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All-American Money

Michael Jordan was third ‹ that is how good the N.B.A. draft was that year. Dan Trant was 228th.

Last pick, last round. Last laugh, too, sometimes. When Mr. Trant, a bond trader for Cantor Fitzgerald, and his best friend, Lance Faniel, joined the bruising pickup games down on West Fourth Street years later, players chose Mr. Faniel first. "They'd look at Danny and they'd look at me," Mr. Faniel said, noting that he is black and had a few inches and pounds on the white friend he called Money. Then Money got his turn, and players saw what the Celtics had seen in the All- American guard they had picked but could not place, maybe because of those inches he did not have.

"We'd walk away laughing," Mr. Faniel said.

"He was able to exceed his All-American status as a father," said Mr. Faniel, who spent Mr. Trant's last night with him and the Trant boys ‹ Daniel, 12, and Alex, 10 ‹ waiting for the rain to stop at Yankee Stadium. Mr. Trant, 40, and his wife, Kathy, also had a daughter, Jessica, 19, whom he coached in soccer. He loved sports, but "he loved me more," Mrs. Trant said. He quit professional basketball in Ireland to marry her, and turned down seats to a Knicks game offered by a job interviewer. Can't, gotta baby-sit, he had said, Kathy is going to the Grammys. He was hired.
Profile published in THE NEW YORK TIMES on October 29, 2001.

Daniel P. Trant, bond trader; at 40

By Globe Staff, 9/17/2001

A memorial Mass will be said today for Daniel Patrick Trant, a bond trader with the firm of Cantor Fitzgerald, who was killed Tuesday inside the World Trade Center during the terrorist attack on New York. He was 40.

Mr. Trant grew up in Westfield and graduated from Westfield High School, where he played soccer and basketball, in 1979. He also attended Suffield Academy in Suffield, Conn., and Clark University in Worcester. He was a two-time All-America basketball player at Clark, leading the team to the NCAA Division 3 finals in 1983.

He played professional basketball in Ireland for teams in Dublin and Belfast. He also played for the Springfield Fame of the United States Basketball League, leading them to a league championship.

In 1986, Mr. Trant joined the Hampden district attorney's office, where he worked for five years in the victim-witness program.

He moved to Long Island, N.Y., and began a career on Wall Street in 1991. Mr. Trant worked for several brokerage firms before starting at Cantor Fitzgerald in 1997.

He leaves his wife, Kathy (Schiaffino) of Northport, N.Y.; a daughter, Jessica; two sons, Daniel and Alex; his parents, William T. and Mary C. (Fay), of Winter Haven, Fla.; three brothers, Kevin of Kensington, Md., Timothy of Manassas, Va., and Matthew of Bethesda, Md.; and four sisters, Patricia Madamas of Westfield, Maureen Landry of Willington, Conn., Sally of Reston, Va., and Sheila Inserra of Park Ridge, Ill.

The Mass will be at 11 a.m. in St. Philip Neri Church, Northport.

Editorial Obituary published in THE BOSTON GLOBE on 9/17/2001.