Doug Bruno started out as a hockey player at the former Archbishop Quigley Preparatory Seminary South on the South Side of Chicago. He enjoyed the fast pace of hockey, but he fell in love with a game he was not so good at: basketball. His sophomore year of high school, he tried out for the team but didn’t make it. 

This led Bruno to what he called the “first goal of his life.”

“I will make the team next year,” Bruno said, recalling his high school years. 

Bruno wasn’t going to let his dream of playing basketball slip through his fingers, so he kept on practicing. He eventually made the team his junior year and became a starter his senior year.

“Working at your sport — working at the craft of basketball — is playing basketball,” Bruno said. 

Since then, Bruno has been surrounded by the game. 

Bruno announced on March 28 that he would be stepping down as the DePaul women’s basketball head coach after 39 years at the helm of the program. 

But his love for basketball isn’t stopping — he will take on a new position as the special assistant to the vice president/director of athletics for women’s basketball, effective May 1. 

Bruno’s tenure at DePaul began during his high school summers, when he worked at a basketball camp organized by coaching legend Ray Meyer. Bruno said he didn’t have enough money to attend Meyer’s camp, so he became an employee. Bruno said Meyer saw him get “progressively better” at basketball and told Meyer he wanted to play in college, but he wasn’t sure where to go. 

Meyer suggested none other than DePaul and gave Bruno a scholarship. 

Little did Bruno know that that would be the start of what would become his renowned career at DePaul. 

“I got lucky to come here and play for coach Meyer,” Bruno said. “I just had no idea what a great place this was.”

It has been more than five decades since Bruno, now 74, made his decision to become a Blue Demon. 

Coaching the same team for nearly four decades is something few coaches do. Those who have coached as long include Geno Auriemma of the University of Connecticut (1985-present), Mike Krzyzewski of Duke (1980-2022) and Pat Summitt of Tennessee (1974-2012). 

“There haven’t been a lot of people in the history of women’s basketball that have given as much to the game as he has,” Auriemma said on March 28 during the NCAA Tournament Spokane Regional press conference. “He’s dedicated his life pretty much to women’s basketball, and all of it in Chicago where he grew up, so he’s an institution.”

Bruno’s first college coaching gig was for the DePaul women’s basketball team in 1976. He then left in 1978 to coach for other Chicago teams for the next decade — including DePaul’s Red Line rival Loyola.

He returned back to his alma mater in 1988 — and stayed. 

“I’m very proud of the person he’s become. He truly loves (basketball),” Bruno’s wife, Patty Bruno, said. “When our kids were little, he would open up our grammar school gym at 6 o’clock in the morning and invite all the neighborhood kids to come play over there. He’s just given his whole life to the sport.”

Bruno started his own basketball camp for female athletes in 1980. In those 45 years, the camp has registered over 84,000 girls from ages 7-18.

The Brunos have six sons and 12 grandkids. One of his sons, Bradley Bruno, followed in Bruno’s footsteps — attending DePaul for college, then becoming a video coordinator in 2015 for DePaul Athletics. In May of 2023 he became one of the women’s basketball assistant coaches. 

The pair were only able to coach one season together. At the beginning of the 2024-25 basketball season, it was announced that Doug Bruno experienced an undisclosed medical incident. 

Bruno later confirmed that he had a stroke. While his beckoning voice was gone from the sideline during games this season, he could be seen in his box seat up in the rafters of Wintrust Arena, watching every moment of each game. 

“It’s not like I sat on the sidelines, saying ‘I wish I could be back there. I can’t believe this has happened.’ I just sat there and enjoyed the moment,” Bruno said. 

It was announced on April 3 that Jill Pizzotti, Bruno’s longtime assistant coach, will be stepping into the new head coach position next season. She first joined the DePaul women’s basketball staff in 2011 and she has been the associate head coach since 2014; she stepped in as interim head coach this past season. The last time she was the head coach of a team was in 2005 for Saint Louis University. 

“I understand the game enough to understand there are a million ways to win a basketball game,” Bruno said. “So, however the coach that’s coaching a team decides to go about winning a basketball game, there is no right or wrong way.” 

Over nearly five decades on the sidelines, Doug Bruno built one of the most successful and enduring careers in women’s college basketball. He finishes his DePaul coaching career with a 786-405 (.660) record. He also earned 25 NCAA tournament appearances and has 19 conference titles. He is a five-time conference Coach of the Year and was inducted into the Women’s Basketball Hall of Fame in 2022.

Bruno is one of the three people in DePaul history — athlete or player — who has won a gold medal in the Olympics or Paralympics. He has won two (2012 and 2016) as an assistant head coach for the U.S. Women’s national basketball team.

Bruno has had 15 players who were drafted into the WNBA — one of the most notable ones is Allie Quigley, who helped the Chicago Sky win a championship in 2021. She has been named WNBA Sixth Woman of the Year twice (2014 and 2015) and she was inducted into the DePaul Athletics Hall of Fame in January. 

Another notable player is graduate student Jorie Allen, who played for DePaul for five years; she finished her last season with the Blue Demons on March 7. During the last home game of the season on March 2, which was also senior day, Allen said Bruno was “the reason (she) came to DePaul.” He was there to congratulate her on her success as a Blue Demon. 

“He loves working with female athletes, he loves coaching,” Allen said. “He’s always been trying to grow the game in any way he can. It’s a really difficult profession and it’s a plethora of hours, but he always found time to do extra. That’s his legacy, never-ending effort to build the game.”

With Bruno’s upcoming new job as the special assistant to the vice president/director of athletics for women’s basketball, he hopes to “be helpful in any which way he can be.”

“Doug’s greatest contribution has been his relentless commitment to developing both the character and the careers of the women who have passed through our program,” DePaul’s director of athletics DeWayne Peevy shared to Instagram. “His influence will continue to resonate for years to come, and we are deeply grateful that he will remain a part of the DePaul family in his new role.”

As Bruno reflected on his time as the head coach of DePaul women’s basketball, he said the best moment of his time as coach was being “blessed” with a great community at DePaul. 

“Everyday, getting in the gym with those players was the best part of the job,” Bruno said. “I had great assistant coaches, great bosses, great staff … DePaul University is a great university for a lot of reasons, but I mean … it’s got great people from the top down.”

Related stories:

• Basketball head coach Doug Bruno steps down
• Pizzotti named next women’s basketball head coach
• Five DePaul women’s basketball players enter the transfer portal 

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