Neil P. Horne, Jr., who passed away on Thursday, July 4, 2024, was the husband of Rose Mary Horne, son of Eleaner and Neil P. Horne, Sr., brother of Lois Doherty, father of Cheryl Wilkinson and Neil, III, father-in-law of Stacy Horne and John Wilkinson and grandfather of Lindsey, John and Danny Wilkinson and Julia and Natalie Horne. Horne cared most about, and was proudest of, his five grandchildren, and nothing made him happier than attending their academic, athletic and music events or just joking around with Lindsey, John, Danny, Julia and Natalie.
Horne’s passion was his family and teaching the game of basketball. During his career in athletics, Horne had joy every day of his life doing what he loved to do. He cherished the close, lifelong friendships he developed through athletics (especially with his players and coaches) more than winning, but winning he and his teams, together, sure did.
Chronicled in Stephen D. Reddy’s award-winning book “A Ball with No Points,” the pinnacle of Horne’s coaching career was guiding Westfield High School to the 1972 Group IV State Championship and a final Star-Ledger ranking of Number 2 in New Jersey, the only boys’ basketball state championship in school history. Described by a New Jersey journalist as “one of the most remarkable Cinderella stories ever written,” the 1972 team’s upset of Elizabeth (ranked first in New Jersey during the regular season victory and ranked second in New Jersey during the state tournament victory) remains one of the biggest upsets in the history of New Jersey’s state basketball tournament. An innovator, Horne’s “The Delay Game Offense” was published in Prentice-Hall, Inc.’s October 1972 issue of The Coaching Clinic and subsequently implemented by multiple college basketball programs.
Horne was a conference championship coach at Ridge High School, guiding Ridge to two state sectional finals, prior to leading Westfield to three Watchung Conference Championships, an initial 2-year combined record of 49-4 and several boys’ basketball school records, including a 27-game winning streak. In 1981, Horne led the Somerville High School boys’ basketball team to one of the best seasons in school history, winning the Mid-State Conference Championship, the Somerset County Championship, the Central Jersey Group 3 Sectional State Championship and a record of 25-4. Horne’s final championship run, prior to becoming Athletic Director at Somerville, was at Union Catholic, where he guided the team to the Watchung Conference Championship his first season and had an initial combined 2-year record of 44-9.
Horne’s coaching masterpiece was leading Union Catholic to one of the biggest upsets in New Jersey boys’ basketball state championship history — described by a New Jersey journalist as “an upset of gargantuan proportions” — implementing in just three days a specially-designed offense and defense the team had never before practiced to slow the game down against nationally-ranked CBA. That Parochial A State Championship game upset in the final state championship game played in New Jersey in 1987 remains the only time in New Jersey boys’ basketball state championship history that a team then unranked in the Star-Ledger’s top 20 poll defeated in the state finals a team that had been ranked Number 1 in New Jersey the entire season.
Horne contributed significantly to the sport through his various basketball camps and clinics and received numerous Coach of the Year awards. Central Jersey Basketball Camp, which Horne co-directed for 25 summers with Coach Wayman Everly, including a girls’ basketball camp codirected by Coach Kathy Matthews, was an outstanding teaching basketball camp that was a mainstay for generations of New Jersey athletes learning the fundamentals of the sport. Horne also co-directed a shooting camp and other basketball camps with Coach John Somogyi, in addition to coaching together St. Joseph High School (Metuchen) to highly successful seasons, including a conference championship and the first boys’ basketball sectional state championship in school history. Horne was inducted as a coach into the Union Catholic, Westfield and Somerville High Schools’ Halls of Fame, and also as a member of the 1972, 1987 and 1981 state championship teams. In 1995, he was inducted into the New Jersey Scholastic Coaches Association Hall of Fame.
In retirement following a pacemaker operation, Horne guided the Westfield boys’ freshman basketball program for over a decade and also volunteered his time into his late 70s mentoring his grandchildren, their teammates and the Westfield PAL girls’ basketball program (just as he had volunteered his time as a father coaching Westfield PAL boys’ travel basketball teams in the 1980s), giving back to the community where he raised his family as the final chapter of a coaching career that was focused on teaching and helping others reach their full potential. Later in life, Horne also thoroughly enjoyed spending long weekends at his beach house in Long Beach Island, New Jersey, hearing the ocean outside his window at night and swimming in the ocean with his family. After his pacemaker operation prevented Horne from raising his right arm in his 60s, he hit tennis balls against the wall for months to learn to play tennis with his left hand and returned to the game as a lefty. And although neuropathy made it difficult for Horne to walk in his 80s, he still made his regular morning walks in the neighborhood to do what he enjoyed most — meeting people, joking, offering encouragement, coaching.
Horne believed in and taught the importance of setting short-range and long-range goals and then trying your best to achieve them. He believed that it was the attempt and effort to achieve those goals, not the end result, that mattered. And he really enjoyed making people laugh. Horne is missed today, tomorrow and forever by his family.
A funeral service will be held at St. Helen Church, 1600 Rahway Avenue, Westfield, on Saturday, July 13, 2024, at 10:00 a.m., preceded by a wake at Higgins and Bonner Echo Lake Funeral Home, 582 Springfield Avenue, Westfield, on Friday, July 12, 2024, from 4:00 to 8:00 p.m. Union Catholic is establishing the Coach Neil Horne Memorial Scholarship in his memory. In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to (i) Union Catholic via check (made payable to Union Catholic High School, with In Memory of Coach Neil Horne on the Memo line) sent to Union Catholic, Office of Development, 1600 Martine Avenue, Scotch Plains, N.J. 07076 or (ii) Westfield PAL via check (made payable to Westfield PAL, with In Memory of Coach Neil Horne on the Memo line) sent to Westfield PAL, P.O. Box 873, Westfield, N.J. 07090.
July 11, 2024
