There is an old adage coaches use in sports; fill positions important to the team’s success with a coach’s son.

For the NIU men’s basketball team, that player is Anthony Maestranzi. The senior point guard from Bartlett orchestrates the offense, initiates plays and is the floor general that sets the pace for others to follow.

His tutelage started years ago in sweaty grade-school gyms, under the supervision of his coach since kindergarten — his dad, John.

“I started coaching Anthony in kindergarten,” John Maestranzi said. “The league started with second graders, but I told my sister who worked at the park that Anthony was real good. She got us in the second grade league, but the catch was I had to be the coach.”

In 5th grade, their AAU team went to Nationals and finished in fourth place; together John and Anthony played everywhere from the big city to the suburbs.

“My father always has driven me, he’s always been my coach,” Anthony said. “I played AAU from fifth grade to junior year, and my dad has always been the coach.”

John has been there for each of his son’s 208 points this year and has seen all of his 41 three-point field goals made.

“My dad has been to every single one of my games,” Maestranzi said. “I just go out there and play hard because I want to make him proud.”

“I’ve never missed a game,” John said. “I used to work a lot when Anthony was younger, I’m fortunate to have done well in work, so I always find time to go.”

Anthony points to the strength of family as the reason for his success in Division I basketball and in life.

“My dad and my mom are so important to me,” Anthony said. “I talk to my mom a lot, she is always there for me, she makes me feel better after a tough loss, or during tough times. She’s never let me down.”

Sizing up

At 5-foot-10 inches tall and 165 pounds, Anthony literally looks up to most opponents.

His passion lies in “doing the dirty work.” He leads the team by shooting 89 percent from the free-throw line, and he is second on the team in both steals and three-point shooting.

“Anthony was never flashy,” John said. “Two points is two points, A good pass is when you give the shooter the ball in stride, and he makes a basket. A good point guard makes the people around him better and gets his players the ball at the right time.”

Anthony models his game after a future NBA Hall of Famer that made two trips to the finals, is the all-time assist and steals leader, and has a similar physique.

“In my opinion, John Stockton was the best point guard to ever play the game,” Anthony said. “He set tough picks and did the little things so well. I like Steve Nash, but Stockton was just a tougher guy, he took charges, dove all over the floor for loose balls and made his team so much better.”

Being undersized compared to other giants of the hardwood, Anthony takes pride in fine tuning his defense in his four-year stay at NIU.

“One of my weaknesses coming in was my defense,” Anthony said. “In high school I was more of a scorer; we played zone defense. But at NIU the coaching staff taught me that defense was the most important part of the game.”

A trip to play at Notre Dame’s Joyce Center during his sophomore year was one to remember since he has a family lineage that runs deep at the Indiana school.

The end of the line

With his tenure at NIU about to come to a close, Anthony talks about the program like a proud father — like his own father talks about him.

“It has been such a pleasure to be part of a Division-I program,” Anthony said. “Especially one like NIU; there is such a great coaching staff here, and I think that the best years of this program might be yet to come for NIU basketball.”

Under the leadership of coach Rob Judson, Anthony said that valuable life lessons have been taught inside the boundaries of basketball.

“Coach does a great job of translating basketball into real life,” Maestranzi said. “For example; an early morning workout is tough, but so is real life. When you get in an adverse situation, he’ll say ‘Hey, that is how the real word is, too.’ He really wants us to be successful going from college into the world.”