Joanna Minardi is well-known for her friendship with the former Louisville coach. She is the wife of Rick Pitino, also known as Richard Andrew Pitino. She is one of the down-to-earth women who is the proud co-founder of the Daniel Pitino Foundation, a non-profit organization based in Lexington, Kentucky that helps underprivileged children.
Pitino’s wife was born in the Long Island suburbs in the year 1953. Regrettably, she has yet to reveal her exact birth date. Similarly, Minardi has not disclosed any information about her parents. She does, however, have two older brothers. Nonetheless, it is known that she attended St. Dominic’s High School in Oyster Bay, Long Island, for her academics.
Earnings and net worth
Joanna Minardi must have earned a healthy amount of money as a co-founder of the Daniel Pitino Foundation. However, because the foundation is a non-profit organization and all funds raised go to needy children, she does not profit from it.
However, because her husband is a well-known basketball coach with a salary of $7.7 million and a net worth of $45 million, she is almost certain to receive a portion of it.
Furthermore, when her husband sold their 12,000 square foot Miami home for $17 million in April 2020, Minardi must have received a portion of the proceeds as well.
Minardi’s Marriage to Pitino
Minardi and the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Famer have been enjoying their friendship for over four decades. The now-married couple first met in the early 1970s while both were students at St. Dominic’s High School.
They quickly became friends, and their friendship progressed to the point where they began dating. And, just a few years later, in 1976, they officially legalized their relationship and marriage.
Since then, the former New York Knicks coach and his wife have been enjoying their marital bond.
Information About the Couple’s Children
When the power couple welcomed beautiful children into their family, their married life became even more joyful. Minardi and Pitino had six children: five sons named Michael, Christopher, Richard Jr., Ryan, and Daniel, and one daughter named Jacqueline.
Unfortunately, a disaster struck the family in 1987, when the couple’s son, Daniel, died at the age of six months due to congenital heart failure. Everyone was shocked by the incident, and the entire family mourned for him.
To honor him, Minardi and Pitino established the Daniel Pitino Foundation and a Daniel Pitino Shelter.
Pitino, Minardi’s husband, is embroiled in a scandal.
In 2009, a controversy erupted that threatened to derail their decades-long marriage. According to some reports, Pitino was cheating on his wife, having a sexual relationship with another woman named Karen Cunagin Sypher, and she was pregnant with his child.
Pitino confirmed the rumors and also admitted to giving Sypher $3000 for an abortion. Only a few weeks later, the former University of Louisville coach revealed that Sypher was extorting him. As a result, he charged her with extortion and lying to federal agents.
When the court hearing took place, Minardi proudly stood beside her husband and supported his claims—Sypher was sentenced to 87 months in prison but was released in January 2017 from a halfway house.
After the controversy was over, the happily married couple, Minardi and Pitino, settled the disputes caused by the controversy and continued to live together as husband and wife.
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