Rick Pullano Hometown: Glenview, Illinois High School: Holy Cross (River Grove, Illinois) Position: Advisor Monogram Earned: Baseball

Rick Pullano - a practicing attorney in Chicago for nearly 20 years - joined Dick Nussbaum as former Notre Dame baseball players who served their three-year terms on the Monogram Club board of directors from 2002-05 and each now has returned to the board in an advisorial role.

Like Nussbaum, Pullano has parlayed his undergraduate experience - including success on the diamond - into a legal career. A 1979 graduate in finance, he earned his law degree from DePaul in 1982 and has been a practicing attorney in Chicago for nearly 20 years, concentrating his practice on civil jury trials in the past 16 years.

Pullano, who opened his own law firm in 1998, has successfully litigated and negotiated a number of multimillion-dollar verdicts and settlements. He also has served since 1990 as an adjunct professor at DePaul and he lectures extensively on topics relating to tort litigation - even appearing as a guest speaker on the Oprah Winfrey Show. His career began in the Cook County State's Attorney Office, where he tried over 100 cases in the felony trial courts and gang crimes unit.

Pullano was the first player since 1904 to captain the Notre Dame baseball squad in consecutive years, also earning team MVP in those '78 and '79 seasons. As a junior, he struck out just three time in 132 at-bats - still good for first in the Notre Dame record book with a ratio of 44 ABs per strikeout. A .338 career hitter, Pullano started the final 150 games of his career (all at shortstop).

He received seven letters in baseball, basketball and football at Holy Cross High School in River Grove, Ill. As a little leaguer, he was featured in Sports Illustrated's "Faces in the Crowd" after striking out all 18 batters he faced in a no-hitter.

Pullano and his wife Candace are the parents of son Michael (13, as of June 2005) and daughter Olivia (9). He is the manager of Michael's baseball team that qualified for the 2002 National USSSA World Series in Overland Park, Kan. The family resides in Glenview, Ill.