Logo: Wesleyan Athletics

2012-13 Coaching Staff

Joe Reilly - Head Men's Basketball Coach
(860) 685-2918 - jpreilly@wesleyan.edu
 
Joe Reilly, head coach     Joe Reilly enters his fifth season in charge of Wesleyan men's basketball in 2012-13.  Joe had been faculty head coach of men's basketball at Bates College in Lewiston, Maine for 11 seasons prior to becoming faculty head coach of men's basketball at Wesleyan in 2008-09.  He holds the rank of adjunct professor of physical education.
     Joe returned to his home state of Connecticut after building the Bates program into one of the strongest in the New England Small College Athletic Conference (NESCAC), to which Wesleyan also belongs. After inheriting an 8-16 squad in 1997-98, Joe fashioned eight straight winning seasons with the Bobcats beginning in 2000-01, a team first, including a record 20-6 campaign in 2005-06 which included a school-record 16-game win streak. Joe was recognized as NESCAC Coach of the Year following the 2005-06 season. His 19-8 squad of 2004-05 earned a spot in the NESCAC tournament title game. Over his 11-year head coaching career at Bates, Joe compiled a cumulative mark of 154-121 and was 6-5 vs. Wesleyan. Over his last six seasons at Bates, Joe carried the Bobcats to a .701 winning percentage with a 108-46 record. He was the Maine State Basketball Coaches Association Coach of the Year three times and the New England Basketball Hall of Fame Division III Coach of the Year in 2003-04.
     Now with a 49-50 record at Weseyan, Joe has surpassed 200 career victories.  In leading Wesleyan to a school-record 20-6 campaign in 2011-12, Joe brought about one of the greatest improvements, year-over-year, in Wesleyan history as the Cardinals raised their seasonal win total from 11 the year before.  Only twice in 110 years of Wesleyan basketball has a team posted a greater increase in its total triumphs than nine.
     Part of a rich basketball coaching family, Joe, a grew up in Connecticut, is the son of legendary high-school mentor Joe Reilly Sr., who won more than 500 games while guiding South Catholic High School. His uncle Gene Reilly had similar success at Portland High School while his brother Luke is well respected for his current efforts at East Catholic High School.
     Joe is a 1991 graduate of Trinity College in Hartford, also a member of the NESCAC, where he was a team captain for two seasons and scored more than 1,000 career points. His first college coaching assignment came at Yale University in 1994, where he served as an assistant for three years before arriving at Bates. Between Trinity and Yale, Joe earned an MBA from the University of Rhode Island. There he worked in the athletics department as a graduate assistant involved primarily with recreational sports.  At Wesleyan, Joe runs a pair of summer camps with the Cardinal Basketball School for elementary through high-school aged students and the Elite Basketball Camp for high-school aged students only.

Tim Lane - Assistant Coach
(860) 685-4162 - tlane@wesleyan.edu
 

Tim Lane, assistant coach      A 2009 graduate of Bowdoin College, Tim Lane came aboard the Wesleyan coaching staff as an intern and assistant men's basketball coach in 2010-11.  He is now in his third season with the Cardinals.  A four-year member of the Polar Bears' hoops squad, Tim was his team's representative to the NESCAC all-Sportsmanship squad in 2008-09.
     Tim began his collegiate coaching career in 2009-10 as an assistant at Dartmouth College.  He also gained coaching experience during the summers of 2007, 2008 and 2009, working at the Hoop Mountain camp in Easton, Mass. while also helping out at the Northern Middlesex Regional High School (his alma mater) Basketball Camp as its director in both 2008 and 2009.

Michael Shelton - Assistant Coach
 

Michael Shelton, assistant coach      An assistant coach at the University of New Haven during the 2011-12 season, Michael Shelton returns to the Cardinal coaching staff after spending two seasons as an assistant coach under Coach Reilly from 2009-11. He comes to Connecticut from the Indiana/Kentucky area and graduated from Jeffersonville Indiana High School in 2000. While in high school, Michael helped his team compile a 62-17 record as a three-year varsity starter. During the 2000 season, he ranked among the top-100 seniors in Indiana under head coach Mike Broughton, the winningest coach in the state of Indiana during the 1990s.
     Michael received a scholarship to play basketball for Division II Bellarmine University and finished his basketball career at Southeastern Illinois Junior College, where he received an associate's degree. His team concluded the season ranked fourth nationally with a 27-5 record and lost in the conference championship to Wabash Valley.
     Michael has previous head coaching and assistant coaching experience at the AAU, high school and middle-school level and recently earned a business degree from Southern Connecticut State University.