The season just began but Loyola’s Livatino is already a big winner

There is little glamour to how Loyola Academy plays basketball under coach Tom Livatino. He knows that. He preaches it.

Maybe it’s not overtly pretty, but the Ramblers’ hit-the-deck, grind-you-down style has been attractive in its own way.

“One of our big niches is we’re always going to guard you, we’re going to take pride in being prepared and playing with a high IQ,” Livatino said. “I think that recipe has been pretty good for us. You have to have players who want to do that. That’s not glamorous; it’s not fun, but it’s all about winning.

“That’s what we’ve hung our hat on, things that translate to after basketball, intangible things, like are you ready to go to work today? We’re going to work today.”

Livatino has cultivated the workman-like approach since he arrived at Loyola 16 years ago, and it has led to two major milestones this season: 300 victories with the Ramblers and selection to the Illinois Basketball Coaches Association Hall of Fame.

With a season-opening victory over Bulls Prep on Nov. 25, the Ramblers gave Livatino his 300th win in the program and 400th overall (100 wins as coach of Lincoln Park High School) in 21 years as a high school head coach.

Livatino, an Evanston resident and Evanston Township High School alumnus, has a career win rate over 65% and has compiled 12 20-win seasons to go with 10 regional titles, five conference titles (3 in Chicago Catholic League) and one sectional title (2013-’14). The resume was enough to earn him a spot in the IBCA’s next hall of fame class. He will be one of 20 coaches — as well as more than 100 others (players, officials, media members, supporters) — celebrated during the organization’s annual banquet on May 3, 2025, at Illinois State University.

“It’s a nice thing,” Livatino said of his call to the hall. “You get to this age, it’s nice recognition of the great teams and great players and great assistant coaches and great administrators you coached with for this amount of time.”

To Livatino, it’s all about that latter piece: the people.

The longtime Ramblers coach credited a number of individuals who have impacted his successful coaching journey. He expressed plenty of gratitude for his wife and children for their support, as well as that of athletic directors like Genevieve Atwood and Pat Mahoney and coaching mentors like Paul Pryma and John O’Loughlin, both of whom are still on the Ramblers staff.

Livatino said members of his coaching staff are also responsible for the Ramblers’ successes, as they reinforce the program foundation: “to grow into better men.”

“All those guys (on staff) and the other guys who have coached with us through the years … are just awesome guys and great mentors,” Livatino said. “So if you can accumulate so many other coaches to help out and share the same vision with a different voice, they’re going to connect with more of the guys.”

This season, Livatino’s squad is off to a 4-3 start and has just begun to integrate four seniors who were members of the state-championship Loyola football team. He isn’t sure what his team will look like in its final state, but he believes in the Ramblers’ potential to make a deep run and compete within the dangerous Chicago Catholic League.

Livatino said the hall-of-fame recognition, while appreciated, is not his current focus; however, when word of the honor got out, Livatino received plenty of messages from former players, coaches and colleagues who wished him congratulations. That mattered.

“When I think about that, as certain people text me, that’s pretty cool. I’m blessed to be in this position,” he said. “Every day I go to work is never like going to work. It’s just an awesome experience. Even though outwardly I don’t always look like I’m super happy, I am super grateful and blessed.”

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