(Guru's Note: The Guru's Own Commentary Will Come After Attending the Maryland-North Carolina Game Sunday Night. But this is another aspect of her wonderlife and career worth noting for the moment.).
By Mel Greenberg
PHILADELPHIA - In the long and illustrious career of North Carolina State's Kay Yow, whose Hal of Fame career as the legendary Wolfpack women's basketball coach ended Saturday when cancer claimed her at age 66 after a lengthy battle, the Philadelphia area was practically a second home.
Over the years her teams played three of the Big Five schools -- Temple, St. Joseph's and Villanova with the later two also matchup in NCAA tournaments.
One of Yow's earliest recruiting coups occurred when she was able to land Linda Page, who broke Wilt Chamberlain's high school record in scoring over 100 points in a game.
Page helped N.C. State quickly become a national women's basketball power.
"When it comes to coaches, Yow was one of the great ones," said Mike Flynn, the head of the nationally-regarded Blue Star AAU program who had Page as a member of the Philadelphia Belles and remembers the early trips here Yow made to evaluate the local high school superstar.
Yow also had strong contacts across the river in South Jersey and years later matched up against two local products on the sidelines -- Bernadette McGlade, now commissioner of the Atlantic Ten, and her sister Agnus Berenato, now coach of the Pittsburgh Panthers.
In the early 1990s N.C. State and Virginia, which had attracted Dawn Staley, matched up in some classic ACC confrontations including a triple-overtime encounter won by the Cavaliers.
After Staley became a head coach at Temple, the Owls travelled to Raleigh in Staley's first season and Temple lost in the closing minutes on a night that Yow reached her 600th career win.
Both coaches jokingly noted that the win against Staley was the price for Virginia's win in that game or Yow would have reached 600 one game before Temple's visit in the winter of 2000.
Another local star in later years who helped N.C. State was Gillian Goring, who had played at Germantown Academy and after several stops, joined the Wolfpack because she just knew she had to play for Yow.
Goring, drafted by the WNBA's Washington Mystics, was one of the key players helping the Wolfpack's fabled run to the NCAA's Sweet 16 in 2007 when Yow returned to the bench after missing 16 games because of her dramatic fight against breast cancer.
Yow was one of the charter voters when the Associated Press women's poll was launched in 1976 and her Wolfpack team along with Atlantic Coast rival Maryland were the last two of the teams from the very first preseason poll who stayed in the rankings the longest until dropping out the same week several years later.
Rutgers Hall of Fame coach C. Vivian Strnger issued a statement on Yow's passing Saturday prior to the Scarlet Knights' game against DePaul in Chicago.
“I am deeply saddened by the passing of Kay Yow. She taught all of us how to handle personal battles with a great deal of grace and acceptance and by believing that God would see us through. She rarely complained, as most of us would or ever wonder why this had happened to her. When I myself was diagnosed with breast cancer, Kay was one of the handful of people I told. I asked her why me? Kay was the person I could best identify with and knew would understand. And she did. I admired that she made her life so open and one day I hoped to do the same to help other women.
"Kay showed us how to handle one of the most difficult things-cancer-in the most dignified and courageous manner. She taught us what it is to have real passion for the sport, any sport. She continued to fight and went about doing what she loved best: coaching. She used every ounce of energy she had left to give to those young ladies. She was and will always be an inspiration to so many people.
"We have lost a pioneer and an ambassador of women’s basketball. I have lost a friend. My thoughts and prayers are with her family, both the Yow family and also the NC State family.”
On Saturday, both Notre Dame coach Muffet McGraw and Villanova coach Harry Perretta commented on Yow after the Wildcats upset the No. 13 Irish at Villanova.
"She was someone everyone respected and admired for the way she always handled herself throughout her life," McGraw said.
"And I think it's a great loss for the entire basketball committee and our thoughts and prayers are with her."
Perretta had a long-standing friendship with Yow over three decades.
"I got a phone call at 8:30 this morning and hadn't seen anything on the ticker," Perretta said.
"I knew she wasn't doing well, because I had taked to Debbie Antonelli," Perretta said of a former Wolfpack player who now broadcasts games on ESPN and other networks.
"You couldn't get any information how Kay was doing, but I knew she wasn't doing well.
"I got the message to Sister Rose Maria, I called her mother," he said of former Wildcat star Shelly Pennefather, now a cloistered nun who played for Villanova against the Wolfpack.
"It's just a said thing, so many years she fought that disease," Perretta said. "I knew her pretty well.
"It was interesting, when I spoke to her in August, it was really like unbelievable, she was so calm. She said, `You know Harry, medicine can't cure me now, I need a miracle," he related.
"But she wasn't afraid. She wasn't scared. It was like inspiring and it's really sad. But from what I heard she was in a lot of pain so I'm happy she won't have to suffer anymore."
Perretta would like to attend the viewing Friday and funeral Saturday in North Carolina but like many coaches, he may not be able to do so because of his team's schedule.
"What they should do is either have a memorial service at the Final Four in St. Louis, or a week after and right before recruiting starts again, have it in Reynolds Coliseum in Raleigh so every coach can attend."
Late Saturday, an email arrived with a reaction from USA basketball, which had Yow in its family off her coaching the U.S. to a gold medal in the 1988 Olympics.
That team had former Penn State coach Suzie McConnell-Serio, now coaching Duquesne and who was inducted into the Women's Basketball Hall of Fame last spring.
"USA Basketball is mourning the loss today of Kay Yow, a friend, coach, mentor, leader and pioneer in women's basketball. Her accomplishments were many within the USA Basketball family. As a member of seven USA Basketball staffs over a 10-year span, the pinnacle of her USA career came when she led the 1986 USA World Championship and 1988 U.S. Olympic Teams to gold medals. Kay has been an inspiration both on and off the court throughout her storied career. However, it has been during her struggles with cancer that Kay has inspired us most. All of us in the USA Basketball family will miss her wonderful smile, personality and strength of character."
Kay Yow's History with USA Basketball:
As A USA Basketball Head Coach:
Event Medal Record
1988 Olympic Games Gold Medal 5-0
1986 World Championship Gold Medal 7-0
1986 Goodwill Games Gold Medal 5-0
1981 World University Games Silver Medal 6-1
-- Mel
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