Jeffrey Beatrice, father of 11, devoted coach of youth sports

“He was the original architect of ‘no child left behind,’ ’’ said friend, neighbor, and fellow coach Jim Byrne. “He had four or five kids with him anywhere he went, and he couldn’t walk by a place where he was needed.’’

Mr. Beatrice, a father to 11 children and longtime resident of the city’s close-knit Nonantum neighborhood, died at his home on Friday of an apparent heart attack. He was 49.

He was a certified public accountant by trade, but his passion was coaching youth sports. His friends estimate he was involved with several dozen city and independent teams over the past 20 years, coaching thousands of local kids in all, while also announcing play-by-play for Newton’s Pop Warner football organization.

“He brought out the best in the kids, though he was no softie. He was into honest-to-goodness team building. He got the kids so psyched up and so excited to play,’’ said Michael Chinitz, whose daughter, Taylor, played on Mr. Beatrice’s MetroWest Basketball League squad last year as an eighth-grader.

He took the team from a distant seventh-place seed triumphantly through five rounds of playoffs, Chinitz recalled.

“It’s not easy to find coaches who have knowledge of the game, commitment, and a great relationship with kids. He had it all,’’ said Chinitz.

Born in East Boston, Mr. Beatrice moved to the Lake, as the neighborhood is known locally, as an infant.

He attended elementary school at Our Lady Help of Christians Parish and graduated in 1978 from Trinity Catholic High School, where he played on the school’s baseball, football, and basketball teams.

A 1982 graduate of Bowdoin College in Maine, Mr. Beatrice worked as an insurance salesman before earning his CPA certification in 1989.

He and his first wife, Janice Fairhurst, settled in Duxbury and had three children, daughters Kirsten, 27, and Lauren, 25, and a son, Nick, 24.

After their divorce, he married Elinor Campbell a Waban native, the mother of one son, also named Nick, 26, whom he adopted.

He and Elinor had seven more children: MacKenzie, 17, Corrine, 16, Madison, 14, Curtis, 13, Sydney, 11, Nathaniel, 9, and Sophia, 5.

Mr. Beatrice lost his father, Marino, in 1965 at age 5, and his mother, Dorothy, 85, in January 2008 when she perished in a fire that broke out at the duplex, next door to Mr. Beatrice’s Ashmont Ave. home, where she and his disabled, older brother, John, lived.

Mr. Beatrice “was not only a wonderful coach, but a wonderful dad,’’ said his wife, Elinor, in a telephone interview.

The family took in several local youngsters in need of a place to stay at Mr. Beatrice’s urging, she said. “If you needed a place to go, our house was always open,’’ she said.

Mr. Beatrice, who was self-employed, had encountered financial problems in recent years, putting the family home in danger of foreclosure, according to friends and family.

It was not something he ever discussed, said Scott Lennon, a Ward 1 alderman who also played with Mr. Beatrice on an adult city basketball team several years ago.

“He always had a smile, he was always upbeat, but there were a lot of things people didn’t know about,’’ said Lennon. “As a community, we are looking to come together and help Elinor and the kids get back on their feet.’’

The family requests memorial donations in lieu of flowers, to the Jeffrey Beatrice Family Fund, c/o the Village Bank, 307 Auburn St., Auburndale MA 02466

The death also weighed hard on the city’s young athletes this weekend. Byrne, a house painter, is also coach for a club high school girls’ basketball team with several players who had been close to Mr. Beatrice, including his daughter Madison.

Despite her grief, she wanted to start in the game, Byrne said.

“Madison wiped her eyes, said ‘I’m ready,’ and scored 22 of the 45 points that half,’’ said Byrne. “That gives you a picture of the Beatrices.’’