•

'

I

V

Y

Barry Bershad

made a few stops

on his way to coaching

at West Bloomfield

High School.

MIKE ROSENBAUM
Special to The Jewish News

n

e's a successful, 35 - year
basketball coach. He's
the head coach of a
solid, Class A program
at West Bloomfield High School. But
when he began coaching in 1964, he didn't
have this type of success in mind.
Young Barry Bershad's favorite sports were tennis
and baseball, although he also played basketball at the Jewish
Community Center of Metropolitan Detroit. Then, while serving in
the army, Bershad received a letter from then-JCC Director Sid
Cohen offering him the head-coaching job of the JCC varsity bas-
ketball team. Bershad accepted, and his coaching career began.
"I started coaching and grew to like it and just stayed with it,"
Bershad said. "[Basketball] grew into an enormous hobby of mine,
more than a passion. I played it, and I've coached a long time. I just
enjoy being around the kids and the excitement of what's going on."
Bershad admittedly did some on-the-job training early in his
career. "I was surrounded by some very good peoples. Sid Fox, who
used to be a head coach, helped me a great deal. I was always around
people who played and coached and I kind of picked up their sys-
tems. Then (West Bloomfield Coach) Tim Domke and (Oak Park
Coach) Howard Golding kind of refined it."
Bershad's non-coaching jobs have included seven years as a middle
school teacher in the Detroit School District, paralegal work and run-
ning school intramural sports programs. As for his "hobby," Bershad
coached the JCC varsity from 1964-96, spent one year as junior varsity
coach and a second year as varsity head coach at Roeper High School, and
put in single years as assistant coach at Groves and Oak Park high schools.
Bershad has spent the past eight years at West Bloomfield. He was the
Lakers' varsity assistant for five years, coached the JV team for one season,
and became the school's head coach last season.
His career highlights? "I was lucky enough to win seven Midwest Jewish
Center tournaments," he said. "They were all something special, but the ones

3/5
1999

94 Detroit Jewish News

Barg Bershad works the
sidelines in a recent game
at Southfieldlatbrup.