Mark Slonaker is an American college basketball

College basketball

College basketball most often refers to the USA basketball competitive governance structure established by the National Collegiate Athletic Association . Basketball in the NCAA is divided into three divisions: Division I, Division II and Division III....

 coach. He is the former head men's basketball coach at Mercer University

Mercer University

Mercer University is an independent, private, coeducational university with a Baptist heritage located in the U.S. state of Georgia. Mercer is the only university of its size in the United States that offers programs in eleven diversified fields of study: liberal arts, business, education, music,...

. He was the 2002–03 Jim Phelan National Coach of the Year after leading Mercer to the best one season turnaround in NCAA history, improving from 6–23 to 23–6. The team won the Atlantic Sun regular season championship with a 14–2 conference record and made school history for number of wins (23); Mercer won 22 games in 1923–24 and 1984–85. The season ended with a loss in the Atlantic Sun tournament. Slonaker was the first National Coach of the Year to receive the award after it was named in honor of Jim Phelan.

Slonaker grew up in Rahway, New Jersey

Rahway, New Jersey

Rahway is a city in southern Union County, New Jersey, United States. It is part of the New York metropolitan area, being 15 miles southwest of Manhattan and five miles west of Staten Island...

, where he attended Rahway High School

Rahway High School

Rahway High School is a four-year public high school that serves students in ninth through twelfth grades from Rahway, in Union County, New Jersey, United States, operating as part of the Rahway Public Schools. The high school's present location was built in 1941...

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Slonaker's contract was not renewed after the 2007–08 season.