University of Connecticut Athletics
UConn Mourns Passing Of Former Bkb Coach Fred Shabel
2/28/2023 3:29:00 PM | Men's Basketball
UConn Athletic Communications / Feb. 28, 2023
Fred Shabel, who guided the UConn men's basketball team to three NCAA Tournament appearances as the Huskies' head coach in the mid-1960s, passed away Sunday at his home in Clearwater, Fla. He was 90 years old.
Shabel took over the UConn program in 1963-64, following the sudden death of longtime coach Hugh Greer in midseason of 1962-63. Assistant coach George Wigton was named interim coach to finish the 1962-63 season and Shabel, who an assistant coach at Duke, was hired as the new head coach in April, 1963.
He enjoyed immediate success with the Huskies, capturing the Yankee Conference co-championship and beating Rhode Island, 61-60, to secure a berth in the 1964 NCAA Tournament. In the tournament, Shabel's Huskies defeated Temple and Princeton – which featured All-American Bill Bradley --  to advance to the Final 8 before bowing to Duke, Shabel's former team as well as his alma mater.
Shabel's UConn teams won or shared the Yankee Conference championship in each of the next three seasons and made two more NCAA Tournament appearances (1965, 1967). His 1964-65 team tied a school record for wins with a 23-2 regular-season record. Along the way, he coached some of the most famous players in UConn basketball history, including Toby Kimball and Wes Bialosuknia.
After four seasons at UConn, Coach Shabel retired from coaching and became the athletic director at the University of Pennsylvania, a job he held until 1975, when he left the athletics department to become vice president for operations at Penn.
He left Penn in 1980 to take an executive position with Comcast-Spectator, a sports management and cable TV company in Philadelphia. He worked there for nearly 40 years, retiring two years ago at age 88.
Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., in 1932, Shabel moved with his family to Union City, N.J., where he starred as an all-state basketball player at Union Hill High School. He went to college and played ball at Duke, before serving in the U.S. Air Force from 1954-56 and was a player-coach for the Shaw Air Force Base basketball team.
Following his discharge, he became an assistant coach under Duke head coach Vic Bubas from 1957-63, when UConn offered him the head coaching position.
In four years with the Huskies, Shabel compiled a 72-29 record, a .713 winning percentage that ranks in the top five among UConn head coaches. Â
