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As Seton Keough nears close, many remember storied program
Trish Cook, who had coached Archbishop Keough, took over the new program and led it to three straight Catholic League championships. The team finished 25-1 overall and 17-0 in the Catholic League the first year.
A member of Archbishop Keough’s first graduating class, Cook laughs when she remembers that her yearbook included a picture of a tiger hanging in effigy in their gym before the annual Keough-Seton game. The Keough Kougars had always been archrivals with the Seton Tigers, but while there was some animosity in the school that first year, the blended basketball team brought the rivals together.
Cook and her players launched a program that would go on to win six Catholic League titles before the league merged into the Interscholastic Athletic Association of Maryland A Conference in 2000.
The Gators won the last two Catholic League crowns and the first IAAM title. In 2009, they won the IAAM title again and went on to become the first Baltimore school to win the Bishop Walsh Girls Invitational Tournament in Cumberland before capping their season with the ESPN RISE National High School Invitational championship.
The current players hope to add another title to polish off the Seton Keough resume.
Seton Keough will go down in history with several other perennial Baltimore-area girls basketball powers whose schools no longer exist — Towson Catholic, Walbrook, Brooklyn Park and Andover.
“There’s a hole in Baltimore basketball with them leaving. We lose a bit of Baltimore history,” said Catonsville coach Mike Mohler, who coached the Gators for one year.
To commemorate the final Seton Keough home game, when the No. 9 Gators host an IAAM A Conference quarterfinal Tuesday at 5:30 p.m., The Baltimore Sun asked players and coaches to share some of their memories and feelings about their experiences with the Gators.
[The merger] was heaven to me, because I got the strength of Seton’s basketball program to meld with the strength of Archbishop Keough, so it was like the strongest players on each team. That first year, we lost one game, and that was to Mount Hebron, and we won all the rest. We talked a lot about how the basketball team became a rallying point, that that was what helped the girls get acclimated to being Seton Keough. All the Seton girls were used to having a good basketball program. All the Keough girls were used to that and so that was something they could come together on and we all felt good about that.
For me [coming from Seton], I thought it was a wonderful year. Everything was out of our control as far as merging the schools and when we found out, of course everyone was heartbroken because of the tradition behind Seton and how old it was. But coming into the school, I already knew several of the basketball players on Keough’s team just from living in the Catonsville area and playing with them or against them in rec or in CYO ball, so it wasn’t a very difficult transition athletically and the basketball team really seemed to unite the school, because everybody came to cheer us on. We had the pep rally and we were doing so well and everybody, even throughout any kind of turmoil going on in the school if that was difficult for a lot of people, they seemed to forget about it when they came to the basketball gym to watch a game. I think it just gave everybody a purpose, something positive to look at in that first transition year. We won the league and then... we beat Walbrook in the Metro Classic. That was a huge deal back then.
I came in as a freshman at Keough and halfway through, we were Seton Keough. Players such as Jeanne Aldave came in as a senior from Seton … and it was a seamless sisterhood with the athletic department. It might sound corny, but you brought in two teams from different areas. They may have been from similar families and they were clearly Catholic. You had to try out. You had to make sure you made the team. And we won championships, … we went to the Metro Classic. I think that seamless transition really came together with basketball. When we were at Keough, I can’t say we were phenomenal, but when we came together as that crew that was an exceptional time for girls high school basketball.
When I first started, Trish Cook was the coach and they have a tremendous legacy. Trish, Jim Stromberg, Mike Mohler, Jackie Boswell were all good coaches. They were all very tactical. They were all very good defensive coaches and so, we had some epic battles with Seton Keough. It was special. I think the [Asya] Bussie years were the best, because she was a special player. She could do a lot of things, so we really had to prepare for her. It was an era in the IAAM that I’ll never forget and I’ll treasure, because that was a time we really had to fight tooth and nail to beat them. It came as a shock to us that the school was closing ... but I think Seton Keough’s legacy in the IAAM is cemented. I think the coaches will never be forgotten and I think the IAAM should do something to honor that program for all they accomplished.
My fondest memory is the year that the IAAM merged with the Catholic League and we won the first IAAM championship. On that team, there ended up being eight girls who went to Division I schools to play basketball. … That team had kids that I coached the whole time and I coached in AAU before they came to Keough — like Denise King, Meaghan Allen and Nikki Brown — those kids were all seniors and it was my last year at Keough. My most vivid memory, although it’s not a good memory, is when Anna Martinez hit a half-court shot at the buzzer to beat us in the semifinals of the Catholic League Tournament. I think it was 1996 and (laughs) that’s the one I remember more than any other.
My favorite memory would have to be the time spent with my teammates and my coaches and the banners that we put up, crazy competition with Spalding, St. Frances; playing players like Nikki Teasley, Vicki Brick or LaTonya Blue. Just a lot of great players we’ve had the opportunity to play against. One thing I’m most thankful and grateful for is the bond that I have with my teammates and all the players that came in after us. We really are one great big family and we will continue to be even though the school is closed.
It’s just really sad that we’re not going to have an actual place to go back to and share those memories, especially with the younger kids. The alumnae were so important during my time there and they really set the stage and kind of allowed us to continue that tradition and it was really important for when I was there that we carry on the memory that those older girls set. We always had visits from Denise King, Keisha Blackwell, Nikki Brown and they made us feel important. The legacy that we were continuing, the tradition we knew it was important and we didn’t want to let them down, so not having that place anymore, not being able to show future Gators how that is, it’s pretty sad.
My favorite memory is that 2009 season when we won ESPN RISE, but I think the part of that ESPN RISE championship was that very evening I got a call from Denise King, who graduated in 2000. She happened to be out recruiting and she was sitting in a restaurant that had ESPN TV on and they were flipping through the channels and she was like, “Wait, wait, wait! That’s my old high school.” They were like, “What do you mean your old high school?” She was like, “That’s where I played high school. That’s my family.’ She was nine years removed from it, but to get that call that evening from a kid who had graduated nine years previously and felt like she was just as much a part of that win that day as the players who played in that game and she’s absolutely right. We’ve always tried to preach that you’re not successful just this year without the people who came before you and that’s what Strom preached from the beginning.
Every time I go into a gym, I’m like, “Wow, this might be the last time I play at Roland Park. It might be the last time I play against Roland Park in my home gym.” It’s always a feeling like this is your last thing you’re ever going to do, so you want to put your best effort into it. You want to do the most you can to make it last or make it memorable for you. Every time I go to a game, my mom’s got a camera “Say, ‘Cheese.’ I’ve got to get this on camera.” I don’t know how many pictures she’s taken. It wasn’t even the end of January yet and she had a new memory card.
I think my favorite moment is yet to happen. Senior night was a great opportunity for us, because we were able to bring all the seniors together and we had a good win over Pallotti. Our overtime win [56-53 over Spring-Ford, Pa., on Jan. 28], I think was good because the girls really came together, but I think we’ve yet to have that favorite moment, because we’re not quite finished. I think we still have some work to do yet and I still hope we … go out with a bang in the tournament. It would be nice to go out with the championship, because this is our last year. That would be the greatest memory of all.
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