It has been less than a week since it ended in storybook fashion.
The Suffern ice hockey team won its third straight Div. I state championship, their fourth in five years, fifth under coach Rob Schelling and sixth overall.
Sean Tyrrell, who’ll play on the University of Delaware’s highest level of three club teams next year, was named the state Final 4 MVP for a third straight year.
He points to Schelling as the reason why.
“He molded me into the player I am today,” said Tyrrell.
While Tyrrell will soon head off to college, Schelling is also heading out.
After 30 seasons leading the team for which he once played, Schelling will retire from coaching at Suffern (he also coaches the Suffern girls spring golf team) and retire from his job as a Suffern guidance counselor at the end of this school year.
A few reasons why now was the right time for Rob Schelling
A few factors converged to make now the right time to move on, he said.
The school district is offering an incentive package this year for veteran staffers to retire.
His son, Ryan, whom he began coaching when Ryan was about 3 and with whom he shared the 2022 state championship, is playing for top-10 Dartmouth and Schelling, who has had to watch many of his games online, wants to be able to attend all, if possible, in person.
And the final piece is that while leaving Suffern ice hockey, Schelling isn’t leaving hockey as a whole. He was offered and has accepted the job as full-time assistant hockey director for the huge, Hackensack-based North Jersey Avalanche program, which includes all ages of youth travel hockey up through the top-tier team for which he once coached and Ryan played.
While some in the district may have speculated, especially after he filed his paperwork to retire as a guidance counselor, before winning the state championship, Schelling told few of his plan to retire as coach.
“I didn’t want to be a distraction. It was their season, their time. I wanted it to be about them,” he said of his players.
Putting players before himself
That, according to those who’ve coached with him or played for him, reflects Schelling’s emphasis on putting players before himself.
Schelling, a 1989 Suffern grad, played for four years for Cortland State, then entered the business world. After a few years, his old Suffern coach, John Orlando, asked if he’d like to work as an assistant Suffern coach.
When Orlando retired after that season, Schelling got the head coaching job at age 24 and went back to school to get his Masters degree, taught for a couple of years and became a guidance counselor.
He might have been financially wealthier if he’d stayed in the business world but said, “I have no regrets whatsoever. In the business world, I wasn’t happy. It wasn’t for me.”
In working at the school, coaching and helping with the Suffern youth hockey program, Schelling said, “It really hasn’t been a job. I enjoy working every day.”
His schedule was even fuller than that. In preparing to play teams, he studied countless hours of video.
“He teaches defense first. … He matches lines very well… and was always looking for an advantage,” Mamaroneck coach Mike Chiapparelli said of what made Schelling effective, adding, “He played upstate teams (during the regular season), when all of us went there and got our butts kicked. But we all got better.”
Schelling sometimes had great players, sometimes had just good players. But no matter who was on the roster, they were ready to play and knew their roles and goals vs. every opponent, according to players.
From a pure coaching perspective, no one was more prepared then he was,” said Kevin Hill, who was a sophomore on Suffern’s 2012 state championship team and later played for Wesleyan.
He said Schelling would prepare his players for each team, readying them not only on the ice but also by having them watch video of upcoming opponents.
The result was Suffern was often dominant.
“By the time you woke up, it was 3-0 Suffern,” Hill quipped.
Taking pride in the little things
“I think the best thing about him as a coach is how he took pride in the little things. He knows what he’s talking about and how to execute the game,” Sean Tyrrell said, noting tips like telling him to shoot low blocker side had improved his game and would be among the multiple pieces of advice he’ll take with him when playing college club.
Also going with him to Delaware will be a photo he was given of him shaking hands with his coach after the latest championship win — a photo, he said, he has looked at every day since receiving it.
Winning the state title was anything but a foregone conclusion this year after Suffern had graduated a couple of major players in 2025. And that, Sean Tyrrell indicated, made it all the more special.
While Tyrrell said one of his fondest memories would be Schelling’s locker room approach of coming in quietly and then getting excited and getting the team excited, Schelling noted he had cautioned his team in recent years not to take anything for granted.
“I talk to the guys about this isn’t easy,” he said. … “You’ve got to be motivated.”
Ryan Schelling said his father had always said, “You have to be battle-tested. You have to deal with adversity. There are going to be ups and downs but you have to keep your head down and keep working through it.”
That’s certainly something Rob Schelling did when coaching.
As successful as Schelling was in recent years getting to the state finals and usually emerging with the win, his first title didn’t come until 2012.
“There were so many years of heartbreak. At times, I’d think, ‘Will Suffern ever win?’ ” said Schelling, whose heartbreak traces back to his own junior year at Suffern when Suffern fell to St. John’s, a private school from Plattsburgh, in the state final. His senior year, his team bowed out in triple-overtime loss in the state regionals to Massena, a team he’d subsequently later beat as a coach in state playoffs.
He describes his first state title at Suffern as “just a huge relief.”
As much as Schelling is now greatly admired, his brother, Rich, who has coached with him as an unpaid assistant for about 25 years, remembers when that wasn’t the case.
Rich played for New Jersey’s Bricktown High School, then one year at St. Joseph’s in Montvale, New Jersey (Rob played at St. Joe’s his freshman year of high school). Rich subsequently played in the minor league system with the Rangers and Penguins.
After he stopped playing hockey, Rich would sometimes watch his brother coach at Suffern’s home rink, Sport-O-Rama. This was maybe three of four years into Rob’s tenure.
“I was sitting up in the stands. The parents were crazy. I told (Rob) I can’t sit up there. They were calling him every name in the book. They were cursing up in the stands every minute but as soon as they were out in the lobby (and saw him), they d say, ‘How are you doing?’ ” Rich remembered with a laugh.
His complaints about nutty parents got him an invite by his brother to join him on the bench.
There he saw Rob evolve, noting after he had his two children, Ryan and Casey (a former Suffern girls lacrosse player, who now attends the University of Wisconsin), Rob softened a bit.
“He was less strict and more forgiving,” Rich said, noting this extended to not making a fuss about players doubling up and playing extra games for their club teams.
Rich, whose two daughters currently play collegiate lacrosse, thinks that evolution has helped Rob as a coach and, in turn, helped the Suffern hockey program.
But his success came down to much more than that.
“He cares about the kids more than anything,” Rich Schelling said, noting his brother “gets to understand kids,” both through coaching them and through his work at the school.
“He (also) loves film and breaking down other teams and putting in a system,” Rich said.
While having a game plan for each opponent, Schelling has been able to make smart changes, when needed, between periods. Showing his assistants respect, he always sought input, although final decisions rested with him, Rich said.
“The kids listen to him. They buy into his systems. He understands kids and kids love and respect him,” Rich said.
“I think Rob has a heart of gold and I think he puts so much time and energy in behind the scenes. … But his biggest trait is how much he cares about his players,” Rich said.
“He developed a lot of personal bonds with players that made playing for him a lot easier,” Hill said. “A lot of coaches try to create distance from their players … He was always investing time into kids and building relationships.”
The secret sauce to Suffern success
Relationships often started early. Hill noted Schelling’s decades-long involvement with the youth program, which has served as a huge feeder program for the school teams.
“The secret sauce to Suffern hockey is the time he put into the youth program,” Hill said, tracing the three straight state titles to his efforts with the youth program 20 years ago.
“He created such an atmosphere. (As a young kid), you wanted to play for Suffern hockey,” Hill said. “I have three older brothers who all played. I started playing at 3. It feeds on itself. It just sort of took off. My whole childhood was going to Suffern hockey. It’s totally idolizing (the high school varsity players). … I joke that I didn’t want to go to the NHL. All I wanted to do is play Suffern hockey.”
“He gave everything to Suffern hockey,” said Schellling’s daughter, Casey who laughed when saying if her brother, Ryan, hadn’t been born, she knows she would have been playing ice hockey for her dad, rather than focusing on lacrosse.
Sean Tyrrell is the youngest of four Tyrrell brothers to play for Schelling. Three won state titles under him. Included was Cole, who was on both the 2022 and 2024 state title teams.
Cole, who now plays club hockey at SUNY-Cortland, said neither he nor his brothers would have played hockey had Schelling not suggested it to their parents when they were very young kids.
The Tyrrell brothers grew up in the youth program.
Of Suffern High’s success, he said, “I think Rob is the main reason why. The time he puts in. (The youth program) is truly something so special. If you look around, there’s not another program doing this.”
Schelling as a mentor
Cole calls Schelling a mentor and along with his dad, the person who has taught him the most. He’s at Cortland on Schelling’s advice, he said, calling him the “voice of reason.”
“He’s done so much for me I can’t put it into words… He’s the man,” Cole Tyrrell said.
Ryan, who, with his team down in the 2022 state final 2-0, to West Genesee, scored the next three goals in what turned into a 5-3 Suffern win, noted his dad still offers him tips after every game he plays.
The feedback is much welcome but wasn’t always.
“He was my toughest critic but also always my biggest fan,” he said.
His dad certainly didn’t pull any punches in critiquing his son’s play
“Mom made a rule: The whole car ride (from the rink) I could get ripped. But once home, it’s over,” Ryan Schelling recalled of his mother, Jenn, a Clarkstown teacher.
Cole Tyrrell said Schelling was “hard on all of us because he knew the potential we had.”
But “that made me a better person and player and made us a better team,” he said, adding he knows he’ll have his coach in his life forever.
“So much (I’m doing today) traces back to him,” Ryan said. … “He always coaches me. He knows how much I can push myself to excel. He always wants the best for me.”
Ryan said the 2022 championship was particularly special because he shared it with his dad and his dad shared it with all of Ryan’s closest friends, who his dad had known for years, first as part of the youth program.
“That’s something I’ll have forever,” he said of winning under his dad and with his best friends.
Going out on top
Casey said her dad going out happy and in “incredible fashion” on top means a lot to her.
Ryan is of mixed emotions, saying it will “definitely be cool” to see him at all his games but it’s a “shame he’s retiring because I think he has kind of found his rhythm.”
He said his dad exiting with another state title is “really a testament to how great a person and coach he is.”
His dad said he’s looking forward to being involved in hockey full-time and to seeing Ryan, now a freshman at Dartmouth after playing juniors post-high school, play for Dartmouth for three more years.
But Schelling, who plans to move with his wife to New Jersey, acknowledged there are things he knows he’ll miss.
“It’s amazing. The kids here, the community,” he said.
“I’ll miss the kids the most. Even at work, I’d talk to them. They were so enthusiastic and so excited to be here. .. I’ll (also) miss the Suffern community. It’s family to me.”
Nancy Haggerty covers sports for The Journal News/lohud.
This article originally appeared on Rockland/Westchester Journal News: Rob Schelling retires as Suffern hockey coach, but remains in the game
Reporting by Nancy Haggerty, Rockland/Westchester Journal News / Rockland/Westchester Journal News
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