‘He is Columbus’: The Shark is retiring — and students say he made them leaders
Christopher Columbus High School without The Shark?
Brother Kevin coached future University of Miami and Florida International University basketball coaches when they were teenagers. He guided future U.S. politicians, Miami business leaders, entrepreneurs, sports figures, actors, a Pulitzer-winning photojournalist and a country music star — all before they could legally drive a car.
Now, Brother Kevin is retiring, this time for real, he insists. His last day is June 5.
Except for 1993 to 1999, when he transferred from Columbus to become principal at a financially struggling Marist High School in New Jersey, Br. Kevin Handibode has been part of Columbus for six decades. The educator nicknamed The Shark started cruising the halls of the then-modest West Miami-Dade campus in 1966.
For 54 years, no one has served the school in more capacities than Handibode — teacher, dean of discipline, varsity basketball coach, athletic director, development director, principal, president, and, for the last seven years, securing philanthropic donations and working with alumni and parents in his role as advancement officer.
The Shark, so named early on for his intensity as basketball coach, dean and indefatigable fundraiser, stepped down from the Columbus presidency in 2018 but assumed his current, and final, role. He’s 87. His mind is made up. He’s grateful for so many things.
“It’s just the right time for me to step aside,” a mellower, contented Shark says softly during an interview with the Miami Herald. He’s inside his office which, with its shelves mostly cleared of his books, photos and knick-knacks that include a Brother Kevin bobblehead, reveals the certainty of his decision.
This bright, immaculate office is in one of the school’s newer buildings facing 87th Avenue that also houses the president and principal and their staff. Soon, an even newer administration building, the under-construction Marist Legacy Building, will join the sprawling, university-like campus that Handibode has overseen for generations.
Alumni include coaches, politicians, stars
Among the Columbus students during The Shark Years: 2025 Heisman Trophy winner Fernando Mendoza, who, upon receiving the honor in December, gave a shoutout to his high school and its head football coach. “Thank you to Coach Dave Dunn and to Christopher Columbus High School for giving me a home, a dream to follow, and, more importantly, a brotherhood. Adelante,” Mendoza said.
Mendoza had just led the Indiana Hoosiers to victory against another Columbus grad, University of Miami head football coach Mario Cristobal, Class of 1988.
Florida International University’s newly hired head basketball coach, Joey Cantens, was coached by Handibode at Columbus when he was a student in 2001.
“Brother Kevin was my first coach in high school and one of the biggest reasons I fell in love with the game of basketball,” said Cantens, 39. “He taught us that basketball was about much more than what happened on the court. It was also about discipline, accountability, and work ethic. At the time, those lessons felt tough, but looking back, they helped shape who I am today.”
Jose Mas, CEO of MasTec, and his brothers Jorge Mas Santos and Juan Carlos Mas, all attended Columbus during Handibode’s tenure. Among their projects together with Handibode after they graduated: the construction of the school’s street-front Mas Technology Complex, completed in 2008. A painted portrait of Handibode, a gift for his golden jubilee as a Marist brother, hangs in the lobby of the $8 million Mas building along 3000 SW 87th Ave. in recognition of his instrumental role in its fundraising and construction.
Entrepreneur Marcus Lemonis, Ryder System Chairman Robert Sanchez, Pulitzer-winning former Miami Herald photojournalist Patrick Farrell, and the late Mavericks country crooner Raul Malo are all Columbus alumni. Former New York Yankee Alex Rodriguez played baseball for Columbus in his freshman year, 1990-91, then transferred to Westminster Christian School in Palmetto Bay.
U.S. Rep. Carlos Giménez and Class of 1972 Columbus grad once said of Handibode: “He is Columbus to everybody who went to Columbus. I wouldn’t be mayor if it weren’t for Brother Kevin,” the then mayor of Miami-Dade County told the Miami Herald when he honored Handibode for delivering a lifetime of Catholic education in 2016.
The Marist mission
Ten years later, Handibode reflects on that mission. It’s a life story that began when the Astoria-born educator studied at the Marist brothers’ St. Agnes High School in New York City. He became a Marist brother in 1957 at 18 years old and has devoted his adulthood to Catholic education since.
“As a Marist brother, our mission is to make Jesus Christ known and loved through the Christian education of youth. So when you’re dealing with students and so forth, you just try to do your best to help them out,” Handibode said.
The Columbus legend — there really isn’t a more appropriate word, although you won’t get him to utter it — knows there’s great interest in the news that he’s retiring after all these years. The stories and tributes to come cast the spotlight in his direction.
But these days, Handibode seems more comfortable crediting others. He dismisses the gush with a gentle chuckle and shrug of shoulder, deflecting the accolades from colleagues and alumni.
“We have such a wonderful community at Columbus High School. I’m so grateful to all the wonderful people in Columbus,” Handibode said, name-checking the school’s current president, Thomas Kruczek, its principal, David Pugh, his fellow faculty, administration, Marist brothers and staff.
“Brother Kevin’s legacy can be felt throughout every aspect of Columbus,” Kruczek said. “His leadership, faith, compassion, and tireless dedication have shaped thousands of lives and helped define what Columbus is today. He will always be a true hero to generations of Explorers.”
Said Handibode: “I was so, so blessed. I had 54 years, but it was just wonderful meeting so many students and then, as the years went on, knowing so many alumni, and so forth. So I’m very grateful for everybody and I cannot thank our alumni and our parents for all they have done to help out Columbus over the years.”
Coaching basketball
Five years before cruising to Columbus, in a year in which the nation featured JFK in the White House, led the Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba, and sent the first American into space, Handibode landed his first teaching gig at Archbishop Molloy High School in Queens, New York, in 1961.
There, in 1964 and 1965, he coached a 14-year-old student on Molloy’s junior varsity basketball court and taught him Latin in the classroom. The JV team under Handibode’s direction was undefeated. That kid wound up the University of Miami’s winningest basketball coach after 14 seasons.
Jim Larrañaga led the UM team to its first Elite Eight and Final Four and first ACC Tournament title by the time he stepped down in the 2024 season in the 53rd year of his coaching career at age 75.
“What I would say I learned from Brother Kevin, very early, I was only 14 years old at the time, was the importance of discipline and that if you’re self-disciplined, if you’re organized, you’re going to have a far better chance of being successful,” Larrañaga, 76, said in a telephone interview with the Herald while boarding a tour bus in Key West with family.
“In his coaching, he also emphasized teaching fundamentals so when I became a coach, those are the things I wanted to instill in my players. I wanted them to learn the fundamentals, and I wanted them to learn to be self-disciplined,” Larrañaga said. “The thing about Brother Kevin was that he was very strict, but he was also a player’s coach, meaning he had a really good relationship with all the players.
“Everybody had tremendous respect for him.”
FIU’s Cantens concurs.
“Our shirts always had to be tucked in,” Cantens said. “And I will never forget having to run the track when you made a mistake. I’ll always be grateful for the year I spent playing for him.
“Now, as the head coach at FIU, I still carry many of his values: discipline, attention to detail, and a true love for the game.”
Growth of Columbus
When Handibode arrived at Columbus in 1966, eight years after it was established in 1958 as a private, preparatory grades 9-12 Catholic school for boys in a residential Westchester neighborhood, there were about 700 students enrolled and six main buildings on campus. Classes were conducted in three rows of rectangular two-story buildings simply named A, B and C.
Handibode taught math. The original buildings also included the gym, PE locker room and a cafeteria that, for decades, also functioned as a stage for students and for events.
Today, that number has doubled to 12 academic and sports buildings on 19 acres and a 2026 enrollment of 1,740 students, according to school leaders.
The mid-1970s saw the construction of the S building, connected to the gym and near the track and football field. Building D later joined A, B and C for academics.
The Marist Legacy Building under construction will house administrators. There’s the Pat Call and Irene Culmo Center for College & Career Guidance, named for a popular biology and computer science teacher, respectively, who began their careers at the school in the late-1970s.
There’s the Lawrence Bell media center, Mas Technology Complex, Bernhardt Wellness Center and All Sports Fitness Complex. Also, the Marist Brothers Residence across from the Cafeteria and the Baseball Field House.
Handibode was awarded the Papal Cross in 2008 by the Catholic Church. He was also honored by Columbus in 2019 with the establishment of the Br. Kevin Adelante Fund that provides tuition assistance to deserving students whose families otherwise could not afford enrollment.
Retirement plans
Pick a favorite role among so many over 54 years? Handibode hesitates.
“I don’t know,” he begins. Perhaps his eventual response isn’t a surprise.
The Shark’s intense coaching style propelled Columbus to a district basketball championship in 1972 and a GMAC Southern Division Championship in 1976. And, of course, there’s his coaching of Larrañaga, Cantens, the late Barry University basketball coach César Odio Jr. and Congressman Carlos Giménez. The basketball court inside the gymnasium bears his name in bold red lettering: Br. Kevin Court.
“I always loved coaching,” Handibode says. “Even when I was president I coached the freshman team for a number of years. You try to help out students; you see parents, you see alumni. ... I’ve always enjoyed that. They mean so much to me over the years. The many that I had in class or coached.”
Coaching and teaching in a classroom aren’t all that different, he says. Coaches and teachers will tell you it’s all about mentoring and motivating.
“I think a lot of times they’re the same,” Handibode agrees. “But I guess sometimes on a basketball court you get more emotional.”
That observation leads his colleague, the school’s marketing director Cristina Cruz, to laughter.
“You’re allowed to let it out more,” she says. They nod together.
They both know another thing: Brother Kevin isn’t going anywhere.
Less than a week before his last day, Handibode spent all of Friday at the Columbus Golf Tournament mingling with alumni, Cruz said.
His office may be gone but the school visits and attendance at alumni events remain in the personal planner he carries in his DNA.
Besides, he’s still going to live on campus in the Marist Brothers Residence.
“I’ll walk around,” Br. Kevin says. “I’ll see people.”
Editor’s note: Miami Herald staff writer Howard Cohen is a four-year Columbus Class of 1981 alum.
This story was originally published June 1, 2026 at 11:15 AM.
