Brothers, basketball and the Brochus

In the late 1980s, Mark Brochu was part of one of the first cohorts to complete Salve Regina University’s early version of a five-year pathway to earning a master’s degree. Looking back, he notes that he wasn’t just learning administration of justice during his time on the ocean-side campus. He was building relationships that felt close and highly personal, and which have stood the test of time.  

“It was a small school and having small classes, I personally got to really know my professors,” he said. “I would even have lunch with them.”

Decades later, that same closeness is what makes the Brochu story feel less like a “legacy” in the formal, polished sense – and more like a family returning to a place that continues to feel like home. One by one, Mark’s three sons followed him to Salve. One by one, they made the men’s basketball program part of their college identity. And, just as importantly, they each found their own lane in the classroom.

Mark earned his bachelor’s degree from Salve in 1987 and a master’s in 1988, both in administration of justice, then went on to law school at Loyola University New Orleans. Thor, his oldest son, earned a biochemistry degree in 2021 and completed his MBA at Salve in 2022. Clay, the second oldest, graduated in 2024 with a biology major and has just finished his first year at St. George’s University School of Medicine. Braden, a junior finance major, is still in the middle of it – watching the same campus become a different version of “home” in real time.

Mark can rattle off the names of the people who shaped him at Salve: retired FBI agents who demanded more than he thought he had, professors who “pushed” him, mentors who made the campus feel navigable. He even speaks about University chancellor Sister Therese Antone with the kind of affectionate disbelief you only get from a true small-world moment.

“I was at Penn Station, and I had not seen her in years,” he said. “We crossed paths and she stopped, looked at me, and said ‘Of course I remember you.’ It just shows you how small of a world it really is, how close Salve really is.”

That’s the same texture the boys describe, too – professors who know your name, departments where relationships carry you through the hard classes, and the kind of campus where “Brochu” became recognizable before Clay and Braden had even taken a seat.

“Professors that taught my dad or taught Thor, they’re like, ‘Oh, are you a Brochu?’” Clay joked.

What makes the Brochu story particularly meaningful is that it’s not just three sons following a father. It’s siblings overlapping on the same campus in just the right way: Thor as the older brother with a year of experience; Clay as the bridge who got to be both “little” and “big” brother; Braden stepping into his own rhythm after watching the path ahead.  

“It really worked out where they only overlap slightly,” Mark said. “It allowed them to each become their own person.”  

Clay added, “It’s pretty cool to have your brothers at college with you. I was once fostered by Thor, now I was able to help Braden.”

Basketball isn’t a footnote – it’s the engine

Mark played basketball in high school and came from a winning program, then started as a first-year student at Salve. Back then, the logistics were different – “we didn’t have a gym,” he said, so practice meant Rogers High School or the YMCA and a lot of coordination. But the social dynamic was familiar: athletes gravitated toward each other, and friendships lasted.

“I still talk to a lot of these guys today. They were like family,” he said.

Thor echoed that decades later. Division III can look lighter from the outside, he said, until you’re living it.

“It’s a full-time commitment,” Thor said. “You really get to know your teammates. Those friendships and those bonds, I still speak to a number of the guys every day. Those kinds of relationships never fade.”

Clay lived the team experience at full volume. After a strange first-year COVID-19 season, he started sophomore year, helped the Seahawks reach the finals and later became captain.

“It was really an honor being named captain by the other players,” he said. “It meant so much that they really trusted me with leadership.”

“I have three brothers,” he added, “but I ultimately have like 30 basketball brothers that I can text and lean on whenever I want.”

The hard part that pays off

Ask any student-athlete what their real sport is, and they’ll tell you it’s time management. Clay, juggling the workload of biology and chemistry, described his study hall as one with four wheels.

“You have to study on the bus,” he said. “I would be writing 500 flashcards for a huge exam or working on an essay while we drove to and from games.”

But the other side of that grind is the way professors at Salve met them halfway – not by lowering standards, but by treating them like adults who could be trusted to do the work.

He credits chemistry professor Dr. Susan Meschwitz, biology professor Dr. Steven Symington and biology lecturer Dr. Kimberly Curesky as anchors – the kind of faculty who guided him from coursework to medical school acceptance.

“They were always very reasonable,” Clay said. “You just have to talk to your professors. They want you to learn, and they want you to do well.”

Thor’s academic turning points were similarly specific. A summer research experience with chemistry professor Dr. Bernard Munge helped him learn what he liked – and what he didn’t.

“I didn’t love the lab work,” he admitted. “But I learned so much, it really did push me. I use that work ethic in everything I do.”

After Salve, the throughline is people

Mark’s post-Salve career took him through legal publishing and major corporations –Thomson Reuters, Dun & Bradstreet, Wolters Kluwer – and he’s candid about the difference between workplaces that invest in people and those that don’t.

“When you’re around certain types of people that promote your growth and development, you’re attracted to those types of people,” he said. “Some companies care more about the bottom line, and that didn’t really sit well with me. Salve really emphasized caring about the person.”

Thor’s path was less linear – biochemistry into cybersecurity – but he sees Salve as the reason the pivot didn’t feel impossible.

“It wasn’t like ‘Oh my God, I don’t know anything,’” he said. “It’s more like, ‘Okay, I need to learn something new, but Salve prepared me to be able to do so.”

He’s been promoted multiple times at his company, Thrive, and he ties that back to continuous development – the same value his dad repeats like a family motto.

Clay is one year into his rigorous medical school journey, with a clear interest in orthopedics or anesthesiology, and Braden, now focused on business, is thinking about economics classes, career prep and maybe studying abroad. 

As for the youngest Brochu, Courtney, the family can’t help but joke that it may only be a matter of time before they’re back on campus again, cheering from the same set of bleachers.