Background
Thurston was born in the Bronx, New York and is an alumnus of Archbishop Molloy High School and Seton Hall University.
baseball player basketball coach
Thurston was born in the Bronx, New York and is an alumnus of Archbishop Molloy High School and Seton Hall University.
He is the head coach of the Saint Francis College women"s basketball team Through both high school and college, Thurston was a two sport player playing baseball and basketball. After graduating high school in 1966, Thurston was drafted by Los Angeles Dodgers in the 1966 MLB Amateur Draft.
Thurston is one of only a few coaches who has been a head coach at the National Collegiate Athletic Association DI, DII, DIII and National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics levels in 26 years of coaching men"s college basketball from 1971-1997.
Thurston started out as an assistant basketball coach of men"s basketball at Fairleigh Dickinson University"s Florham Campus in 1971. Then from 1972 to 1975, he served as the FDU-Florham Devil"s head coach.
Thurston next served as an assistant to Lou Campanelli at James Madison University, and was promoted to head coach in 1985. In 1988, he moved to Wingate University as athletic director and head men"s basketball coach.
Thurston then began coaching women"s basketball, starting from 2003 to 2005, he was the top assistant at University of North Carolina Wilmington, and in 2005, became the head coach at Northwood University, as the first head coach of the women"s program
After the 2008 season, Thurston resigned from Northwood and became an assistant at Fordham University for 2 years. In 2010, Thurston was hired as an assistant coach by then Terriers head coach Brenda Milano for the Saint Francis Brooklyn Terriers women"s basketball program In 2012, Thurston was named the head coach of the Terriers women"s basketball program
His 2013-2014 squad set the program record for wins in a season with 19.