Tiger Sharks History! The Rise and Fall of Tony Mancuso

Tony Mancuso Vice President/General Manager
After spending the first two season with the Tallahassee Tiger Sharks as Assistant General Manager and Director of Sales, Tony returns for his third season as Vice President and General Manager. Originally from Providence, Rhode Island, Tony obtained a Bachelor's Degree in Administration of Criminal Justice from Roger Williams College in Bristol, Rhode Island. He worked as a police officer with the Cranston Police Department in Rhode Island prior to his employment with the Toledo Storm hockey team. As a former player and coach, Tony knows how important community involvement is to the success of a team and he would like to thank the fans and sponsors of the Tiger Sharks for their support in the past two seasons. He and his wife, Julie, have three children: Michael, 7, Joseph 5, and Anthony III, 4.
Bio from 1996-97 Faceoff: the Tallahassee Tiger Sharks game night program.

In June of 1996 the Tallahassee Tiger Sharks introduced Tony Mancuso as their new general manager - their third in as many years of existence. Mancuso took over for Walt Edwards, who moved on to become president of the Eastern Indoor Soccer League.

Mancuso, who was promoted from his former position of assistant general manager and director of sales, was passed over for the same position the season before when Tim Mouser moved to the Sharks' International Hockey League parent club, the Utah Grizzlies.

Mancuso hoped to "move the team to the next level" by improving attendance. "My goal is to sell out the Civic Center, where we've never had a sell out before."

Mancuso, a former police officer and high school hockey coach, came to the Tiger Sharks from the ECHL's Toledo Storm in 1994.

Charlie Muenger, who was the advertising sales manager, was promoted to the position that Mancuso left vacant.

Mancuso would leave the team by the end of the season under a cloud suspicion, although actual allegations were never filed against him.

In June of 1998 Dick Yancey, newly elected president of Hockey Roanoke Inc., would hire Mancuso to replace Pierre Paiement as Roanoke's general manager, giving Mancuso carte blanche despite warnings from other ECHL owners. Mancuso named Jimmy Higginbotham as assistant general manager to the team.

Mancuso would announce his retirement from that position in March of 1999, stating that he was leaving the Express to take a job outside of hockey in his native Rhode Island. He would be fired by the team four days after that announcement, following a completion of investigations into financial irregularities and unpaid bills uncovered in December of 1999. By the end of the season, Roanoke's owners estimated a debt of more than $200,000.

Both Mancuso and Higginbotham would be indicted on charges of embezzlement, grand larceny and obtaining money by false pretenses for allegedly taking a combined $13,900 worth of goods and trade from the team while they ran the Express front office in 1998-99 season.

Lawyers for the former T-Shark executive and his associate said that their clients denied accusations that they stole from the Roanoke Express.