As he starts his 31st year as head coach of the Pioneers, Dave Bike has taken the Sacred Heart University basketball program on a succession of steps that resulted in a Division II National Championship and the move to the Division I level. Last season, Bike guided the Pioneers to the brink of its first Division I NCAA Tournament appearance, losing in the Northeast Conference championship game - a move the team accomplished in just eight short seasons of Division I play.

Bike's Sacred Heart teams have captured five NCAA Division II Regional Championships and four New England Collegiate Conference (NECC). During the 1980s, the Pioneers competed in a remarkable seven straight NCAA regional championship games. During that stretch his teams went an impressive 173-51 - winning 77.2 percent of their games. Overall, Bike has amassed a 464-415 record. He has the 25th highest win total of any active Division I men's basketball coach and only Jim Boeheim of Syracuse has been at one institution longer.

Bike, 60, led the Pioneers to the NCAA Division II National title during the 1985-86 season. The 93-87 win over Southeast Missouri State in the championship game at the Springfield Civic Center just down the road from the Basketball Hall of Fame, was the first for a New England institution. Bike's charges, led by All-American guard Roger Younger and Tony Judkins, finished the campaign an impressive 30-4.

The National Association of Basketball Coaches (NABC) selected Bike as its National Coach of the Year in 1985-86. His coaching brethren also voted him NECC Coach of the Year three times. In 1990, Bike was presented the Doggie Julian Award for outstanding service by the New England Basketball Coaches Association (NEBCA).

The next major step for Bike was ushering his Pioneers to the Division I level and the Northeast Conference in 1999. In their first year of eligibility for the NEC playoffs, his team nearly knocked off eventual champion Central Connecticut State University in the semi-finals. He accomplished some of those steps not just as the basketball coach, but as an administrator as well. From 1978 through 1992, he wore two hats - running the men's basketball program and serving as the University's athletic director.

In his youth, Dave Bike was perhaps one of the most gifted athletes from the State of Connecticut and certainly the best in the City of Bridgeport. He played with and against men from the region who went on the play professionally in both basketball and baseball who will tell you what a fierce competitor and athlete Dave Bike was. An athlete that few outside of the area knew about, who grew into a man that chose to pass up a potential professional baseball career to touch the lives of young men across the country. At nearby Notre Dame High School, he was an outstanding baseball player as well as an All-New England and All-State basketball selection that elected to bypass scholarship offers from Fordham and Boston College to sign a professional baseball contract.

Bike caught professionally for eight seasons (1965-72) in the Detroit Tigers' farm system, reaching the Triple-A level. He played semi-professional basketball for several clubs during the off-season. Just a width of the chalk line from the Major Leagues, Bike walked away from the game he loved to go college an embark on a career as a teacher and coach.

He returned home to Bridgeport and enrolled at Sacred Heart University is a member of the third graduating class in school history. While a student, he served as an assistant coach to his predecessor, J. Donald Feeley during the 1965-66 and 1966-67 seasons and graduated with a B.A. in Mathematics. He returned to his alma mater in 1978 after four seasons as an assistant basketball coach at Division I Seattle University.

In recognition of his myriad of accomplishments, the Connecticut Sports Writers' Alliance presented Bike with its prestigious Gold Key Award in February 1993.

Bike, lives with his wife Judi (O'Connor) Bike `68 in North Haven. They are parents of four children, Kelly `91, Amy, Corey and Keith `01 MAT. Judi, Keith and Kelly are all SHU graduates, as are his son-in-law, Dan DeFrancesco '87 and '07 MBA, and sister, Marilyn Torre `87. They have four grandchildren, Maggie and Jack DeFrancesco, and Keira and Tyler Bike.