His name is synonymous with Hudson County cross country and track and field, and his teams were known statewide.
John Nagel’s passion for the sport guided a coaching career that spanned six different decades, nearly 250 championships and hundreds of loyal runners at St. Dominic Academy of Jersey City, where he coached for the past 46 years.
Nagel, 65, died Friday at a hospital in Largo, Florida, a month after falling ill while pursing another of his passions — a baseball spring training trip.
“He loved to travel and go to games,” said his daughter, Ashley Nally-Nagel, who accompanied her dad on this trip. “He’s been to every major league stadium for football, baseball, basketball, hockey, many on opening day. ... He lost his dad when he was 13 and they used to go to baseball games together, and I think that was him keeping his dad alive, going to all the games.”
Nally-Nagel said she has been overwhelmed by the outpouring of love for her father from the St. Dominic Academy community.
“Since the news became public, just seeing them all connect for my dad, from runners from the 1970s to today, has been incredible,” she said.
Nagel was inducted into the Hudson County Coaches Track and Field Hall of Fame in 1999, the New Jersey State Coaches Hall of Fame in 2000, the St. Peter’s University Hall of Fame in 2003 and the Hudson County All Sports Hall of Fame in 2006. His squads won 108 Jersey City championships, 52 Hudson County titles and 80 HCIAA championships, as well as three Non-Public B titles as of 2019.
“He had an intense passion for coaching and was fiercely dedicated to his athletes and his sport,” said longtime Secaucus High School track and field and cross country coach Stan Fryczynski, also a member of the Hudson County Sports Hall of Fame and the Hudson County Track Coaches Association Hall of Fame. “That might sound simple, but it’s the ultimate compliment. ... He just absolutely loved the sport.
“He touched and influenced many lives. ... He had an army of athletes that would attest to that.”
In 2019, Hudson County dedicated the start of the running path for cross-country races at Lincoln Park in Jersey City as the “John E. Nagel Running Path.”
Despite the personal honors, Nagel never considered the success as his own.
“I’m not about myself,” Nagel said in a 2019 interview. “I never have been. I still haven’t run a race or jumped or thrown for St. Dominic Academy. These personal accolades are a byproduct of the performances by the student-athletes.”
Nagel, who also served as the school’s athletic director since 1991, graduated from St. Paul’s Grammar School, Hudson Catholic High School and St. Peter’s University. He also coached at Hudson Catholic.
His SDA teams traveled from New England to North Carolina to compete, and Nagel took pride in having the program compete at every Ivy League school. SDA accomplished the goal when it raced at Cornell in early March.
“You don’t encounter a lot of people who make a commitment to a place and we have been blessed with John,” said St. Dominic Academy Head of School Elizabeth Christou-Woodall. “It’s not common for someone to commit because they are so passionate about what they do.
“When I talked to the girls today was about how he was the best advocate they could ever have because he wanted them to be better than they knew of themselves at that moment.”
Nagel was also an accomplished public address announcer for local high school sporting events, and he laughed off talk about being good enough to do it professionally.
“He could do any game, he loved all sports,” Fryczynski said. “It was more of a hobby, but he could have made that a career. Without question, he was very good.”
Nagel, who was only a few years older than the athletes he was coaching when he started in 1978, kept in touch with many his former runners. His devotion to his athletes was evident in the number of wakes and funerals he attended for family members of those he coached.
“He came for both my parents’ wakes,” said Fryczynski, who began his coaching career in 1973. “He did that for a lot of people in different walks of life. That’s just anther testament to his life.”
Funeral arrangements have not been set, and Nally-Nagel said services will likely be delayed until next week, partly because the Penn Relays are being contested this weekend “and his team will be (there) and he definitely wouldn’t want to screw that up.”
