Charlie, Titus, left, coaching legend at UMass Boston, is leaving the bench.

Charlie Titus — the “founding father” of UMass Boston’s athletic department and basketball team— will retire from his post as men’s basketball coach at the end of this season, after four decades on the bench. The search for Titus’s replacement as head of the Division three squad will begin at the end of the 2014-2015 season. Titus will remain Vice Chancellor of the university’s Athletics Department.

Titus began his career at UMass Boston in 1974 at the request of Levester Tubbs, who was then the Vice Chancellor of Student Affairs at UMass Boston. Titus grew up in the Columbia Point housing development next to the campus and attended South Boston High School before attending college at St Michael’s in Vermont on a basketball scholarship. He was working in community development in Boston when Tubbs made his pitch to Titus.

“They were ready to start a basketball club as their first athletic program,” said Titus. “They had money for uniforms but they didn’t have money to pay a coach so I said ‘Okay’ and volunteered to coach for two years.” Titus was asked to be a consultant during the construction of Clark Athletic Center in the 1980s and helped take on the project of getting UMass Boston’s teams admitted into the National Collegiate Athletic Association. He became UMass Boston’s first Athletic Director in the 1980-81 season.

In his second year of coaching Titus led the UMass Beacons team to its first NCAA tournament. The team competed against highly ranked division 2 and 1 schools, and finished the program with 19 wins, a record that stands today. Following the success of the ‘83 season Titus was encouraged to find work at a more established program. But he says his decision to stay at UMass was not complicated.

“I saw it as an opportunity to impact young lives in the city that I grew up in,” said Titus. “Because I grew up playing basketball in the city I thought I understood better than most where a lot of those young people were coming from and what they needed to be successful. To me that was a rare opportunity.”

Jack Lambert, a 2000 graduate of UMass Boston, is one of Titus’ many former players who remains close to his former coach.

“Because of what coach Titus has done for me I am able to give back to the university, and really that is on behalf of coach Titus,” says Lambert, who now lives in Florida. “He was a father figure to me. I always felt like he had my back so I felt that same respect and it helped to keep me focused even far from home.”

Carl Joseph, a senior at UMass Boston and member of the men’s basketball team, credits Titus with his development as a leader on the team.

“We have a great player coach relationship but we also have a great man to man relationship as well,” said Joseph. “When we suffered our first loss of the season I was pretty frustrated throughout the whole game. The day after the loss Coach Titus called me we just talked about my attitude during the game and the fact that things are going to happen over the season but just that he called to check in helped to relieve frustration and helped me out tremendously. I am thrilled that he and I are going out at the same time because I can’t really imagine playing for another coach.”

Titus played an integral part in establishing the Little East Conference in 1987.

“We were pretty good in basketball and really good in hockey,” said Titus. “So I called a meeting with about 20 different schools and began to talk about forming a conference. We would take all these good Division 3 teams put them in competition with one another and grow together.”

The lack of on-campus housing at UMass Boston’s Dorchester campus has made running a successful athletics program “uniquely challenging,” Titus explains.

“Kids in dorms are not worried about rent, food, or transportation,” said Titus. “The fact that we have been able to compete and have success in all of our sports against teams with on campus housing is a testament to the quality of the coaches and staff working here. Overcoming the difficulties of off-campus living reflects the quality of our student athletes as well.”

In his continued role as a vice chancellor, Titus will face more unique challenges as the growing student population puts a growing demand on Athletics facilities.

“We have 16,000 students and they have gotten younger,” said Titus. “We try to balance everything, we have to get the academic buildings built. We have to have the roadway project done so we can get utilities to all the new buildings. So what we are dealing with now is fitting the demand for athletic facilities into the larger project.”

Titus has been involved in basketball since he was 8 years old, so “it is going to be strange not being on the court,” said Titus.

“I won’t miss long bus rides or big losses, but I will miss much more,” Titus told the Reporter. “I will miss watching students gain appreciation for the results of the effort they put in on the court and seeing them apply that in their daily life.”

In a statement last week, UMass Boston Chancellor Keith Motley said, “There will only ever be one founding head coach for University of Massachusetts Boston Men’s Basketball team. That will always be Charlie Titus. His meaning and imprint on that program is indelible and will never be replaced. Charlie’s legacy is both wide-ranging and deep, touching generations of youth whom he transitioned from boys, to student-athletes, to men and then to leaders. He was the perfect basketball coach for Boston’s public university”.