Mount Has 'Interim' Head Coach
After Dorf Resigns From His Post

CALDWELL- Mount St. Dominic will have a different person in the top position guiding its girls basketball team for the rest of the current 2025-2026 season after head coach Brian Dorflaufer – who is known in North Jersey sports circles by the shorter surname ‘Dorf – delivered his letter of resignation to officials at the Caldwell-based Catholic school on Wednesday morning (Jan. 21).

Athletic Director Lorenzo Sozio said that assistant Kyla Ramseur would serve as the Lions interim head coach for the remainder of this season. The Lions, who lost 59-36 at West Orange on Thursday (Jan. 22) have now lost five of their last six games, dropping to 8-7 overall and 1-5 in the Super Essex Conference-American Division.

“I felt that it was in everybody’s best interest that I step aside,” Dorf told Sideline Chatter. “It’s unfortunate that it has come to this, and I wish the Mount nothing but success moving forward.”

The departing head mentor would not elaborate on the reasons behind his decision which comes at the mid-point during his second season at the helm. 

The Mount now have nine regular season games remaining plus at least one game in both the county and state tournaments. 

The 27-year-old Ramseur is a 2016 graduate of Bloomfield Tech and also played at Dominican (N.Y.) University and Post University in Connecticut. She takes the reins of a promising, young team which has just one senior on the roster and started two freshmen in its last game.

"The timing is not ideal,” said Sozio. "We are thankful for Coach Dorf’s time spent with the program and wish him all the best.

“We are moving forward with our season with Kyla Ramseur as our ‘Interim’ head coach.” 

The 33-year-old Dorf has a detailed coaching resume including being the head coach for two seasons with the Verona girls basketball team through the 2022-2023 campaign. He has been an assistant under two different head coaches in boys basketball at West Orange along with stints at Glen Ridge, Hanover Park and Cedar Grove and also with the girls hoops squad at Randolph in the 2023-2024 season.

Dorf had been appointed to his most recent post at the Mount in August of 2024 as he began the task of trying to re-establish a winning tradition in what had been a strong history in the sport at the Caldwell-based Catholic school, but a hoops program which has had its struggles during the past decade.

The Lions have had just two winning records in the last 12 seasons and have not played in the Final Four of either the Essex County Tournament or Non-Public, North A state sectional tourney since 2014.

Dorf’s 2024-2025 squad showed some promise finishing 12-15 overall but just 2-8 in the rigorous SEC-American Division which is the top division in the Essex County league.

Looking back, the most memorable Mount season may have been with the 1993-94 squad with coach Deb Malmgren and standouts such as Anne Giblin which captured the 1994 NJSIAA Tournament of Champions title.

Jerry Aquino won more than 300 games as the Mount coach in the 2000s before he stepped aside in 2016.

Ted Sochaski, the former standout Belleville player and former Buccaneers’ boys coach, directed the Lions for two seasons before Dorf’s arrival on the scene, including an improved 12-14 team in 2023-2024; however, business responsibilities in South Carolina required him to move there in the spring of 2024 which left the coaching post vacant once again.

Dorf is a history and technology teacher at Memorial Middle School in Cedar Grove.

“I wish the Mount nothing but success,” said Dorf. “They are a sleeping giant!”