FAREWELL, COACH ‘MACCA’: Bill McCormack, 88, of Rowley, former longtime Malden High hockey coach, standout HS player and MHS Hall of Famer

By Steve Freker

When you heard the way he talked about his players at several Hall of Fame banquets, it made you wonder how his between periods and postgame “chats” must have gone with his Golden Tornado players. Former longtime Malden High School boys hockey coach “Bill” McCormack had the heralded “gift of gab,” that’s for sure, and there was no subject to talk about dearer to his heart than the only team sport played on ice – Malden hockey, particularly. That is why it was such a sad loss to the many former Golden Tornado skaters he coached when we learned of the passing of Golden Tornado Hall of Famer Coach Bill “Macca” McCormack on June 14.

Sylvester William “Bill” McCormack was also a much beloved teacher at the Beebe Junior High School on Pleasant Street before his retirement. Bill grew up at 340 Highland Avenue, in the Edgeworth section of Malden. While he eventually moved to Rowley and raised his family there, his family says his heart had never really left Malden.

Bill McCormack loved all sports and was a two-sport standout at Malden High School, Class of 1956. He was a captain of the Golden Tornados Varsity Hockey team and pitcher for the Blue Bombers Varsity Baseball team. Though he loved hockey the most, he was of the best pitchers in baseball around, known as “a classy southpaw,” who went on to hurl in the semipro ranks for Ralph Wheeler’s Malden City Club, and for two summers in the late 1950s, the Cape Cod League. Though he received a full baseball scholarship to attend Boston University and played on the Terrier baseball team, he also was one of the few Malden High athletes in all the years to play two collegiate sports.

A 1960 graduate of Boston University, Bill McCormack was a three-year letterman for the BU Terriers men’s ice hockey team and its co-captain from 1959-1960, when he was recognized as the season points leader. That same year, he was on the Beanpot Championship Team.

Career-wise, Bill was a popular science teacher at Beebe Junior High School in Malden and the Malden High School Varsity hockey coach. His team won the Greater Boston League Championship in both 1973 and 1974. He coached some of the all-time Tornado hockey greats, such as Matty Marden, from 1971-1985 alongside longtime assistant and great friend Joe Bogan.

Bill McCormack was inducted into the Malden High School Golden Tornado Hall of Fame in 1992, in recognition of his outstanding ability as an athlete and coach. His 1973 Tornado Hockey Team was inducted as group into the Malden High Golden Tornado Hall of Fame in 2021.

Bill’s son and namesake, William “Bill” McCormack, was, in his own right, an outstanding hockey player, a 10th round draft pick out of the University of Vermont by the Philadelphia Flyers. As fate would have it, Bill Jr. never played in the NHL. Sadly, Bill’s son, his namesake, pride and joy passed away on June 8, 2024, at the age of 60, in Japan, a mere six days before his own passing.

During the summer months, Bill McCormack was an ice hockey skills instructor for future promising professional hockey players, including his own son. In retirement, he worked on the grounds of the Ferncroft Country Club, where he enjoyed playing golf every chance he could get.

While living in Rowley, he was on a first name basis with those in the town hall, bank, grocery store, gas stations, bakery, automobile repair shop, etc. His neighbors thought the world of him. He brought humor, great conversations and joy to every person he met, stranger and friend alike.

Bill had traveled to many places with his late wife Nancy, including Bermuda, Italy and Yugoslavia. His most cherished trip was to Yokohama, Japan, to visit his son and his son’s mother-in-law Shinkosan, wife Shukuko McCormack and their daughters, Aimi and Elena McCormack.

Bill McCormack was the beloved father of Kara McCormack of Ludlow, Massachusetts, and Kate McCormack-Reznicek of New Hampshire; the beloved grandfather of Christian Digenova of Ipswich, Massachusetts, Henry Reznicek of New Hampshire, and Aimi and Elena McCormack of Yokohama, Japan.

In addition to his son, Bill was predeceased by his wife, Nancy (Brown) McCormack; by his sisters, Julia Gilligan, Joanne Frahm and Patricia Welch, and by his sister-in-law, Shigeko Brown, all of whom he treasured. He will be missed by his children, grandchildren, daughter-in-law, the Gilligan, Frahm and Lane families, and brothers-in-law Jeffrey Brown and Peter Brown (Trudy), all of whom held a special place in his heart. He will also be missed by his friends, half siblings, cousins and many former hockey players.

Services were held at the Breslin Funeral Home in Malden on June 20. Interment was in Main Street Cemetery in Rowley. Donations in Coach McCormack’s memory may be made to Brookhaven Hospice, 59 Interstate Drive, Suite 8, West Springfield, MA 01089.