Windermere hoops coach Mark Griseck recognized for 300 career wins | Observer Preps

Windermere High boys basketball coach Mark Griseck was recently recognized for a career milestone — his 300th win as a head coach — by someone who has helped him earn several of those victories.

Trey Griseck, Mark Griseck’s son and former star at Olympia High while his father was a coach there, presented his dad with a commemorative “300 WINS” basketball for the achievement ahead of the Wolverines’ home game January — which, ironically enough, was against the Olympia Titans.

After starring collegiately at St. Leo, Trey — who graduated from Olympia in 2012 — has joined his father as a high-school hoops coach and is an assistant on Griseck’s staff at Windermere. 

As for the accolade, the veteran coach with a 302-150 career record — good for a 67% career winning percentage —  is quick to point out that he has had some help along the way.

“That’s what it really is about — I’ve been blessed to have a lot of good players and a lot of good coaches with me,” Griseck said. “(Coaches) are only as good as our teams, and I’ve just been blessed along the way.”

Griseck took the job to start the new program at the first-year high school after previously serving as an assistant on Scott Williams’ staff at Apopka High. Entering this season, Griseck’s career record was 291-144 over 15 seasons, meaning his ninth win for the Wolverines would mark the milestone — a win that came January 15 when Windermere defeated Lake Brantley in the finale of the Metro vs. Florida Challenge.

Currently, the Wolverines are 11-6 despite having no seniors, and Griseck says the challenge and opportunity of starting a program has been a rewarding one.

“It’s neat — the newness and the excitement around campus,” Griseck said. “It’s been kind of rejuvenating for me.”

Before coaching at Windermere, Griseck previously coached at Olympia, Gainesville’s P.K. Yonge High and Apopka. He has coached three state runner-up teams — two at P.K. Yonge and one at Olympia in 2009.

While leading the Titans for seven seasons — from the 2007-08 season to 2013-14 — Griseck oversaw a program that went 128-69. Olympia made four playoff appearances in those seven seasons, advancing past the regional quarterfinals twice. 

“That’s what it really is about — I’ve been blessed to have a lot of good players and a lot of good coaches with me. (Coaches) are only as good as our teams, and I’ve just been blessed along the way.”

In 2009, the Titans fell to Miami’s Coral Reef High 69-60 in the FHSAA Class 6A State Championship Game — at the time, Class 6A was the largest in Florida.

Griseck also coached two of his teams at P.K. Yonge to state finals appearances in 2003 and 2007, just ahead of his move to the Orlando area.

To date, it has been a career full of memorable wins, with some of his earlier successes in Gainesville standing out, including a 79-72 win in the 2007 Class 6A State Semifinal against a Pine Crest (Fort Lauderdale) team that included a young Brandon Knight — currently a member of the NBA’s Phoenix Suns.

“There have been so many — every year there are good wins,” Griseck said. “Even this year, I thought our win against Dr. Phillips was a good win.”