Poly Prep Country Day School is what it sounds like: private, privileged and prestigious. Located in the Dyker Heights area of Brooklyn, the sprawling 25-acre campus isn’t where you’d expect to find football players from the city.

“It’s a (big) school with ducks and a pond,” said Lance Bennett, one of those inner-city kids who normally wouldn’t be at a school with tuition upwards of $20,000 annually. “You might have one of the Mets or the Yankees, their children might go there.

“A lot of rich kids, but Coach Mangiero, he turned it around. He started coming into the inner city and recruiting kids who would never have been able to go to a school like that.”

“Coach” is Dino Mangiero, IU Director of Football Operations. He built the Poly Prep program by recruiting inner-city students and scheduling football powerhouses from around the eastern United States instead of the apathetic New York prep teams.

Poly Prep barely registered on IU’s recruiting radar before Mangiero arrived last year. Now there’s an 800-mile pipeline running from Brooklyn to Bloomington. Current Hoosiers Chris Mangiero, John Pannozzo, Lance Bennett and Jahkeen Gilmore all followed their beloved former coach, hoping to repeat a rise to prominence at IU.

Mangiero, a former NFL lineman who played for the Kansas City Chiefs, Seattle Seahawks and New England Patriots in the 1980s, was named Poly Prep head coach in 1994. Gerry DiNardo took over at Louisiana State that same year. The two coaches already had several mutual friends and established recruiting ties from New York to Baton Rouge.

When DiNardo took the Indiana head job for the 2002 season, Mangiero uprooted his family for the chance to work in Big Ten football with his friend.

“It doesn’t happen everyday where you can work with a guy of his caliber, background and knowledge,” Mangiero said of DiNardo.

In his seven years at Poly Prep, Mangiero established himself as one of New York’s most successful high school coaches. His teams were 61-5-1, including an 8-0 record in 2001 and the No. 10 ranking in the nation.

Leaving behind his prep success was easier than moving his family, Mangiero said. The IU post was a career-motivated move, but he had his family in mind when he made it.

“If you’re successful, your career takes care of your family,” he said.

The smooth transition his son Chris has made to living in Indiana must be a relief to his father.

Like father...

Chris Mangiero is unlike the other 46 IU players from the Hoosier state. The native New Yorker played his senior year at Bloomington South High School, unaccustomed to Indiana’s craze for high school sports, including football.

“In New York football, nobody really cares,” the younger Mangiero said. “I never heard of Friday night (football) until I came out here.

“At Poly, we had to be told it was a rival game. Out here, (Bloomington) North vs. (Bloomington) South is the biggest thing in the world. I didn’t go to South before, but when I stepped out on that field I could feel the electricity.”

The new atmosphere energized Mangiero, who didn’t leave his New York toughness back east. He broke his hand on the first play of a game last year and stayed in the Panthers’ line-up all night.

His work ethic paid off when he made his first collegiate start against Michigan in Ann Arbor Sept. 27. Chris said his father was influential in his decision to join the Hoosiers, but the business school also appealed to him.

Pannozzo Paving the Way

As the Mangieros settled in, one member of Dino’s football family couldn’t wait to play for him again. All-state fullback John Pannozzo was the first Poly Prep product to have an onfield impact for the Hoosiers.

One of eight true freshmen to see game action, Pannozzo had 26 catches for 258 yards and three touchdowns last season for IU’s school record-setting passing offense.

You would not mistake Pannozzo and his thick Brooklyn accent for a native Hoosier, but he appreciates the Midwestern lifestyle.

“It’s a little more laid back here,” Pannozzo said. “Most of the time I’m with the team or in class, so it’s not a big deal.”

Pannozzo adjusted to Indiana with relative ease, allowing him to focus on football and schoolwork.

“It was definitely easier coming out here and knowing a couple of guys,” he said. “Now having Chris Mangiero and Lance Bennett, it has helped out the transition a lot.”

Pannozzo was the first person to talk to Bennett, the latest Hoosier to hail from Brooklyn after taking the longest road to get here.

Fast friends follow Pannozzo

When Lance Bennett called Pannozzo last year about coming to IU, the freshman could only ask what took so long.

“I thought he should be playing college football all along,” he said. They also joked about the glory days, as high school teammates often do. A straight-faced Pannozzo claims, “He’s only good because I blocked for him.”

The 21-year-old Bennett is the oldest of the Poly Prep players at IU, but still a freshman. The talented songwriter has been working on both coasts the last couple years and co-wrote Will Smith’s 2002 hit “Black Suits Comin.’” But football always stayed in the picture.

“He would come back and come watch the games (at Poly Prep),” Bennett’s roommate, Jahkeen Gilmore said. “He kind of had that Jordan feeling when Jordan retired, he came back and knew he could do it.”

The former tailback stayed in touch with his former coach, who told him there was an opportunity at IU.

“I could never imagine playing for [Mangiero] again after I graduated high school,” he said.

Bennett was then reunited with Gilmore, now an IU defensive back. The two struck up a rivalry at Poly Prep that blossomed into a friendship.

“When I met Lance we were always in competition,” said Gilmore, three years his junior. “When I first got to school, we had battles in the 40-yard dash and as a freshman I beat him.

“He started to practice harder and I started to practice harder and the whole team, we all started practicing harder. And on a one-on-one level, Lance and I became real close.”

Gilmore invited Bennett to run track where they continued to have All-America success.

“Lance started to like the sport, although he didn’t like training,” Gilmore said, laughing. “We like competing against other people out of state and winning.”

Gilmore spent last year exclusively on his studies as a freshman. He felt comfortable in Bloomington even away from football because he knew it was the right place.

“[Dino Mangiero] was concerned about where I wanted to go when I was a senior,” he recalled. “We started looking at a lot of colleges and he helped me out with the best choices to help me limit it down to where he felt best fit my character.”

After considering Pittsburgh and Michigan State, Indiana was the predictable choice.

“I pretty much ended up with Dino because I trust him,” Gilmore said. ‘He’s like a father to me.”

End of the line?

Other players echoed Gilmore’s sentiment for his former coach.

“Coach Mangiero was my coach for four years back at home and he’s one of the main reasons why I’m out here,” Pannozzo said. “We’re close, and I can always count on him if I have a problem.”

But Mangiero no longer has a coach’s influence. Will the Poly Prep pipeline soon dry up? He doesn’t think so.

“Next year there are a couple (of Poly Prep students) coming up that I’m excited about,” he said. Poly Prep is 4-1 in 2003, outscoring the opposition 142-49. “There are two very good players that hopefully will give us a look, and they can come here and help us.”

Some current prepsters might be enticed to join this tight-knit fraternity in the Midwest.

Poly Prep football players share a bond only outcasts could forge. They aren’t like the rest of the school. Chris Mangiero said players were the most down to earth and the toughest kids in the school. There is comfort knowing his best friends are nearby.

“We were really tight and we were really close,” Mangiero said. “I’ll never forget that.”