Jeffrey "Jeff" Vanderbeek is the former owner of the New Jersey Devils, a professional ice hockey team in the National Hockey League. Vanderbeek, a New Jersey native and Devils season ticket holder since the late 1980s, bought a minority stake in the Devils when Puck Holdings, an affiliate of YankeeNets, purchased the team in 2000. In 2004, he bought the team outright and resigned his position as an executive vice president of Lehman Brothers, which he joined in 1984. Filed 2002-03-01. Retrieved on 2006-11-15. He was ranked the ninth highest paid executive of 2002 by Business Week with pay totaling over $29 million.
Vanderbeek has been a strong proponent of the Prudential Center, which hosted its first New Jersey Devils hockey game on October 27, 2007. In 2012, Vanderbeek finalized a deal with the team's lenders that allowed him to retain the franchise for at least two years. For the most part, Vanderbeek was a hands-off owner. He left the Devils' day-to-day operations in the hands of president and general manager Lou Lamoriello. In August 2013, a deal was reached where Josh Harris, owner of the NBA's Philadelphia 76ers, bought controlling interest in the Devils for over $320 million. Vanderbeek remained as a minority owner after the sale.
In December 2014, Vanderbeek was hired by Kyle Franey, Director of Athletics at Somerville High School, as co-head football coach. Somerville High School, one with a storied past, had lost 22 games in a row. In just his 4th game as head coach, on October 2, 2015, Somerville won its first home game in nearly four years. Somerville High School football had gone 2-28 in the three season prior to his arrival. In just Jeff Vanderbeek's second season as head coach "The Ville" ran off 10 straight wins, falling in the state semifinal to the eventual champion, Rumson-Fair Haven. Along the way the Pioneers recorded a Mid State Conference Mountain Division Championship and dubbed the season #TheRise, which is chronicled at www.somervillefootball.com. Their 25-game losing streak far in the rearview mirror, in 2017, The Ville, led by Jeffrey Vanderbeek won their second consecutive Mid State 38 Mountain Division Championship and added the NJSIAA Central Jersey Group 3 State Championship - The Pioneers first state title since 1994. After going 2-21 in their previous 23 games, "The Ville" under Jeffrey Vanderbeek turned their football program around to go 21-3 and won the Central Jersey Group 3 NJSIAA State Sectional Championship on December 2, 2017 at Rutgers High Point Solutions Stadium. After graduating 12 first team all conference players during an 11-1 season in 2016, The Ville was expected to have a rebuilding year, but in quite possibly the greatest turnaround in high school football history, Somerville Football defeated Rumson-Fair Haven to become state champions, defeating the 4 time defending state champions who had also won 8 of the last 9 sectional championships. #TheGrind became the motto of the season, and the 2017 team saw underclassman score 31 of the last 32 touchdowns of the season. For this unlikely and unprecedented turnaround Jeff Vanderbeek was named the area and state Coach of the Year.
