Hill Top Anthony Fucillo Named Head Coach, Assistant Ad at Belmont Hill School

 Anthony Fucillo, one of Winthrop High School’s greatest quarterbacks, is returning to the interscholastic sidelines as a coach and an administrator.

Fucillo, son of Hall of Fame football coach Tony Fucillo, has been named the head football coach and assistant athletic director at the Belmont Hill School.

Fucillo was an assistant football coach on Tim Murphy’s staff at Harvard for the past six seasons.

“I decided to take a little bit of a backseat in terms of lifestyle, which was getting crazy, and this opportunity works out better for my family – it’s all good,” said Fucillo, who is married to Dr. Stephanie Clegg, an orthopaedic surgeon. The couple has a baby daughter, Madison Fucillo.

 Success as a College Coach

Fucillo was the safeties coach at Harvard, where he helped build one of the nation’s best rushing defenses. More importantly, the Crimson beat their archrival Yale twice in the game.

“I appreciate the opportunity being on Tim Murphy’s staff and the staff as a hole,” said Fucillo. “I think Scott Larkey is the best defensive coordinator that I’ve ever been around. He’s an awesome person, a great family man, and just a great teacher of football. I learned so much from him.”

Prior to his stint at Harvard, Fucillo also coached at Amherst College, WPI, and Stonehill.

“Coaching college football was a great overall experience,” said Fucillo.

 Excelling at QB

Fucillo was a three-year starting quarterback at Winthrop, where he played for his father Tony Fucillo’s Vikings. He also played varsity hockey and baseball, emerging as a superb shortstop in the state tournament.

Fucillo led the football Vikings to a 9-2 record as a senior, falling shy to Gloucester, 14-0, in the NEC title showdown on a cold, windy night at Miller Field that neutralized the passing game. Interestingly, had the current MIAA playoff format been in existence, the Fucilllo-led Vikings would likely have been one of top seed in its division. But back then, only the NEC champion advanced to the playoffs.

“If we had the format we have now, I would say my father probably would have won 10 Super Bowls,” said Anthony. “But I wouldn’t change my experience for anything. I loved everything about Winthrop, and it’s in great hands now with Coach [Jon] Cadigan.”

Two years later, his younger brother, James Fucillo, quarterbacked the undefeated Winthrop Vikings to a 25-8 victory over the Wareham Vikings for the Division 2A Super Bowl championship. Their sister, Jenny, was a Winthrop High track star, who continued to excel in the sport at the University of Notre Dame.

College and Pro Football Career

Anthony Fucillo began his college football career at Colgate University before transferring to Tufts University where he was a two-year starting quarterback and captain.

He played one season of professional football in Denmark. “The experience over there was awesome,” said Fucillo. “It was fun. I got the best of both worlds. I got the itch out of me [to play pro football], and I got to experience something pretty cool, being out of the country. I had never done that before.”

The Future at Belmont Hill

Fucillo will be taking over a football program that competes in the highly competitive Independent School League (ISL).

“We have a lot of talent on the roster,” said Fucillo. “We have two defensive ends (Tommy Rupley and Sampson Ounoha) who are Power-5 kids with multiple college offers. We also have some really good seniors returning. My main goal is to first build a culture of hard work and high character, and hopefully the wins come after that.”

Inspired by his Father

As Winthrop High fans witnessed, Tony Fucillo was in a class by himself as a head football coach. His dominance in the Winthrop-Revere Thanksgiving series is just one example of the Vikings outplaying larger schools on annual basis.

“Obviously, I wouldn’t be in the position I am now if it weren’t for him,” said Anthony. “He’s been my inspiration to get into this profession. My goal has always been to try to emulate a lot of the things that he did as a coach, in terms of the impact he had on young men. I love the game of football, but being a coach to me is being a teacher and mentor. There’s not a better guy in terms of that aspect of it than my dad. What he was able to do at Winthrop every year, more than just the wins that he had, the bigger impact was his ability to get us to play above our level of talent every week. Some of the things he taught us as players, I think that went a long way in life for a lot of us.”