The big challenge of taking over as the girls head softball coach of the highly successful Bishop O’Connell Knights high-school team is certainly recognized by, but doesn’t scare, Tony Uccellini.
Instead, Uccellini plans to meet the challenge “head on, and one he wants to take,” he says.
“There is not much like O’Connell softball,” Uccellini said. “We want to continue the tradition of what coach Tommy [Orndroff] started with the program, then coach Suzy [Willemssen] pressed forward with that tradition.”
Uccellini takes over for Willemssen. In six seasons (2020 was not played because of the pandemic), Willemssen’s O’Connell teams had a 95-6-1 record, won five Division I private-school state championships and won the last three Washington Catholic Athletic Conference tournament crowns. The Knights finished the 2024 campaign 23-0 to extend their three-season winning streak to 54 games.
Willemssen stepped down so she could have the flexibility to travel and watch her daughter play college softball for the University of Notre Dame.
Willemssen had succeeded Orndorff, who retired after 33 years and winning 733 games, 23 state championships and 24 WCAC titles.
Known more familiarly by the O’Connell team as “Coach T,” Uccellini has worked as an assistant high-school coach under Willemssen for 12 seasons, including all six for the Knights.
“These are enormous shoes to fill,” Uccellini said. “I see myself being very similar to Suzy’s style of coaching at O’Connell. She coaches at a college level and wants her players to be driven as athletes and achieving students and members of the community.”
The new head coach is very familiar with the many talented returning O’Connell players next spring, so he said there won’t be an adjustment period like when a new coach arrives from outside the program.
“I’m not stepping into the unknown,” Uccellini said.
The new coach said other O’Connell assistant coaches also plan to return, and he plans to stay in contact with Willemssen.
“Tony Uccellini was the perfect choice to lead O’Connell softball, “ Willemssen said. “He defines servant leadership and I can’t wait to watch him soar with the program. He is a great coach and even a better person. O’Connell hit a grand slam by naming Coach T to the position.”
Uccellini is a full-time health and physical education teacher with the Fairfax County school system at Poe Middle School in Annandale. He grew up in Indiana, Pa., where he was a three-sport athlete in high school. He graduated from Slippery Rock University.
