Two Mendel Monarchs were inducted into the Chicago Catholic League Coaches Association Hall of Fame on Thursday April 27, 2023, at the Crystal Sky Ballroom in McCook, Illinois. Monarchs Mark O’Hare (‘72) and Michael Hampton (’82) were two of the eleven Inductees for the 2022-2023 Class of the Chicago Catholic League Coaches Association Hall of Fame.

MICHAEL HAMPTON MENDEL CLASS OF 1982

Michael Hampton was one of the greatest basketball players to ever play for Mendel Catholic High School. He will always be remembered for firing ”the shot”, a 24-foot jumper with two seconds to play in the 1982 Illinois State Semifinal Game, ending a 64-game winning streak by Quincy High School. Michael grew up near 113th and Green on the Southside of Chicago. He was recruited to Mendel by Mendel Freshman Coach Mike Manderino, who Michael said changed his life forever, and to whom Michael will be forever grateful. Michael credits his varsity Mendel Coach Mike Flaherty for developing his basketball game and being a mentor for him. As a 6’4” Senior in 1982, Michael was named to the All-Catholic League, All-Chicago City, and All-Illinois State teams. In the 1982 Illinois State High School Athletic Tournament, Mendel was the Class AA runner up, and Michael, who was the second leading scorer for the tournament, was named to the All-Tournament Team.

ACCOMPLISHMENTS AFTER MENDEL CATHOLIC COLLEGE CAREER
After he left Mendel, Michael attended Southeastern Community College in Iowa, where he earned his Associate`s Degree in General Education while averaging 17 points a game during his two seasons playing basketball there.
Michael got his chance to play Division I basketball in 1985 when Howard University offered him a scholarship. He played two seasons for the Washington DC school and averaged eight points a game.
After college, Michael joined the Navy. After his term of service, Michael moved to Minnesota to start his career as a barber, a career that lasted twenty years. Today Michael lives in Bloomington, Minnesota and is an executive at Vierkant Disposal.
Michael works out regularly and stays in good shape, which he showed in the game between the Mendel All-Stars and the Catholic League All-Stars in April 2022. If you were not there, Michael repeated his 1982 State Semifinal Game performance by nailing the game winning shot for the Mendel All-Stars at the buzzer!
Today one of Michael’s life goals is to take care of himself in all aspects of his life, which he is doing under the watchful eye of his significant other, Rachel Grosskurth.

MARK O’HARE MENDEL CLASS OF 1972 (JOHN WILSON (’72) ACCEPTED THE AWARD ON BEHALF OF MARK O’HARE

Mark O’Hare was the second of two Mendel Monarchs in the O’Hare family. Like his brother Mike, Mark played football, wrestled, was in the honors section at Mendel all four years, and was President of his Junior and Senior classes. Mark was on the Student Council his Freshman and Sophomore years, and as a Senior, he also was the President of the Student Council and selected to sit on the Teacher’s Council to discuss student issues and concerns. Mark earned seven (7) Varsity Letters in three (3) different sports at Mendel. He played football all four (4) years and was one of the team captains his Senior year. He wrestled three (3) years with a record of seventy-six (76) wins (sixty-five (65) by pin) and only four (4) losses. He anchored a Mendel wrestling team that won twelve (12) tournaments. In Mark’s Junior year, Mendel competed in the Chicago Wrestling City Championship against Lane Tech. Mark’s heavyweight match was the last match of the evening. In a hard-fought battle, Mark prevailed, and Mendel won the championship! It was a great accomplishment in Mendel’s history thanks to Mark! Mark also threw the shot-put for two (2) years on Mendel’s track team. Mark was an active member of Mendel’s Third Order of Augustine. Mark received multiple awards at graduation, including the Mendel Medal. He was selected by USA Today as a First Team Football All-American tackle. He was First Team Illinois All-State, First Team All-Catholic and selected as a member of the Chicago Tribune’s Football First Team. Mark was highly recruited out of Mendel High School with seventy-six (76) scholarship offers. His top choices, which were based on the schools’ academic excellences were Harvard, Notre Dame, and the US Naval Academy. Mark chose the Naval Academy.

ACCOMPLISHMENTS AFTER MENDEL CATHOLIC COLLEGE AND NAVAL CAREER

While attending the Naval Academy, Mark played varsity football and wrestled. Upon graduation, Mark continued what would become a twenty-six (26) year Naval career by joining the Navy’s Surface Warfare Community, and he served tours of duty as an Intelligence Officer, Operations Officer, and Engineering Officer. During his Naval career, Mark led and managed one of the most sophisticated weapons systems programs in the world. This program, managed by Mark, included thousands of military and civilian personnel and had a budget of billions of dollars. He retired from the Navy with a rank of Captain in 1998. Mark received numerous awards from the Navy including two (2) Legion of Merits, three (3) Meritorious Service Awards, three (3) Navy Commendation Awards, two (2) Navy Achievement Awards, and three (3) Battle E Awards. The Society of Naval Architects and Marine Engineers presented Mark with the Kennedy Award for innovation and technology infusion in the shipbuilding industry. After retirement, Mark was asked to serve on the Naval Academy’s Board of Trustees, a position he still holds today. Mark earned a master’s degree in Mechanical Engineering from the Naval Post Graduate School and completed both the Northwestern University Kellogg Graduate School of Management and the University of Virginia Darden Graduate School of Business Executive Courses.

ACCOMPLISHMENTS AFTER MENDEL CATHOLIC PROFESSIONAL CAREER
Since his retirement from the Navy, Mark has focused his career on efforts to develop advanced software-defined security solutions. His stated goal is to help to protect industries’ desires to use digital information in their everyday business platforms. Over the course of his professional career, Mark has started up and run multiple companies. He currently is the CEO of CONQ™. CONQ™ is the industry-leading, Artificial Intelligence (AI) based Business Intelligence & Insight Engine (BI/IE) platform that accelerates the transformation of information to insights and delivers measurable business impact twenty times faster and at a fraction of the cost of mainstream BI/IE solutions. Mark is a high-energy, thoughtful, and balanced leader with over 40 years of technical and business expertise. He has co-authored nearly three hundred (300) patents on security, multi-factored secret sharing, polyurethanes, Artificial Intelligence (AI) and modeling. He has more than 20 years of CEO experience in High-Tech companies ranging from cyber security software, hardware acceleration, imaging, modeling and polyurethanes to AI. He is a proven leader.