaching NBA talent and what separates future pros
 📌 Academic standards and expectations for post-grads
 📌 How Tilton develops players on and off the court
 📌 Understanding playing time + how it’s earned
 📌 The evolving D1 recruiting timeline in 2025
 📌 Tilton vs. AAA and other prep school levels

🏀 ABOUT COACH MARCUS O’NEIL

Marcus O’Neil is the head boys’ basketball coach at Tilton School in New Hampshire. A prep school veteran with over 15 years at Tilton, O’Neil led the program to a national championship and coached several future NBA players. His unique background in social work and philosophy shapes a thoughtful, holistic approach to player development and mentorship.

🔗 CONNECT WITH COACH MARCUS O’NEIL:

Facebook | www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100057439360417#
Instagram | www.instagram.com/tiltonboysbasketball/

🔗 Connect with Cory:

Website | https://www.prepathletics.com
Twitter | https://twitter.com/PREP_Athletics
Instagram | https://www.instagram.com/prep.athletics/
Facebook | https://www.facebook.com/PrepAthletics
Email | coryheitz@gmail.com
Phone | 859-317-1166

🔖 Subscribe to the PREP Athletics Podcast:

iTunes | https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/prep-athletics-podcast/id1546265809?uo=4
Spotify | https://open.spotify.com/show/6CAKbXFiIOhoHinzsReYbJ
Amazon | https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/3c37179d-3371-47f9-9d97-fd569e8802a7/prep-athletics-basketball-podcast #AmazonMusic

Chapters

• 1:54 Growing up in Portsmouth, NH and playing at Seacrest Rack
• 3:10 Choosing Brandeis because of the Celtics
• 4:02 Playing pickup with nine Celtics as a college student
• 5:05 Post-college journey: cross-country road trip, coaching start
• 9:01 How life and philosophy shaped his coaching
• 10:01 The role of philosophy & social work in his coaching
• 12:04 Why Tilton School stands out as a prep program
• 17:12 Coaching NBA players: common traits of future pros
• 20:09 Player development philosophy: culture, consistency, identity
• 22:48 Academic requirements for post-grads at Tilton
• 24:23 Do Tilton players need to play multiple sports?
• 25:35 How Coach O’Neil answers playing time questions
• 27:20 Holman Smith story: from third string to D1 starter
• 29:27 Getting college footage and recruiting exposure for all players
• 32:03 How placement works in 2025’s recruiting landscape
• 35:17 Why families need realistic goals and backup plans
• 37:31 Does class level (AA, AAA, A) really matter?
• 38:51 Why Coach O’Neil values AA structure and regulation
• 41:22 What kind of players Tilton looks for
• 43:24 What it takes to be a D1 guard today
• 44:53 What prep school basketball might look like in 5 years
• 46:44 Best player Marcus ever played against
• 47:58 Best player he’s ever coached against
• 49:35 Facing Buddy Hield and Andrew Wiggins
• 51:19 Tilton School rivalries and tough matchups
• 55:21 Final thoughts and where to find Coach O’Neil

Transcript

Cory Heitz (00:00)
Welcome to this week's episode of the Prep Athletics Podcast. I'm proud to have joining us coach Marcus O'Neil from the Tilton School. Marcus O'Neil was previously at the Tilton School for 15 years and even won a national prep school championship while he was there. He's had a lot of NBA players come through such as Wayne Selden, Nerlens Noel, Terance Mann, Georges Niang, and a couple others. And he took a hiatus and now he missed the game so much he is back at Tilton.

just got hired a few weeks ago back in April and I don't know when this is coming out, but yeah, he's going to be there in the 2025-2026 season and he's going to hit the ground running refreshed and ready to get back at it. We talked about his upbringing in New Hampshire. We talk about him going to Brandeis and one of the reasons he chose Brandeis is because that's where the Boston Celtics practiced and he tells a story about actually getting to play with them in September during one of their early season get togethers. We also talked about what it's like to coach NBA players.

the advantages of double A versus maybe triple A or single A, his recruiting process. Do you have to play another sport at Tilton? What's his playing time philosophy when talking to families? How does he develop the players? How does he place them and much, much more. So enjoy this conversation with Tilton schools, Marcus O'Neil here in the prep athletics podcast.

Cory Heitz (01:40)
Marcus, welcome to the podcast.

Marcus O'Neil (01:42)
All right. Good to be here. ⁓

Cory Heitz (01:45)
Hey, yeah, good

to have you here. Welcome, welcome. And ⁓ where'd you grow up and how'd you get so good at basketball?

Marcus O'Neil (01:54)
I think a lot of people would ⁓ say that I never was very good at basketball, but I grew up in an awesome neighborhood called Seacrest Village, is located in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, since it's been named Osprey Landing. And ⁓ I grew up playing in this thing called the Seacrest Rack, and the hoop was about nine and a half feet tall. The room was bent, and it was in the corner of a concrete building, and the ceiling was about...

10 and a half feet tall and we played this game called 21 every day for hours. So we learned to beat the crap out of each other and ⁓ it's the reason why I don't have very good arc of my shot and could never make a shot outside of eight feet. But we had a lot of fun and we played at the parks. This was sort of pre-AAU. you played with the older guys at the park and if you're lucky, you know.

If you're getting beat up pretty good, they would say, you should try this. And that was sort of our player development. Yeah.

Cory Heitz (03:01)
Yeah, the old heads. That's the old way of doing things.

And then you ended up playing at Brandeis. What led to that decision to play there?

Marcus O'Neil (03:10)
Well, ⁓ you know, I had a couple of schools that had some mild interest in having me play play for him. Brandeis was one of them. You know, I went there and I think, you know, at the time that's where the Celtics practice. grew up, you know, screaming at my black and white TV, you know, anytime the Celtics would get behind at the game and ⁓ Celtic for practicing at Brandeis. And I said, this is where I want to be. I want to be around these guys. You know, it's a beautiful facility. turns out it was a

outstanding school and you know I played a couple years there but ⁓ you know I was a much better student than basketball player so after two years I would spend a lot more time with philosophy professors than ⁓ the basket you know in the gym. Well I continue to play you know pick up and stuff.

Cory Heitz (03:59)
And when you were there, did you have any self-excitings? Did your dream come true?

Marcus O'Neil (04:02)
Well, the

Celtics practiced there the whole time I was there. I, you know, I ended up as my work study job, you know, ⁓ basically, you know, bringing the water out to practice. But yeah, I ended up, know, you sometimes probably my best, one of my fondest basketball memories is one day I was in the gym shooting and nine of the Celtics guys showed up. This was sometime in late September before training camp and they were getting ready to play pickup. And they said, Hey kid, you want to play? We need one more guy.

And it didn't lead to an NBA contract, but I made one nice pass to deep ground. So that was a lot of fun. Yeah. Yeah.

Cory Heitz (04:38)
That is awesome. That's a great story. I

actually worked at camp at Dee Brown in Taiwan randomly.

Marcus O'Neil (04:45)
Yeah, he was always a nice guy, like when I would work at their practices, you know, he was a nice guy and a showman. I saw him afterwards, he was later at the Milk House in Florida, you know, he remembered me, a good guy, definitely a hoop dude.

Cory Heitz (05:01)
Yeah, absolutely. What did you do after graduation?

Marcus O'Neil (05:05)
⁓ Well, you know, I was into philosophy and theater and those things. And I think the day after I graduated, I jumped in my 76 scuttle and drove across America. And I was planning to get a job, but I ended up playing a lot of pickup at this park in San Diego and ran out of money. So I ended up living with some friends in Phoenix. then eventually I decided I should

get a job and I ended up back in my hometown and a friend of mine asked me to coach his, he got the varsity job at Spalding High School and said, you know, you're gonna come be the JV coach. I said, all right, I'm not doing much. And I ended up there full time, up getting, know, after a few years of doing that, I got my master's degree in social work. So I was sort of doing human services stuff.

training to become a therapist and all the stuff I learned in the social work program at the University of New Hampshire.

help me in coaching. I just never got out of coaching. While I was getting my master's degree, a that coached me at Brandeis called me and said, hey, you want to be my assistant at Endicott College? I said, sure. So I worked for Mike Plansky, who was a great, great coach. Learned a little bit about coaching. I knew he was going be an outstanding coach when he coached me at Brandeis.

And we ended up setting the school record for wins each of the three years we were there. And I was recruiting kids at Tilton for Endicott. the coach was leaving here and he said, hey, Marcus, what you think about applying for this job? I was spending so much time, I was camped out trying to get these two, recruiting these two kids from Tilton to come to Endicott.

We didn't get either of the kids, but I ended up with a tilting job, also it very funny.

Cory Heitz (07:16)
Your story is kind of like Jack Kerouac's on the road, know, going across the US and then kind of I bet you have a lot of stories from that. Do any stand out on your road trip?

Marcus O'Neil (07:27)
Uh, well, I don't know if it was on that road trip or another road trip. Again, I, you know, a lot of the most interesting things happened to me at, the park, you know, that's a lot of my life was lived at the park and I was at this park one day and, uh, a couple of women approached me and said, you want to go to a cookout? And I said, sure. I'll go to the cookout. I got in a car with them and,

I ended up at some other part of San Jose at this cookout. And then they said, we want you to talk to this guy. And this guy took me to another park and he was shooting hoops with me and said, you you should, you know, do you, you, do you, I don't want to get into religion or anything, but he says, do you want to accept Jesus Christ as your Lord and savior? We'd like to send you away to this camp. then, before you know it, I was.

I didn't know where I was, I didn't know where my car was, and they wouldn't bring me back to my car. These women were nowhere to be seen. So that was the only time in my life that I had been kidnapped, recruited to probably the Manson family. that was a fairly interesting story.

Cory Heitz (08:46)
You've made it back to your car, obviously, and unscathed. Yeah. Wow. Now, ⁓

Marcus O'Neil (08:50)
I did, I did escape, you know, and here I am. ⁓ I don't know how this

helps us talk about basketball, but you know, this sort of happened at a park playing basketball. Yeah. Yeah.

Cory Heitz (09:01)
I just like story. It's all about stories too in life, Marcus. It's more than just about X's and O's. I mean,

I lived in my truck for a year and a half when I got out the military, trapezing the US and Canada. And yeah, had crazy stories too with that. not everyone takes off in their car across America with no destination. So I kind of like that.

Marcus O'Neil (09:21)
Yeah, I mean, I wish sometimes I wish I had a, you know, a four year plan or five year plan. And I could tell you that I knew what I wanted to do and went and got it. It just hasn't, hasn't been my life. mean, and I sort of blame my parents for that. You know, my father was at Woodstock. So, I mean, it's, it's gotta be their fault that I have lived a life, you know, without analytics for a long, time.

Cory Heitz (09:42)
wow.

Right, right. Well, let me ask you this, your social work, the philosophy ⁓ you got into, do you incorporate any of that into your current coaching style?

Marcus O'Neil (10:01)
Well, think I incorporate all of it. I would say, you know, half of sort of what I use to live my life, you know, what I've learned is sort of through formal education, you know, I had such incredible professors in the philosophy department and other departments at Brandeis and, you know, you were allowed to take courses at other universities. took a course over with Professor Minkiti who was a teacher, a professor at Wellesley.

So half of what I use, I think, is through formal education, the master's in social work and the philosophy department at Brandeis. And I think the other half is sort of the stuff that you learn through athletics. And I think that's sort of what drives me, because I think as you get older, you go through tough times in life. And I remember we used to, when I was playing Pee-wee football, we had this guy Ralph Estes, who was our coach.

He's making us run up this hill way more times than you need to. And just when you think you can't do it anymore, you hear his voice, get up that hill, O'Neil. So I think coaching, hopefully as a coach you realize to have somebody who's instilled that internal voice, get up that hill.

is sort of a sacred thing. So that's the position you can occupy in somebody's mental and emotional life. And, you know, I still draw on that today. I'm a 53 year old guy and I still need to get up that hill. And I still think of Ralph Estes or Jim Katkin or, you know, Mike Plansky, these guys, just at the right time. You know, when you think you can't do it, they're telling you, you better do it and you got to do it, man. So.

So yeah, I think that's coaching.

Cory Heitz (12:04)
Yeah, absolutely. Now you're back at Tilton. You took a break and you're back now. For people that don't know, give us the pitch on Tilton as a school and then your basketball program as well.

Marcus O'Neil (12:07)
Yeah.

Well, the first thing you need to know about Tilton School and the basketball program is that I'm here and I have these great stories. ⁓ But I think, ⁓ you know...

My thing is I always try to get people to visit, know, if you're considering, you know, a boarding school, prep school for basketball, and you look at the website so you gather information from some other site that tells you, you know, which one is ranked in a certain way academically, you know, that's all well and good, you know, but, you know, ultimately these places provide some of same basic fundamental things. But...

Like until you visit a place, I don't know how you can know anything about that school. And I think when you come to our campus, what you'll find out is yeah, you're going to work hard. You're going to have a structured thing. You're going to, you know, foster a sense of independence as a young person. But.

So we'll make you work hard, but you're going to have fun. ⁓ This isn't a miserable place. And I'll also say it's not.

You know, it's not as formal as some of these, some of the other boarding schools that we compete with, you know, like there's certainly events where you're going to have to, uh, you know, put on a sports coat and a shirt and tie, but you're not going to have to do it every day. Um, so, uh, you know, I think there's a real importance to know which, which fork is a salad fork. I still don't know, but I know it's important, you know, so, um, you'll learn those things here.

You'll learn how to function in a professional environment, how to interact with adults, how to develop your resume, talk in an interview. You'll learn those things.

you you also can, you spend a lot of your time in a less formal setting, you ⁓ you won't every time you're, you know, solving some physics problem or something, you're not going to have to be in your sports coat. So it's a happy place. You know, it's maybe a little less formal, but ⁓ you know, we got such awesome students here. When people come and visit, I mean,

you know, some high percentage of the time they come back from the student guide tour and say, wow, those kids are impressive. Those guys are really impressive. And I do think, so we have a, you know, we have a great community here and, ⁓ you know, for anybody from any distance too, it doesn't help that we're, it doesn't hurt that we're right off interstate 93. Like if you're trying to get here, you know, it's

You we go and play some of these road games and you're not even within 15 miles of a pizza place. How do you live like that? That's not, that's inhumane. Right downtown Tilton, we have Tilton House Pizza, the best pizza place in New Hampshire. We have Casa Migos, Eduardo owns it. Eduardo does a terrific job. It's probably the best Mexican place within 50 miles as well.

I mean, and you can walk, if you're a student here, I'm gonna walk down there for lunch as a way to do that. Think about that if you're thinking about coming to Tilton. If you need a pair of sneakers or clothes, the Tanger Outlets are right up the street, you can get to those. ⁓ So, you know, we have a great physical location. It's not in the middle of nowhere. You know, it's a decent downtown, you know, so. ⁓

I don't know what to say for a sales pitch other than this is the perfect place. This might be the best place on earth aside from some of the beaches in Costa Rica. ⁓ So, you know, if you're looking for a place to be, you want to be with great people, great guy, this is where you should come. I don't know why you would even look at another school. I guess that's what I would say.

Cory Heitz (16:29)
I love it. What's your closest airport?

Marcus O'Neil (16:32)
Well, ⁓ there is Laconia Airport, is a private, of one of smaller places. So if you have a private jet, you can fly into there. And sometimes, you know, when a college coach is coming here to recruit, you know, they're flying into Laconia. Manchester Airport is maybe 40 minutes from here. There's a lot of direct flights, you know, into Manchester. But, and then Logan's within, you know, within two hours whenever the traffic is reasonable.

So.

Cory Heitz (17:03)
Perfect.

Let me ask you this. You've had a bunch of NBA players come through your program to include George Nieheng, Wayne Selden, New Nerlens Noel, Terrence Mann. Everyone's trying to crack the code, Marcus, of how to get to the NBA, right? It's easier to get struck by lightning twice than to make it there. So is there any commonalities these guys had that you saw early on that made you aware that they had NBA potential? Like what's the secret sauce, if there is any?

Marcus O'Neil (17:12)
Yeah.

Right.

Yeah, I don't know the answer to that question. ⁓ those guys were all tremendous guys. in terms of on court play, efficiency is really important. Each of those guys had different reasons why they were able to go as far as they could. ⁓

you know, sort of evaluate offensive players based on, you know, a few pretty simple statistics, you know, shooting percentage and assist to turnover ratio. And, you know, I think there's, you know, better metrics out there for people who have better technology than us, but, ⁓ you know, efficiency on offense is an important part of it. And then, you know, I always...

think that for younger players it's important to have an identity. know, college coach calls me says, what is this kid? know, this kid is a, you know, he's a really a pest on defense. He'll pick up full court. People don't get by him real easy, you know, or this kid's an elite rebounder, or, you know, this guy can really put it in the hole. You know, we all want to be the guy that, you know, scores the points. But, you know, if you have an identity as a player, that's a good thing. But like, you know, George and Terrence play together.

on the Atlanta Hawks now and those guys are just you know, they care about winning and You know for those guys to be in the league versus other players that are probably similar You know physically You know, it's be a guy that people want to have around don't be a guy that people don't want to have around I don't you know, like have a bunch of other people around you that we have to deal with an answer to like

Those things start to matter. It doesn't get in trouble. One of the guys, it's the first ones here to work out and train. So there's on court stuff and there's off court stuff that's really important. But ⁓ we've been lucky. All those guys, we still have guys playing professionally overseas and other places. ⁓

You know, all those guys are people you want to have around, you know? And, you know, be the guy that if you show up at my house to date my daughter, I'm happy to see you. Hard to do, you know? Be that guy. I don't know if I'm that guy.

Cory Heitz (20:04)
Perfect. Now I'm going to ask you a lot of questions here coming up that lot of families ask me, right? And you're going to probably get these asked to you all the time. So I figured let's get it out in this forum here so people can hear philosophy. But ⁓ if I'm asking you how you're going to develop my son, is your stance on player development?

Marcus O'Neil (20:09)
Yeah.

⁓ I mean, you know, we try to, you know, obviously provide, you know, appropriate and good coaching, you know, I think, ⁓ you know, and that work is the weight room's included and the court is included. think, ⁓ consistency is, ⁓ is important. ⁓ so, ⁓ you know, being in the gym, being consistent training on, you know, sort of this. So repetition of, you know,

A small amount of skill is more important than learning a thousand different things. So, you know, I think environment's important. The fact that, you know, I think we have good energy and good culture, you know, makes it important. You if you hate coming to the gym, it's really hard. if that's either because our culture is bad or you hate basketball, that's no good for us. So we try to have a, you know, a good culture, fun environment. And, you know,

course, appropriate training is important and we've been lucky. I've learned from some of the best guys. Noah LaRoche coached with me here. He's a world class trainer now. He trains on NBA pros. He's an NBA coach, you know. So I learn a lot from him. I still consult with him. But, you know, I also believe you get better at basketball by playing basketball, you know. Whereas, you know, guy gets late in their NBA career, you know, they're probably not running up and down the court a lot.

in the off season because you only have so many trips in your body before you start to break down. At this age, when you're 15 to 19, there's three things that we sort of think about. It's ⁓ being in great shape, having great skill, which is handling the ball, shooting the ball, and ⁓ decision making. And the best way to... ⁓

learn to make good decisions is to be in a situation where you're on the court with nine other guys. You're playing with four, there's five of them out there. I don't know how else you can practice making those decisions other than being in those situations. So I'm not a coach that hates pick up basketball. still think guys in the gym playing basketball and figuring things out is helpful too.

Cory Heitz (22:43)
Yeah, love it. for your post-grad that come there, what are the academic requirements?

Marcus O'Neil (22:48)
Well, it's the requirements are first of all, to be a student here. know, sometimes we'll get a family that says, you know, my kid's smart enough, he's taken enough courses. You know, we really want him to focus on basketball, which is great, but you can't play basketball eight hours a day. So you're going to be a full-time student here. There's no part-time students. And for every student, that's sort of something different. You know, we have the nine to 12.

through post-grad curriculum, but it's not a separate program. So if you've taken your senior English before coming here, which you probably have, then ⁓ we're such a small school, such ⁓ good academics, you have the academic dean looking at your transcript saying, okay, AP language and composition is the appropriate course.

And there, you know, there is sometimes is some back and forth between the parents and the student, but, know, you take the next thing in the progression of classes, you know, and if we don't offer it here, you know, which I don't know if that's ever happened, you know, but, you know, if a kid gets to a certain level of math or English, they need to do something online, you know, or through a community college, you know, some of that has been done in the past, but you take what's the next in the progression.

of your learning, you know.

Cory Heitz (24:18)
Yeah, got it. At Tilton, do basketball players need to play multiple sports? ⁓

Marcus O'Neil (24:23)
No, no one gets forced here. It's not like, hey, because you're coming here from basketball, got to, you know, you know, in exchange for, you know, coming to, you know, be here, you know, you have to serve us by playing on the soccer team or something. We've certainly had some great, great players that are multiple sports guys. So, you know, we don't enter into the debate of, you know, is specialization good or bad. You know, the bottom line is, you know,

A lot of basketball players specialize in a sport, so we're not going to fight you on that. To the contrary, if you found this thing that happens to be basketball that you're passionate about, you want to zero in on, we're with you on that. no, we don't strong arm kids into playing other sports.

Cory Heitz (25:17)
Gotcha, gotcha. Now a big question families ask before they make this investment is how do I know how much playing time I'm going to get when we go to this prep score, that prep score. I know the answer, right? Of what you're going to, what coaches say and what I say to them, but how do you respond to that when a family asks that?

Marcus O'Neil (25:35)
Uh, you know, I think that's a fair question, a tough question. I I would say I have no idea how much your child is going to play here in most cases. know, in some cases I may say, you know, these are the players that I sort of have come in that I know of. This is where I have you evaluated. You know, it's obviously, you know, it's a much different experience when you're

say the sixth guy versus the 10th guy, no doubt about it. ⁓ So I try to give them a gauge of where I sort of see them on the depth chart, but once they get here, there's competition for playing time. ⁓ yeah, mean, I think the goal of every team, like for me, the natural thing is we're gonna go play it.

go down the street and play another team. The goal is for us to walk out of the gym with more points than the other team. So I got to do what's in the best competitive interests of the team. And it's personal for or against anybody. That's what I'm going to do. ⁓ so ⁓ we're always going to do what's doing the best competitive interests of the team.

situation we're in. So, you know, we never tell anybody you're going to get this many minutes. We may say, you know, like, yeah, we sort of see it. This is where we think you'll end up. you know, it's sort of, you know.

So that whatever in the best competitive interest of the team.

Cory Heitz (27:20)
Yeah, you know, I use the Holman Smith story a lot to where he was third on the depth chart for you. Right. And then I think a player got hurt. Another player had another issue and I think 10 games in Holman became the start of the rest of season and ended up, know, at a D one program. So, uh, you have to be ready to go always. Cause as in life, you don't know who's going to get injured, whether it's a college program or prep school program, who's going to get injured, who's going to transfer, who's going to fail out, who's going to get benched.

Marcus O'Neil (27:28)
Yeah.

Right.

Cory Heitz (27:48)
due to not being how they should be on the quarter off the court. So you always got to be ready and true Marcus, you also have to get film on everybody. That's a last year player to show to college coaches. So kids are going to get playing time. It just depends how much, right? Yeah.

Marcus O'Neil (28:01)
Right, yeah, and

I would say, yeah, think kids are always gonna play at some point. You have all sorts of games, all sorts of opponents. I I think the good thing about our team, one of the things I like about our team is there's not. ⁓

you know, sort of pressure from the school to be like, you know, we really can you carry 18 guys, you know, like that's not happening. Like I've got to sort of be there to coach each and every player on our team. So ⁓ if I tell you, you you come here and you visit and I say you're on the varsity, you're on the varsity and that's not 18 guys, you know, I'm not going to push you off to another team. So ⁓

You know, you'll be with us and you know, typically I don't think there's been a year where we've had, I don't know if we've had more than 13 players. It's usually 11 or 12, you know. And so yeah, there is opportunity and yeah, like, know, yeah, Holman when he came here, yeah, he might've been third on the deaf chart. He ended up at the start, he played great for

Cory Heitz (29:21)
So Marcus, I'm assuming everybody on your team has to play at some point, right? So you get footage for college coaches, explain that.

Marcus O'Neil (29:27)
Yeah. Well, yeah, I think, ⁓ you know.

The nice thing about here is, know, I'm not going to, our varsity team is our varsity team. You know, if you're in the admissions office and I tell you, you're going to be on the varsity, you're going to be on the varsity. So you're to be one of probably 11 or 12 guys. You know, we don't keep 18 guys. So the opportunity here is real. And, like we talked about with Holman, mean, you know, basketball is physically demanding.

So, you know, sometimes guys get hurt. Sometimes somebody outplays somebody that you didn't expect. And ⁓ so, you know, there is opportunity. know, I mean, ultimately everybody plays in some of the games. I mean, you play all kinds of games, all kinds of opponents. It's a 30-game season. So ⁓ there's a lot of chances to play. But, you know, we also, you know, there's a lot that...

Even though some of the fall traffic has been reduced, know, so, you know, there's still coaches coming through here. You know, sometimes coaches will sit, you know, you sometimes we'll have coaches say, Mark, if we'd rather come to a practice than a game. And we play a lot in practice, you know, we're not, you know, running a million sprints, you know, without a ball on our hands. We there's a lot of opportunity to be evaluated, even for a guy that plays a lot.

There's a lot you can see in our practice and a lot of coaches want to see that. then, you know, over the years you do this long enough, sometimes there is a coach that calls you and says, you got anybody for us? And not that they're going to just completely take your word for a guy, you can get them in the gym to see a kid. And sometimes you're placing a kid in the spring, March or April, you know, so, ⁓ so, you know, your opportunity.

will be what I say it is. ⁓ I'm not going to mislead you if you come here. It's important to honor what you say and say what you mean. I think we've done that.

Cory Heitz (31:49)
Yeah, love it. Now my son just committed to play for Tilden, right? Walk me through what you tell players and their families about how you're going to get them placed in college. Like what is your recruiting placement process now in 2025, which is different. You know, obviously it was five years ago.

Marcus O'Neil (32:03)
Right? Well,

I think it's not fair if you don't acknowledge that the landscape has changed, that timetable's a little different. You have these guys like Patino coming up and saying, we're not looking at high school kids at all. ⁓ So ⁓ yeah, I think with every player that comes in, say they're a post-grad, you talk about, well, what's your...

current recruiting and if a kid says well I don't have a single college division one two or three interested in me and I want to play division one and so you're really trying to bump a kid up three or four notches I mean ⁓ it's not realistic you know now there's plenty of kids that come in and say hey I have a division two offer I want to go division one you know and I'm a six seven you know forward you know

there's fewer six, seven people walking around in 511, you know? And so it's a different situation, you know? I might chime in and say, well, I think your thing is realistic, but if somebody has unrealistic expectations, you know, it's, know, I'll tell them I think they're being unrealistic, you know? But, you know, like we, you know,

Kevin Kresenzie came and played for us. think that was 2012, Kevin played for us. And he was from Florida. So there's no Division III basketball down there. He had some college recruitment, but not significant. And he was a good student and a good player. You know, I could see on film he was a good player, but I wasn't telling that kid or his parents, hey, you should come here. You're going to end up Division I. And, you know, he basically went from

sort of minimal recruiting to play in four years at Dartmouth and he's still playing professionally in South America. I didn't know it was gonna happen. So, you ⁓ don't wanna mislead people. I don't mislead people, but I also don't believe that it's my job to tell you that your dreams are stupid or unrealistic because I I grew up.

playing at the rec thinking I was gonna replace Larry Bird. And that's what drove me to play and try to play like Larry Bird. And when I was 32 and playing pickup at the park, I said, I might not ever get drafted, you know? And I'm thankful that there wasn't a lot of people. Like, you wanna be realistic about stuff, be realistic about your retirement portfolio. Like, I'm not a dream killer either. So there's always that balance. You don't wanna kill kids' dreams, but.

You also don't want to set people's expectations in a way that's not realistic. But I didn't turn out to be Larry Bird. I still have a good life. I'm still in the game.

Cory Heitz (35:09)
Yeah, but then you got to tell families too now things are taking longer than they ever have before and that that's tough if you're a post-grad family and it's April and a kid's still not placed yet. That's how do you hand it? What are you gonna do when that happens?

Marcus O'Neil (35:17)
Yeah.

Yeah, I think for every player you need to have a plan and a backup plan. Like if a kid's like, I want to play division one or I don't want to do anything. Well, all right. So if that doesn't happen, if that doesn't happen, yeah, if that doesn't happen, what are we going to do? Are you going to consider junior college? Are you going to consider this? Are you going to consider that? Because the worst time to talk about that is in April or May, you know, like

Cory Heitz (35:36)
Well that's path of failure. ⁓

Yeah.

Marcus O'Neil (35:51)
Oh, well, it didn't happen. What are we going to do? you know, if all right, you want to have a division one or bust plan, say you get hurt. What are you going to do? And, you know, I don't care if it's, you know, working on the family farm or, you know, driving your 76 cutlets across country and searching for your soul. You can do that too, but I'm not going to be the one, you know, being like, you know.

What are we doing now? We have to have a plan and a backup plan. And ⁓ one that everyone can sort of agree on. ⁓ So yeah, each family's different. But yeah, the timetable's changing. I don't have control over the market. The market is what it is, but what I'll tell you is if know.

In life, one of the most important things is to get with the right people. And, you know, we have our track record of having players leave here and go division one, two, three, playing the pros, whatever it is. ⁓ So we have our network and people we can call and people that'll take our calls. So, you know, being, being in the right neck, connect connected network is, a good thing to do. You know, that's why you should come to Tilt.

Cory Heitz (37:16)
Yeah, it's

That's huge. Yeah, exactly. The Rolodex you've got. ⁓ Tell me this, you are in NepSAC Class AA. Does it matter what class a player goes to?

Marcus O'Neil (37:31)
yeah, that's tough question. think, think so. mean, I think, ⁓ you know, finding a, you know, I think the most important thing is, you know, you, you, you, visit these campuses and the place that sort of feels right. But I do think, you know,

What's the difference between AA and AAA? There's probably less difference there than AA to Class B or something. I mean, there's great players, great teams, and certainly great coaches in every class, every level. I know these guys, and they run good programs. But yeah, I mean, of course, if you're asking about, you going to make my kid run cross country in the fall? ⁓

versus ⁓ being in a training program. There's a big difference there in terms of player development. ⁓ you have to know those things. But ⁓ there's guys that have gone on from all these levels. ⁓

Cory Heitz (38:40)
Well, let me ask you this, let me get more specific. Is there any difference between AA versus AAA or AA versus single A? Like you got one level up and below you. You know, everyone says their level is the best for some reason. Give me your pitch on AA and why a family should consider it if they're thinking like AAA is better or, you know, is single A that much worse? Like these are all just opinions, but I'm just curious to hear yours since you've been at AA so long.

Marcus O'Neil (38:51)
Right.

Right.

I guess, ⁓ you know, sort of what I like about AA is, ⁓ you know, we play a little bit longer game, you know, so we're at the 18 minutes. ⁓ So that gives you a little more opportunity to play a deeper rotation of players. So I think that helps, know, AAA is a little more than even that. ⁓ I think, ⁓ I just, I think there's a little...

that there's sort of more oversight, there's more regulating AA than AAA. AAA, you know, it's sort of... But yeah, I think the difference between AA and AAA is sort of...

I don't know if there's a huge difference there. ⁓ There's a huge variation from school to school, think more so than AA to AAA, because I think every school has their own identity and how they want to do things. ⁓

AAA teams, like every single one of the AAA teams are saying we take basketball very seriously and every night that we play, you better be ready. I think the AA's, some of our schools aren't sure they're ready to say that for whatever reason.

Cory Heitz (40:25)
question.

Yeah, it's a night fight every night though in double. mean, let's not kid ourselves.

Marcus O'Neil (40:51)
Yeah,

I don't expect to have an easy game all year, you know. But to be fair, we've had tough games in the single 18, one of the good ones there too. But I think it's more school to school, coach to coach. Who do you visit and feel like, I want that to be the guy screaming at me, get up the hill.

Cory Heitz (41:18)
That's right. That's right. Now, what are you looking for in a player,

Marcus O'Neil (41:22)
I

mean for us, when I talk to guys in our mission office, obviously we need a certain amount of guys, a certain amount of talent. But if you're talented, but you don't love basketball, sometimes it doesn't even work with us, because we're in the gym. I think...

You know, people talk about it, you know, if you want to be a good player, you got to work hard. And the last thing I want to talk about is work. you know, work to me is, you know, third shift at the post office. You know, I've done it. If you don't love it, it's all work, you know. But if you do, if you have that thing, if we have that shared passion for basketball, ⁓ that's a starting point. So you have to love basketball.

to sort of enjoy and be part of our program. So I sort of look for that. I think every prep school coach is gonna wanna hear from a high school coach, this guy's the first guy in the gym, he's a gym rat. If anyone wants to hear that, they love basketball. So I think that's important. We play both ends of the floor. ⁓ But yeah.

So we put an emphasis on culture, but we need guys to play all the different positions. And we train our guys all the same, our guards learn to finish around the basket and be inside. Post players playing on the perimeter, developing their skills and shooting. I mean, it's sort of the way basketball is going. And that's when you become a problem on offense is.

when you can take advantage of mismatches playing different parts of the floor.

Cory Heitz (43:20)
Yeah, love it. What does it take to be a D1 guard?

Marcus O'Neil (43:24)
What

Cory Heitz (43:26)
a guard at the Division 1 level.

Marcus O'Neil (43:30)
Well, it comes down to, you know, handling the ball, shooting the ball, and, you know, playing both ends of the floor. You know, again, I think if you're a 6'4", versus 6'4", you know, in great shape, know, versus 5'11", and not, you I think size, you know, like...

It's still better to be six, four than five 11, but you you see those guys. just think, uh, the, the more, uh, the more challenge you are physically, the better you have to be, you know, you have to be that much better. then, you know, to get on the, on a division one court, you know, requires you, got to have a certain amount of the requisite, you know,

physical attributes, you know, in terms of speed and strength and then the fast twitch and decision making, you know, and some of those things are easier to teach and develop than others. Some of those things may be a little more innate, but ⁓ yeah, I think.

You have to be pretty exceptional to be a Division I player.

Cory Heitz (44:47)
What is last question? What is the prep school basketball world look like in five years from now?

Marcus O'Neil (44:53)
Boy, I don't know. I think ⁓ the NCAA will have something to say about that, depending on... The NCAA has had a tough time when they've been taking a court and illegal fights and they've tried to do some regulating. Depending on how they regulate the junior colleges could have an impact on prep schools, but...

I think ⁓ despite all that stuff that can impact ⁓ you, ⁓ we're going to be a place, Tilton School is going to be a place where you can come and ⁓ you're going to be in a ⁓ safe place where there's a certain amount of nurturing, coaching and teaching where you can develop personally.

the interpersonal skills to function effectively in the professional environment. I don't know, things are always changing. One of the things we talk about on our website is being in a world that's marked by diversity and change. Where are we going to be five years from now?

That's a big philosophical question. I know where we're going to be. We're going to have our feet on the ground helping young people develop their healthy identity and the qualities they're going to need to be successful in the world.

Cory Heitz (46:41)
Yeah, love it. Here's some quick hitters for you. You ready? Best player you ever played against.

Marcus O'Neil (46:44)
Yeah.

Best player I've ever played against?

Peace.

Cory Heitz (46:52)
Anyone

that Celtics four on five that you know you had to guard

Marcus O'Neil (46:55)
Yeah, the Celtics 515. ⁓

You know, I'm gonna say it's probably some of the guys that are here, know, playing pick up with some of the guys here at Tilton. I don't know which one to pick out. I've been beaten pretty bad by some of these guys. ⁓ Terrence, man, beat up on us pretty good. George beat up on me, New Nerlens, Wayne, all those guys. Oriaki, Coombs. ⁓

So yeah, it's sort of funny, you I have thought about that because, know, I played a lot of men's leagues and played in prep school and college.

⁓ Yeah, there's been some very good guys, but ⁓ I'm going to say the best guys that I've played against are Tilton and Alom.

Cory Heitz (47:54)
who's the best player you ever coached against.

Marcus O'Neil (47:58)
man, yeah, there's so many, yeah. ⁓

Cory Heitz (48:03)
You faced a lot, or maybe the guy that lit you up one night more than any other that really stood out.

Marcus O'Neil (48:07)
Yeah,

who I mean early on in my career, Rakim Sanders from St. Andrews was really tough. mean, Jerome Dyson in those early years, Jerome Dyson at Procter was really tough. But then as we got going, there was just so many players and we had players to play against those guys. ⁓ know, Donovan Mitchell played against us from Brewster, you know.

They were, they had five other great players too. So they don't stand out as much, you know, like even Donovan Mitchell didn't stand out as much because he had other five other high major guys on his, on his, ⁓ on his team. Will Barton had a really good game against us. So to single-handedly, you know, stole our heart one year at, at Brewster.

You know, he was very good. I mean, I know I'm forgetting some awesome, awesome players. mean, when we played Hargrave, they had the kid that played for Louisville when they won the national championship and he had transferred from Luke Hancock. Luke Hancock was really good. I didn't think we were going to have a real answer for him, but you know, we snuck away with the win in that game. ⁓

Cory Heitz (49:23)
yeah, Luke, Hancock? Hancock.

Marcus O'Neil (49:35)
He would yeah, I remember thinking this guy's as good as anybody we've played against and he was Really good, know, buddy healed we played in a tournament one year buddy healed was very good You know, we played them in a tournament. I think I think we played them in Illinois and ⁓ There was no shot clock and his coach just We had a better we had better all around talent

But they would just hold the ball until Buddy Heald could get a shot off. And he was really tough to beat that day. We ended up winning some low scoring game by one point. But yeah, he was very good. then-

He's a kid from Canada played at Huntington Prep. He's with the Miami Heat now. Yeah, Wiggins, yeah. Yeah, he was a good player. We did a good job on him. But going into that game, we were aware of him.

Cory Heitz (50:28)
Wiggins.

Marcus O'Neil (50:43)
But yeah, there's been so many great players. It's like Brewster, we've probably played against 10 NBA players that played at Brewster alone. And those guys were all really good that year. had, the front court was all NBA guys, Jakara Sampson, kid that played with the Suns.

to play for Michigan.

Those guys were awesome.

Cory Heitz (51:15)
Who's Tiltin's rival? Do you guys have one?

Marcus O'Neil (51:19)
⁓ You know, we had a great rivalry when I first got here, when we first got into the New England Championship game against Marianapolis. And Dave Vytel was the coach there. And those were fierce games. know, there was always some crazy thing happening. But, you know, ⁓ New Hampton's right up the street from us. Brewster's not too far away. you know, those games are, you know, sort of charged for us.

Um, but you know, Mike Hart, you know, at St. Andrew's, you know, I was considered out of rivalry because we've had some great games over the years. But, um, it's, uh, I think as a school, as a school, you know, we got these other lakes, lakes, region schools, Proctor Holden, it's Manhattan, Brewster, you know, Vermont's in there. You know, it's sort of, we've gone through cycles because I was here for 15 years before, you know,

We'd have, you we went for a two, three year stretch for us in Vermont. know, those games were pretty intense. Like I said, Marion Apples before that, St. Andrews, but you know, it's always hard to go to New Hampton and be competitive. You know, the AD over there, Jamie Arsenal was from my hometown. He's a great guy, but ⁓ you know, the students.

You know, they're on the court, you know, they're playing that. They have this huge gym downstairs, but they choose to play these games in this small gym. ⁓ the fans are right on, you know, they're really rowdy, you know, and, you know, we've had some great, great moments over there. Just, you know, just trying to be competitive, never mind when, you know, we've been lucky enough to get a couple, I think, over there. But I love going over there.

guy I think that works in town there that comes there just to scream at me. You don't like me so you know we like that. ⁓

Cory Heitz (53:24)
What's your favorite movie of all time?

Marcus O'Neil (53:27)
⁓ You know

that always changes, you know, I'd have to say Rocky, you know, you know, and I think all four, the first four, Rocky one through four are all pretty good, you know, but, you know, probably, you know, probably, yeah, Rocky, you know, it's a love story. It's a sports story. It's in Philadelphia, great city, you know, it's.

Cory Heitz (54:04)
Rock, gotcha. And then last thing, are your hobbies when you're not at Tilton?

Marcus O'Neil (54:10)
uh... well you know i still uh... you know i still try to get out and work out in the morning you know in these workout classes, boot camp, yoga, and pilates but you know most you know my biggest hobby these days is you know having my young daughters you know tell me what to do you know like going to the they do dance and stuff so you know I'm a dance dad now so go watch them in dance competitions and uh... but uh...

Yeah, I mean I still like to travel. You we try to go to the Outer Banks, you know, every year, every other year I got a sister down there. So, you know, if you go to the beach with me, you got to be prepared to be in the ocean for six hours straight body surfing. You know, you, you know, if you're one of these people that go there and want to have to leave after 20 minutes, don't come in my car, it ain't happening, you know. You get stung by a jellyfish, you got to suck it up and keep swimming, you know, so.

I like the beach and I've enjoying watching the NBA tournament recently.

Cory Heitz (55:15)
Yeah.

Is there anything you want to touch on that we didn't ⁓ talk about in this conversation?

Marcus O'Neil (55:21)
No,

I've talked about way too much already. I don't think there's anything else that we should cover before it gets inappropriate.

Cory Heitz (55:30)
a of it. We'll keep it apolitical. All right. We'll stay away from that. Well, Marcus, thanks so much for joining us on the podcast today. Welcome back to Tilton. We're excited to watch you, you know, do your thing back at your school you're at for so many years and did so many great things at, and we're going to put all your contact information in the show notes, but for people listening that are interested in learning more, where can they find you?

Marcus O'Neil (55:31)
Yeah.

Uh, what's that? Where can they find me? Oh yeah. Yeah. Uh, I don't know. We're to have to leave that up to my assistant that we're in the process of hiring, but you know, I still have the old people, social media. have a Tilton basketball Facebook that we're going to, we're starting to create some content for, but you know, my wife is like, you know, you look so ancient doing that. That's, you know, got to get an Instagram. So, uh, yeah.

Cory Heitz (55:57)
social media or email or any of that.

Okay.

Marcus O'Neil (56:22)
You can contact us to the Tilton basketball Facebook page. I do get those messages, you know, but ⁓ Yeah

Cory Heitz (56:32)
We'll link everything we've got in the show notes and if you have any updates, let us know. right. Coach Marcus O'Neil, head coach at Tilton school joining us today in the prep athletics podcast. If you like what you heard, be sure to subscribe on all the major podcasting platforms and YouTube where we put bonus content.

Marcus O'Neil (56:35)
Alright.

Cory Heitz (56:49)
Go to prepathletics.com. get so much content on there to answer all your prep school questions. If you want a free assessment, we'll let you know if prep school is right for you. And any questions you've got, we get back to every single email that comes our way because we're about promoting this game and all the benefits of it in the prep school world too. So Marcus, thanks for joining us today. All right. Thanks so much. We'll see you guys next time on the Prep Athletics Podcast. Take care.

Marcus O'Neil (57:10)
Thank you.