This feature originally ran in the Fall 2026 St. Bonaventure University Magazine

For Mike MacDonald, the dream of coaching basketball as a career took hold during his time as a student at St. Bonaventure.

That dream has resulted in over 500 coaching victories in a career spanning three decades as a head coach and now comes full circle as he enters his first season leading his alma mater.

"It's great to be back," he said. "The one thing that hasn't changed is how deeply people care about the Bonnies."

An institution in the Western New York collegiate basketball scene, MacDonald, '88, revived the program at Medaille before recording a 265-86 record over the past 12 seasons at Daemen, including a sparkling 61-3 mark over the last two years.

While it may have been easier to continue running his Division II powerhouse, the opportunity to return home was one he couldn't pass up.

"This is a special place where people really care about basketball. It's a premier basketball program in the East," he said. "We had a great run at Daemen, but this was a chance to try it at a different level and at a place that was very important in my development as a person."

Knowing the uniqueness of St. Bonaventure firsthand as an alumnus, MacDonald plans on selling what makes Bona's special to recruits – and then cultivating relationships to make it a place student-athletes come to stay, rather than merely using as a stopover on the next trip to the transfer portal.  

"What you see nowadays in college sports, athletes jump from school to school. We want to show them how special Bonaventure is and have them realize it's not like that everywhere," he said. "Our hope is in the new landscape, once our guys see that, they will want to stop bouncing to other programs just to make a move. This is a great place to be a part of, a great place to get a degree."

MacDonald returns to the Division I ranks as he takes over the Bonnies, having accepted his first head coaching position as a 30-year-old at Canisius. He won 108 games with the Griffs over nine seasons at the helm and left downtown Buffalo with a different perspective on coaching and himself.

"The first time running a program is always challenging. You just learn, like in anything," he said. "When I left Canisius, I had opportunities to be an assistant other places or get out of the profession altogether. The opportunity to go to Medaille came along and I looked at it as a challenge. I knew I could coach and wanted to prove it. In the lower levels, you step out of your comfort zone and learn and grow as a coach."

He overhauled a program which had won just four games in the previous four seasons before his arrival, leaving as the school's all-time wins leader (149) in eight years.

MacDonald preaches a team-first approach built on player development. It's one which has led to becoming the only coach in college basketball history to earn at least 100 victories at every NCAA level.

"We pride ourselves on sharing the ball, being unselfish both offensively and defensively, and competing like crazy," he said. "When people watch us play, we want people to say, those guys are connected and they care about each other. We are going to have people who represent Bonaventure well on the floor, in the classroom and in the community. When you have that, and some talent mixed in, you can go far."