Jay Wright saw enough of Collin Gillespie a few nights before to invite him to Villanova on a Monday in January 2017 and offer him a scholarship. But this was hardly a courtship. Wright told Gillespie that he would redshirt his freshman season, maybe play as a junior, and then have a complementary role as a fifth-year senior.
“I thought he would get his master’s degree and be a great coach one day,” Wright said. “I was thinking ‘I would love to have this guy on my staff.’”
Gillespie — who has molded himself into an NBA starter with the Phoenix Suns after going undrafted in 2022 — nodded along. He didn’t have a Division I scholarship before his senior year at Archbishop Wood and declined to visit Division II schools because he believed bigger programs would eventually see what he already knew: He could play. Redshirt? OK. Bench player? Sure. Coach? Yes, sir.
“I didn’t really believe him,” said Gillespie, who will play against the 76ers on Tuesday night. “I believed in myself. I was just like, ‘Whatever he says, I’ll take it and then prove him wrong.’”
There was Gillespie 15 months later on the court for Wright in the national championship game, taking a charge against Michigan and looking the part. In his fifth year, the kid who had to wait for college scholarships was named the nation’s top point guard in 2022. He went undrafted that June but landed a non-guaranteed contract in July with the Denver Nuggets. He was on track.
Three weeks later, Gillespie suffered a broken right leg while playing in a pickup game at Villanova.
His NBA career — the one that is now flourishing — seemed unlikely then to nearly everyone except the guy who nodded along that day in Wright’s office.
“Everyone has their own journey,” Gillespie, 26, said. “Everyone runs their own race. You just have to stick to what you do, put your head down, and work hard. Don’t compare yourself to anyone else. If you work hard enough, you can probably achieve anything you want to.”
Collin Gillespie (right) became much more than a fifth-year senior role player first envisioned by Villanova coach Jay Wright.
G League to the league
Andre Miller often learned via text messages which players would be flying nearly three hours from Denver to join his G League team that night. He coached the Grand Rapids Gold, the Nuggets’ minor-league affiliate in Michigan that played 1,100 miles from Denver. Those morning flights gave Gillespie a chance to get on the court.
“It wasn’t a good recipe for these guys to be successful, but when he did show up, he didn’t want to come out of the game,” said Miller, who played three of his 17 NBA seasons with the Sixers. “We knew we had to leave him out there because he didn’t have an opportunity with the other team and he took great advantage of it.”
Gillespie feared that the Nuggets would void his contract after he suffered that injury playing at Villanova. That’s the first thing he said to his father, who was in the gym when it happened. But they didn’t. They kept him around that first season while he rehabbed and then split his time the next season between Denver and Grand Rapids.
“There was no ego,” Miller said. “One thing that’s tough to deal with is when your career is in the hands of other people. Some people felt like he wasn’t an NBA player and some people felt like he was an NBA player. The one thing that stood out about him to me is that he’s a competitor. He’s a dog. He’s a guy who enjoys playing basketball. He’s a leader. He plays with a chip on his shoulder.
“I wish I could have coached him more in the G League, but he was an NBA player. I knew that from the first time I saw him on the court with the G League players. I was like, ‘He probably won’t be here much.’”
Gillespie signed before last season with the Suns, again splitting time between the NBA and the G League. The 6-foot-1 guard earned a full-time role this season, starting for the Suns and fitting in with pesky defense and a three-point shot. Just like college, it took time before Gillespie’s game was appreciated.
“You just don’t see it initially. He doesn’t wow you,” Wright said. “But when you see him play over time and you realize this guy is getting to the rim and finishing, he’s elevating on his jumper and shooting over bigger guys, and he’s not getting backed down. You almost need to have time to believe what you’re watching.”
Collin Gillespie is shooting 41.4% from three-point range for the Suns.
Gillespie entered Monday’s game against Brooklyn averaging 13.2 points, 4.9 assists, and shooting 41.4% from three-point range. He hit a game-winner at the buzzer in November, regularly finds ways to create his own shot, and has proved that his game fits in the NBA.
Kevin Durant called him “a dog” and Anthony Edwards said after a loss to the Suns last season that “No. 12 is pretty good at basketball.” Two NBA superstars could see what Gillespie always believed: He belongs.
“He has more heart than talent,” said his father, Jim. “The kid just doesn’t want to lose. When he sets his mind to something, he just does it. And ultimately, he’s a winner. Wherever he’s gone, he’s won. At every level.”
Jay Wright says Collin Gillespie came to Villanova with a “killer mentality and stone face that we try to teach.”
Change of plans
Gillespie was in the stands for a Villanova game as a senior in high school, seated behind the La Salle bench at the Palestra. The Explorers invited him and Gillespie thought a scholarship offer was near.
“But they never offered,” Jim Gillespie said.
Gillespie eventually landed smaller Division I offers as a senior, but he was hopeful a Big 5 school would have a spot for him. None of them did until January when Villanova assistant Ashley Howard urged Wright to watch Gillespie play a game against five-star recruit Quade Green’s Neumann Goretti squad at Archbishop Ryan.
The Northeast Philly gym was packed and the coach couldn’t stay long as he was being hounded. Howard called Wright while he was driving home and told the coach that one kid scored 42 and the other kid scored 31. Wright figured the 42 points belonged to Green, who was already committed to Kentucky. It was Gillespie, the assistant said. Wright was sold.
“Nothing was spectacular, and he’s not bringing any attention to himself,” Wright said. “He just makes the right plays.”
Wright called Gillespie’s father and told him he needed his son at Villanova on Monday. The coach gave Gillespie his pitch that day without any guarantees.
“We left and we were like, ‘What are you going to do?’” his mother, Therese, said. “He said, ‘I’m going to play out my senior [year].’ I said, ‘Collin, it’s Jay Wright.’ He said, ‘Mom, I know what I’m doing.’”
Gillespie committed a week later, simply deciding after a game at Bonner-Prendergast that he had enough of the recruiting trail. He was headed to ’Nova and told a Wood coach without first running it by his parents. Gillespie knew what he was doing.
“He always said, ‘I’ll bet on myself,’” Jim Gillespie said. “He put the work in and the effort in and that’s what he’s always done.”
It took Gillespie just a few weeks to force Wright to rethink the plan that he would redshirt. Every day in practice that June he went up against Jalen Brunson and held his own.
Collin Gillespie (left) got to play in practice against future NBA players Donte DiVincenzo (center) and Jalen Brunson (right) at Villanova.
“He came in with that killer mentality and stone face that we try to teach,” Wright said. “But he came in with that. Then he spent every day with Jalen Brunson and it just became reinforced. It was so obvious. The coaching staff, behind closed doors, was going, ‘This kid is going against Brunson every day. He’s pretty good.’”
Gillespie suffered a minor injury that month and Wright checked with athletic trainer Jeff Pierce to see how the freshman was feeling. He was fine, the trainer said.
“The trainer said, ‘You’re not redshirting this kid,’” Wright said. “I said, ‘Is it that obvious?’ He said ‘Yeah, everyone knows.’ Yeah, it was.”
The guy who nodded along in Wright’s office proved that he belonged. Now, he’s doing it again in the NBA.
“It’s the way I was raised and where I come from,” said Gillespie, who grew up in Pine Valley before moving to Huntington Valley. “My brother is a year older, so I always played a year up. I had to play against older guys and was always smaller. I always had to prove myself and had a chip on my shoulder. My parents always believed in me and my family always believed in me and taught me to believe in myself.”
John Linehan and Kobe Bryant used to talk. A lot. This would not have been unusual for other AAU teammates, but these two were fierce high school rivals.
Linehan was a scrappy point guard for Chester. Bryant was a relentless shooting guard for Lower Merion. Both were competitive, almost to a fault, and in the days leading up to big games, they’d get chippy.
The week before the 1996 PIAA Class AAAA District 1 title game, for example, the players talked every day on bulky landline phones, with Bryant often calling Linehan at his home in Chester.
“I just said, ‘You know, John, I haven’t won a championship yet, and you have,’” Bryant told The Inquirer in 1996.
Linehan knew what his friend was doing. The future NBA star did the same thing a few weeks later, on March 19, a day before the teams met again in the state semifinal.
“He was trying to get me to trash talk,” Linehan said. “I think he needed a little edge. I didn’t want to give him too much. I was like, ‘Man, you crazy.’”
The late Kobe Bryant, a former Lower Merion basketball star, announcing he will go directly into the NBA draft out of high school.
Lower Merion wasn’t a basketball school when Bryant arrived in the fallof 1992. It paled in comparison to the local powerhouses like Simon Gratz, Coatesville, and Chester.
But Bryant changed that. Even in his freshman year, a season in which the Aces went 4-20, he brought a new standard, working out before class and introducing a level of toughness that was foreign to his teammates.
Bythe mid-1990s, Lower Merion was among the best high school teams in the Philadelphia area. Its players were more confident, celebrating after big shots, and talking loud on the court.
The Aces didn’t play as many games against Coatesville, a rising power led by Rip Hamilton. They couldn’t consistently measure themselves against Gratz, which didn’t participate in the PIAA playoffs untilthe 2004-05 season.
But they could against Chester. And so, a decades-long rivalry was born.
From 1996 through the mid-2010s, Chester and Lower Merion put on some of the greatest high school basketball games in the area. They’d often sell out venues like the Palestra and Villanova’s Pavilion. Some fans would even scalp tickets.
Their communities were almost diametrically opposed. Chester was predominantly Black; Lower Merion was predominantly white. Chester was plaguedby poverty; Lower Merion was considered affluent.
Chester, with its Biddy League, had a legacy of basketball greatness, and a steady pipeline of talent. Lower Merion had nothing comparable. But these differences melted away on the court.
And while the rivalry is not what it once was, it lives on today.
“The pride and the intensity and the history will never fade,” said Lower Merion coach Gregg Downer. “I mean, if we played them tomorrow night, that would be an intense game.”
The Bryant-Linehan era
When Downer was named head coach in 1990, he already was well-aware of Chester’s tradition. He’d played youth basketball growing up in Media and had heard about the stars who’d come out of the Biddy League.
It was obvious that his team would have to go through the Clippers to win any sort of accolade. But it wasn’t until Bryant’s arrival that Downer’s aspirations became a real possibility.
The shooting guard, who was the son of former 76er Joe “Jelly Bean” Bryant, was mature for his age. He’d demand more, mentally and physically, of older teammates. Doug Young, a former Lower Merion forward, remembered seeing Bryant leaving the locker room at 7 o’clock one September morning in 1993.
He’d been at the high school gym since 5 a.m., working out by himself. To the Lower Merion basketball team, this was a “crazy” concept, so Young and his cohorts decided to join him.
In the District 1 championship game against Chester, Kobe Bryant goes to the hoop over the Clippers’ John Linehan.
They arrived the next day at 5:06 a.m. The players knocked on the door. Bryant didn’t answer.
“He wouldn’t open it,” said Young, who graduated in 1995. “You’re either there or you’re not. We were six minutes late.”
His teammates waited outside until 6:30 a.m., when the school opened. They made sure to show up before 5 a.m. from that day on.
Downer was wired the same way. The coach — and his NBA-bound pupil — would push the team in practice. Losses were particularly tough. The players would go through endless sprints and rebounding drills that sent them running to the trash can.
It wasn’t fun. But over time, the method created a newfound tenacity.
“No one walked into high school saying, ‘Oh, yeah, I want to win a state championship,’” Young said. “But [Kobe] knew what that was. He was like, ‘I don’t know any other way. If we’re not going to win a championship, what the heck are we playing for?’”
Chester was always going to be an obstacle, so Downer tried to play into the battle. He’d use analogies for the tough, hard-nosed team, comparing it to an animal stalking its prey.
The coach began to screen movies to underscore this point. Together, in a Lower Merion classroom, Downer’s players watched Jaws and other tales of survival, like The Edge, a 1997 thriller about a plane that crashes in the Alaskan wilderness.
“This bear is stalking them, and the couple is saying, ’What are we going to do about this bear?’” Downer said. “And one of them says, ‘The only thing we can do is kill the bear.’
“And I remember being like, ‘We can do this.’ But the only solution is to — not to be overly graphic — but to kill them.”
(The bear in this analogy was Chester.)
He added: “We tried everything humanly possible to get through to this team.”
The first few games were ugly. In 1995, Lower Merion met the Clippers in the District 1 championship, only to lose by 27 points. But they came back with a renewed focus the following year, in 1995-96, going 25-3 in the regular season to earn a district final rematch against Chester.
The Aces showed up at the arena with “27″ printed on their warmup shirts. Bryant, armed with fresh bulletin board material from Linehan, dropped 34 points against the Clippers en route to a 60-53 Aces win.
The shooting guard scored 39 points later that month — with a broken nose — in a 77-69 state semifinal win over Chester. Lower Merion went on to beat Erie Cathedral Prep, 48-43, to win its first state championship since 1943.
Kobe Bryant celebrates after defeating Chester at the Palestra in 1996 to advance to the state final.
To Linehan, the difference Bryant made was obvious. He joked that he’d “never heard of Lower Merion” before his friend arrived. But once he did, Chester realized it would have to go to great lengths to prepare for the phenom.
Ahead of a big game against Lower Merion in the mid-1990s, the coaching staff reached out to Clippers alumnus Zain Shaw. He played at West Virginia and in Europe and possessed some of the same characteristics as Bryant — a tall frame and an athletic build with strong ballhandling skills.
The Clippers invited Shaw to practice, where he played the role of Bryant (to the best of his ability).
“Kobe was so special, we had to bring in a pro to help us prepare,” said Linehan, who later starred at Providence.
But there was another impact the future Lakers star had, one that had nothing to do with his own prowess. Linehan noticed that Bryant’s Lower Merion teammates started to take on some of his qualities. Suddenly, they were playing brash, confident basketball.
“We didn’t have reason to believe, until Kobe got there, that we belonged on the court with Chester,” Young said. “The fear was real. Teams were afraid of Chester because they’d run you out of the building.
“The idea of Lower Merion being on the court in a meaningful game against [them] was such a crazy thought. But then, you started to believe.”
The buzzer-beater heard ’round Chester
Bryant never got over the rivalry, even after he embarked on his Hall of Fame NBA career in 1996. Sometimes, he’d call the coaching staff before big games against Chester, leaving expletive-laden voicemails to use as motivation.
The Lakers shooting guard also created an incentive structure for his former team.
“You couldn’t get a pair of Nike sneakers unless you qualified for the playoffs,” Young said. “If you don’t earn it, you don’t get it.”
He became especially involved in 2005-06. After a lull in the early 2000s, Chester and Lower Merion found themselves neck-and-neck again. The Aces were led by the duo of Ryan Brooks and Garrett Williamson, and the Clippers boasted a deep roster, headlined by Darrin Govens. All of them eventually played in the Big 5.
(Chester was so stacked that it brought a 1,000-point scorer off the bench in Noel Wilmore.)
Students from the class of 2005 show their support as Chester and Lower Merion play in the state final.
The rivals met in the state championship on March 19, 2005. Despite strong performances from Williamson and Brooks, the Clippers pulled away in the second half thanks to a dominant third quarter from Govens. Chester won, 74-61.
The teams reconvened the following season with their competitive spark fully reignited. They faced each other three times that year. Chester took Round 1, a one-point regular-season victory on Dec. 27.
Round 2 was in the district final on March 3. Before the game, in front of a packed crowd at the Pavilion, Chester sophomore Karon Burton walked up to the layup line.
Lower Merion’s student section caught his ear with a chant about coach Fred Pickett’s stout stature.
The dig didn’t intimidate Burton. If anything, it fueled him. He grew up playing street ball in Chester and always loved trash talk.
Instead of cowering, like the crowd hoped, the sophomore delivered an unforgettable outing. The game went into overtime, and was tied at 80 with only a few seconds remaining.During a timeout, assistant coach Keith Taylor pulled Burton aside.
“He was like, ‘Hey, listen,’” Burton said. “They’re going to double Darrin. If you get that ball, do your thing.’”
Taylor’s words proved prescient. As Lower Merion’s defenders swarmed Govens, the Clippers inbounded the ball to Burton.
He took a pull-up jumper from beyond the arc and drilled it for an 83-80 win. The Chester fans stormed the court. Burton, who later joined Wilmore in the 1,000-point club, said he felt like a celebrity in his hometown.
“It was like watching a buzzer-beater in the NBA,” he said. “I just ran to my teammates, they picked me up. It was a crazy feeling.
“I’m a big Kobe fan, too. Kobe’s my favorite player ever. So when I came and I hit the game-winner on that team …”
Round 3 took place a few weeks later, in a state semifinal rematch at the Palestra on March 22. Bryant called Lower Merion’s coaches before the game.
“I don’t remember specifically what he said, but I’m sure there were a lot of [expletives] dropped,” said Young. “Like, ‘Don’t call me back if you don’t beat those [expletives].’ That was a line we heard from him a couple times.”
This one didn’t go Chester’s way. After trailing the Clippers, 47-37, at the end of the third quarter, the Aces came roaring back in the fourth and put up 33 points to eke out a 70-65 win.
The celebration in the locker room was cathartic. Water sprayed into the air. Players sat atop each other’s shoulders and turned the showers into a slip ‘n slide. Bryant called in, again, as other members of the 1996 team filtered through.
Darrin Govens scored his 1,000th point for Chester against Lower Merion in the state championship in 2005.
This was not how Govens wanted to end his high school career. And a few months later, when he arrived at St. Joseph’s on a basketball scholarship, he saw a familiar foe.
It was Williamson, his new Hawks teammate.
“We were sitting on the opposite side of the bench,” Govens said. “I didn’t want to sit next to him; he didn’t want to sit next to me. We’d kind of avoid each other and just head nod.
“Even in running drills, it was a competition. He looked to the left. I looked to the right. We tried to beat each other in sprints. But then we realized, ‘All right bro, we’re teammates now.’”
‘Hero status’
Chester had always rallied around its high school basketball team. Linehan said it was akin to playing for the Sixers. The teenagers were treated like professional athletes — especially those who had been a part of big wins.
The Clippers’ public address announcer, James Howard, called this “hero status.”
“All of a sudden, your money’s no good,” he said. “Barbers take care of you, make sure your hair looks nice before games. Free food. Little kids look up to you and ask for your autograph. That’s how it is.”
In Chester, there were plenty of heroes to draw from. There was Linehan, but also Jameer Nelson, who met a young Burton in the late 1990s. Nelson, a friend of Burton’s cousin, gave the aspiring basketball player a gift before he left for St. Joe’s: his MVP medal from the Chester summer league.
“He was one of the biggest guys in our city,” Burton said, “so it’s definitely something that I’ll always remember.”
By the early 2010s, when the rivalry was reignited for a third time, Lower Merion had built more of a basketball tradition. Aces guard Justin McFadden said he’d get stopped in Wawa before big games against the Clippers.
Chester celebrates its win over Lower Merion for the state championship in 2012.
“It became a community thing,” he said. “People would be asking, ‘What do you guys think about Chester? Do you think we can get it done?’”
In 2012, the schools met in the state championship for the first time since 2005. Junior forward and future NBA starter Rondae Hollis-Jefferson put up a double-double to lead the Clippers to a resounding 59-33 win over the Aces. It was their second straight title and their 58th straight victory.
A year later, after going 17-0 in the Central League, the Aces met the Clippers in the state final again. Chester had won 78 straight games against in-state opponents. Snapping that streak would be daunting, but Downer had a plethora of motivational tactics at his disposal.
Just as they had in the 1990s, The Aces again spent pockets of the season watching Jaws, The Edge, as well as an addition: Al Pacino’s “Inch by Inch” speech in Any Given Sunday.
“He would have that fired up on YouTube, ready to go,” McFadden said. “Looking back, [your reaction] is a chuckle, but in the moment, it worked. We knew that this was the hill that needed to be climbed.
“And every time they played that speech, we got goose bumps. We were ready to fire.”
Chester got out to an early lead, but Lower Merion rallied behind a 22-point, 11-rebound performance from B.J. Johnson, who later starred at La Salle. The Aces snapped the streak and won their seventh state title with a 63-47 victory.
Lower Merion’s Jaquan Johnson goes to the net as Diamonte Reason guards him in the Chester-Lower Merion state championship game in 2013.
The Clippers then were coached by Larry Yarbray. Pickett, who was diagnosed with cancer in2010, was in declining health. Just before he died in 2014, Downer decided to say goodbye.
He and his former assistant coach Jeremy Treatman drove out to Pickett’s home in Chester. They went to his bedside.
“And we talked,” Downer said. “And we held hands. It was a really touching moment for me. This is a man that carried Chester on his back. That tried to carry Lower Merion on his back. And I knew it was the last time I was going to see Fred.
“We walked out the door, and we told each other that we loved each other. And I never thought he would say that to me, or vice versa. But it was just kind of like, ‘You know what? We’ve had some amazing battles, and there’s a lot of respect there.’”
Keeping the tradition alive
In recent years, the Chester-Lower Merion rivalry has diminished.
There was a brief period when the teams were in different classifications. Both programs have lost players to private schools that can recruit, and the addition of the Philadelphia Catholic League to the PIAA has made the state playoffs more competitive.
One place the Aces and Clippers could meet is in the district tournament, where they reunited in 2024. But they haven’t played each other since. And Howard says the contests don’t have the same feel.
“Both teams have lost D-I talent,” he said. “It’s not as high-flying, above the rim, as it was in the past. But still a great game. Sold out at Lower Merion, and at Chester, same thing.”
The history will always be there, though, and Burton is doing his best to keep it alive. His 8-year-old son, Karon Burton Jr., is playing in the Biddy League. His father is his coach.
Sometimes, they go on YouTube and watch old Clippers games. Junior’s favorite, of course, is the 2006 district final.
Burton believes that his son has a promising future, but isn’t sure of where he’ll go to high school yet. He doesn’t want Karon Jr. to feel obligated to follow his father’s path.
But if it worked out that way, what a story that would be.
“I’d love to be the first father and son to have 1,000 points,” Burton said. “With the same name? That would be crazy.”
TORONTO — Trendon Watford’s eyes widened as he walked into Scotiabank Arena’s visitors’ locker room and noticed the media scrum surrounding Kyle Lowry’s locker. Teammates Justin Edwards and Jared McCain joined the back of the crowd, with McCain pulling out his cell phone to pretend to ask a question.
“This is why I’m here,” Lowry quipped to those gathered.
The scene was warranted. This could be Lowry’s final visit as a player to Toronto, where the North Philly native and former Cardinal Dougherty and Villanova star became a Raptors franchise legend and NBA champion. And the 76ers’ back-to-back against the Raptors — they lost a 116-115 overtime heartbreaker Sunday night — represents another bridge between the city that Lowry now calls his second home and his hometown Sixers, the team with which he is likely to wrap up his NBA career primarily as a mentor on the bench and behind the scenes.
“You’ve got to find ways to challenge yourself,” Lowry said when asked about his role before Sunday’s game. “And the challenge for me is to try to help these guys every single day. … It’s just finding that niche and helping people get better — and me being in a place where I’m happy.”
The 39-year-old Lowry went into last offseason with a public declaration that he wanted to play one more season to reach the “massive accomplishment” of 20 in the NBA. Only 12 players have achieved that benchmark in league history, including two who stood 6-foot or shorter (Lowry and Chris Paul). His sons, Karter and Kameron, who are still based in Miami following Lowry’s post-Raptors tenure with the Heat, signed off on him pursuing that milestone.
Yet when asked before the Sixers departed for Toronto late Friday if he expected this to be a farewell trip of sorts, Lowry’s tone shifted to “I don’t know, honestly.” It is possible that the Sixers (21-16) could return to Canada after these consecutive regular-season matchups because, if the playoffs began Monday, the 24-16 Raptors would be their first-round opponents. Lowry also believes his leadership is “immensely important to what this organization is trying to do.”
“You’ve got to be able to kind of take yourself out of it sometimes,” Lowry said, “and be able to say, ‘OK, how can I pay it forward a little bit?’ … It’s that balance of I know I’m not on the court, so I can’t yell at them and curse at them. But I can say, ‘Hey, these are the things that I see. Let’s try to do that.’”
Kyle Lowry played nine seasons in Toronto (2012-21), winning a title in 2019 and being named to six All-Star teams.
It is a transition that those who knew Lowry in Toronto — where he was a six-time All-Star and a notoriously tenacious point guard — might be surprised he has so wholeheartedly welcomed. Though he became a starter after joining the Sixers off the 2024 buyout market, Lowry’s minutes dramatically diminished while hampered by a lingering hip issue for the bulk of last season. He has played in 42 total minutes across five games this season, receiving a rousing reaction from teammates when he buried a three-pointer in his debut at the Brooklyn Nets in November.
Survey those same teammates about Lowry’s daily influence, and faces typically light up.
Rookie VJ Edgecombe can count on Lowry to “keep it real,” including during a pressure-releasing pep talk before Edgecombe scored 34 points in his NBA debut at the Boston Celtics. Quentin Grimes said Lowry’s diligent workout routine — he is still the first Sixer on the floor for his pregame shooting nearly three hours before every game, and puts in extra individual work before and after practices — provides a blueprint on how to prepare as his own career progresses.
And though star Tyrese Maxey jokingly calls Lowry “old as hell,” he also views the veteran as “like, my leader. He comes to me and leads me, and I try to lead the team.” Lowry fosters this relationship while regularly rebounding and screening for Maxey during workouts, and when he calls the 25-year-old “at least three or four times a day,” Maxey said.
“I couldn’t do this without him, honestly, right now,” said Maxey, who finished Sunday ranked third in the NBA in scoring at 30.9 points per game and has entered the MVP conversation.
Even Sixers coach Nick Nurse, who also led Lowry’s Raptors teams, said the point guard has “talked me off the ledge a couple times” during games this season. Nurse views Lowry as a valuable conduit between the players and the coaching staff, providing insight on when the Sixers might need a day off from practice or should be pushed.
“There’s times when I’ll be leaning on him,” Nurse said. “He’ll get behind me and say [to teammates] … ‘This is what it takes.’”
The relationship between Nick Nurse and Kyle Lowry is extensive and built on trust.
Before Sunday’s game, Nurse said that he would speak to Lowry about his desire to hit the floor inside Scotiabank Arena again. Lowry acknowledged he would “love to get in there for the fans, and help my team,” but stressed that winning was the top priority. There was no appropriate opportunity for Lowry to enter during Sunday’s down-to-the-wire overtime defeat.
Still, Lowry remained active from the bench. He jetted onto the court to greet Maxey after he drilled a three-pointer with 20.1 seconds remaining in regulation. He stood between Nurse and assistant Bryan Gates during an overtime discussion. And after Kelly Oubre Jr. attempted what he described as a “terrible” inbounds pass to Edgecombe that became a critical crunch-time turnover, Lowry pointed out that Grimes also had leaked open.
“He’s been there, done that,” Oubre said of Lowry. “Been at the highest level. For him to be so engaged and allow him to use his IQ to help us grow ours, it’s amazing. He’s definitely a huge leader on this team, and his voice is always heard.”
Doug Smith, the longtime Raptors beat writer for the Toronto Star, suggested in an article that Nurse should put Lowry in Monday’s starting lineup so he can bask in a pregame introduction here one last time. When asked how it will feel to see his No. 7 raised into the rafters someday, Lowry’s response was, “Y’all ever seen me cry?”
He walked into the arena Sunday wearing a signed jersey from Maple Leafs star Auston Matthews, a tribute to the player and the city. He confirmed that, whenever the time comes, he would sign a one-day contract to retire as a Raptor.
Veterans like Joel Embiid (21) know the impact Kyle Lowry has made during his 20 seasons in the NBA.
And his forever connection to Toronto was clear when Joel Embiid tried to land a playful jab inside Friday’s postgame locker room in Orlando. Hours before the Sixers’ flight across the border, Embiid interrupted an interview with Lowry by asking, “Why are they talking to you?” in an exacerbated tone.
“Where you lost Game 7 at,” said Lowry, referencing the Sixers’ crushing playoff defeat to the eventual-champion Raptors in 2019.
“Talking about how great of a cheerleader you are?” Embiid countered.
“Yes, basically,” Lowry responded.
“He’s a great cheerleader,” Embiid conceded.
Because right now, Lowry is a Sixer. And when asked about how enthusiastically those teammates describe Lowry’s impact in his 20th — and, potentially, final — NBA season, his emotions again bubbled to the surface.
Kyle Lowry could be finishing a storied career with a mentor role on a possible playoff team.
“It means a lot, to be honest,” Lowry said. “Because I really give to them the purity of how I feel about them. Like I said, sacrifice. I don’t care about myself as a basketball player. I know in my career what I’ve done. And what I’ve done is I’ve given everything to this game. Everything I could possibly give to this game, physically and mentally.
“You see me every day with these guys. I cheer for them. I clap for them. I help coach them from a player’s perspective. I try to give them things in life. I try to help them out, just overall, in general.
“I guess it’s a testament to how they feel about me. I’m the ancient man in this locker room. I embrace it, and they embrace me.”
NEWARK, N.J. — As the Prudential Center’s public address announcer rolled through Arkansas’ starting lineup introductions, two players remained on the bench.
Then Darius Acuff, the Razorbacks’ leading scorer and a projected NBA lottery draft pick, was announced. D.J. Wagner was last, a distinction often reserved for a respected team leader.
It might seem unfathomable that Wagner, the former Camden High School star and once the nation’s top-rated recruit, is now in his third college basketball season. The 6-foot-4 combo guard continues to be an interesting case study in expectations put on high school athletes, this era of name, image, and likeness in college sports, and how one defines success.
But Wagner has embraced his role as a veteran for a Razorbacks team — which also includes fellow former Camden star Billy Richmond — that was ranked 14th in the Associated Press poll before Arkansas lost to No. 8 Houston, 94-85, Saturday night in the Never Forget Tribute Classic.
“You could say I take a lot of pride in it,” Wagner said earlier in the week. “It’s just an honor. It’s a blessing to be able to be playing under Coach [John Calipari] for three years. …
“I’m just happy to be here. Whatever I can do to help my teammates out, I’m happy to do it.”
When asked before Saturday’s game how many family members and friends would be inside the arena about 80 miles from Camden, he said, “I couldn’t even tell you. I know it’s going to be a lot.” He finished the game with 11 points on 4-of-10 shooting and two assists in a season-high 34 minutes, flashing what made him an intriguing recruit who now possesses an inconsistent college body of work.
Camden’s DJ Wagner guarding Imhotep’s Justin Edwards, now with the Sixers, during a game in 2023.
He got past his defender for a crafty layup for Arkansas’ second bucket, then splashed a three-pointer to tie the score at 11. Early in the second half, Wagner dished a pass to Acuff for a three-pointer that cut what had been a 21-point Houston lead to 51-44. But after those two early buckets, Wagner did not score again until hitting two late three-pointers, when the game had all but been decided.
“Even D.J.’s got to play better, make better plays,” Calipari told one local reporter in the hallway after the game. Arkansas did not hold its scheduled postgame news conference, preventing The Inquirer from asking additional questions about Wagner and Richmond.
Wagner, who played his freshman season at Kentucky before following Calipari to Arkansas, is averaging a career-low 8.4 points this season. But he has improved his shooting from the floor (41.5%) and three-point range (34.9%). He also has totaled 33 assists against 10 turnovers while shifting more to an off-the-ball role. He is one of two players to start all 12 games, a sign of trust from Calipari as a steady presence with deep familial ties. Wagner’s father, Dajuan, played for Calipari at Memphis before being selected sixth overall in the 2002 NBA draft.
“A lot of these kids get ranked, then they’re trying to live up to rankings,” Calipari told the Fort Smith (Ark.) Southwest Times Record before the season. “What does the ranking mean? You’ve got to go in and compete and take what you want, but it could be a burden.
“I think with [Wagner], he needed to shed that and just be the player he is. Let’s see your best version. I believe his best version is being more aggressive, less dribbles, more attack. The things that he’s doing, the way he leads; he’s just matured.”
Wagner’s Razorbacks team gained national prominence in March with a surprise run to the NCAA Tournament’s Sweet 16 as a No. 10 seed. Arkansas upset No. 7 Kansas and second-seeded St. John’s before losing an overtime heartbreaker to third-seeded Texas Tech. Wagner acknowledged he “didn’t really watch” much of the tournament after the Razorbacks were knocked out, but called Arkansas’ Dec. 13 rematch victory over Texas Tech, which was ranked 16th at the time, “definitely personal.”
Arkansas coach John Calipari on the sideline during the second half against Houston in Newark, N.J.
That win was part of Arkansas’ 9-3 start against an intentionally difficult schedule. The Razorbacks also already have a victory against No. 11 Louisville. Their other two losses are to No. 9 Michigan State by three points — when Wagner had 13 points on 4-of-6 shooting, three assists, and three steals in perhaps his most impressive performance of the season — and to No. 3 Duke by nine points.
That is why Houston coach Kelvin Sampson called Arkansas the best opponent his Cougars, who advanced to the national title game last season, had faced so far. Sampson added he believes Arkansas has “as good [of] a chance as anybody” to win the loaded SEC, which included six other ranked teams in the most recent AP poll.
The marquee nonconference, neutral-site matchup against the Cougars added to Wagner’s growing list of college experiences in “crazy games in crazy atmospheres,” he said. He played Kansas at Chicago’s United Center as a Kentucky freshman. Last season, he faced Michigan at the legendary Madison Square Garden. And “every game in the SEC, you know you’re going to fight,” he said.
Wagner’s calming leadership was on display Saturday when he approached Malique Ewin to say, “You got this” as Ewin uncharacteristically struggled at the free-throw line. Wagner’s biggest advice to the high-profile youngsters who enter the program is to remember that the uber-demanding Calipari “might be hard on you, but he’s just coaching you because he cares about you.” And with Acuff as the primary point guard, Wagner said he gets more opportunities to read and react to the defense.
Arkansas guard D.J. Wagner blocks a shot by Jackson State’s Cael Jones on Nov. 21.
“It kind of gives you more time to see what’s happening,” Wagner said. “More time to see a play before it even happens. You could be more aggressive, like attacking more, just from getting passes and not having the ball in your hands all the time.”
Yet the former Camden star whom Sampson singled out as “dynamic” was Richmond, who totaled 12 points on 5-of-6 shooting, two rebounds, and two steals off the bench. It was a sentiment echoed by a spectator behind the basket, who hollered, “Billy Ball!” when Richmond first entered the game.
The sophomore’s versatility fueled the Razorbacks’ rally to cut a 40-19 deficit to eight points at the break. Richmond immediately hit a baseline jumper, a skill Wagner said his teammate has refined while connecting on 57% of his shots. Then Richmond sank a three-pointer. He drove baseline for a dunk that got Razorbacks supporters on their feet, then mean-mugged after swiping a steal underneath the opposite basket and lofting a pass to Ewin for the alley-oop slam.
Added Wagner: “He gets in the game, the energy [is] going to shift, because that’s just the type of player he is.”
Acuff, meanwhile, amassed 27 points, seven assists, and five rebounds. He will likely join Adou Thiero, Reed Sheppard, Rob Dillingham, and the 76ers’ Justin Edwards as former teammates whom Wagner will watch reach the NBA before him.
It is unclear whether Wagner will ever be regarded as a legitimate draft candidate again. He was not listed on last week’s top 100 prospects by ESPN, where teammates Acuff (No. 15), Maleek Thomas (No. 28), Karter Knox (No. 56), and Trevon Brazile (No. 82) were all included.
And without a defined path to the pros, it is far more practical (and lucrative) for Wagner to stay in college. He was one of the first high schoolers to sign an NIL deal with Nike, and has also landed partnerships with Express clothing and Marathon fuel during his college career. One of the Arkansas men’s basketball program’s biggest boosters is John H. Tyson, the chairman of Tyson Foods.
So Wagner’s third college season brought him back to his home state, where he was introduced last in Arkansas’ starting lineup. And he has embraced this unexpected role as the veteran for a Razorbacks team with aspirations of another deep March run.
“Really just taking it one day at a time,” Wagner said. “Just stay in the gym. Just trying to get better at everything.”
Adem Bona got Johni Broome’s attention from across the 76ers’ locker room, subtly interrupting a conversation ahead of their Nov. 30 game against the Atlanta Hawks.
“I’m coming, Bona!” Broome hollered in response.
It was time for the young Sixers to head to chapel, which has become a pregame ritual. Jared McCain, VJ Edgecombe, Justin Edwards, and Hunter Sallis joined them, too.
Those teammates have swiftly forged a bond through serious activities, such as tapping into their faith, and sillier ones, such as intense NBA 2K video game matchups. And everyday ones, such as bus rides and shared meals.
Outside belief that the Sixers are old and washed up is primarily used as a dig at the oft-injured (and max-salaried) Joel Embiid and Paul George. But these youngsters are debunking that notion and injecting energy — and promise — into their team’s 14-11 start.
“We’re all just kids,” Edgecombe recently told The Inquirer. “Just enjoying the moment. Knowing that we’re in the NBA, what we worked for our whole life. …
“It’s just a natural bond, for real. It’s no forced relationship.”
This contingent of the roster is made up of rookies Edgecombe, Broome, and Sallis; second-year players Bona, McCain, and Edwards; and two-way newcomers Jabari Walker and Dominick Barlow. There is also a trio of 25-year-old “tweeners” in star point guard Tyrese Maxey — who noted before the season that he has tried to pick up video games in an effort to connect with his younger teammates — along with Trendon Watford and Quentin Grimes.
The Sixers’ front office more deliberately course-corrected to this roster-building direction in the middle of last season’s 24-58 flop, citing a need for more players who were athletic and consistently available. Bona, McCain, and Edwards received legitimate minutes as first-year players. Edgecombe, the third overall pick in last summer’s draft, is averaging 15.2 points, 5.6 rebounds, and 4 assists as an instant-impact rookie. Barlow is a starter and arguably the Sixers’ biggest surprise so far this season, and Walker is part of the rotation.
The bulk of this 2025-26 group initially linked at the Sixers’ facility for summer league practices. Conversations while sticking around for cold-tub and treatment sessions spilled over to their newly created group chat, a player’s home, or a local restaurant. They went through the two-week summer league odyssey from Salt Lake City to Las Vegas. Then to workouts in Los Angeles, which included a Disneyland trip organized by Maxey. Then back to Philly for informal pickup games.
Sixers guards VJ Edgecombe and Tyrese Maxey talk strategy during an NBA game.
By the time training camp began in late September, those Sixers had already spent nearly three months together. And while the rookies had nothing to compare this early NBA chemistry-building to, Walker, now in his fourth season, called it “a different type of bonding” while likening it to a college-team environment.
“Sometimes, in other situations, you want to hurry up and get off the court and just go home,” Walker said. “I’ve been wanting to lag behind, because there’s so many different personalities. … For things to happen like that so quick, you don’t feel like you’re just coming to a job every day.
“I actually wake up like, ‘Dang, I’ve got to tell Johni this when I get there’ [or] ‘I’ve got to tell Justin this.’”
Coach Nick Nurse grinned when this topic was broached following an early-season practice. He said he first noticed the “entertaining” connection among those players while on the bus heading to gyms in the summer. He added that they embody this staff’s 12-months-a-year philosophy, and helped set the tone for the Sixers’ commitment to “dig ourselves out of a hole” following that disastrous 2024-25 season.
These days, Nurse said, there is a row of chairs along the practice court where those players frequently sit after their work is done.
“I go up there once in a while,” Nurse said, “and I say, ‘What are you guys doing over here?’ And they’re like, ‘We’re just hanging out, Coach.’ And I’m like, ‘All right, keep hanging out.’”
Sixers guard Tyrese Maxey and forward Trendon Watford have a close friendship on and off the court.
Once those players finally leave the Sixers’ facility for the day, they regularly hop on their video-game headset.
Unsurprisingly, NBA 2K is their top choice. In “My Player” mode, Broome has an “elite” 7-foot-4 big man who can shoot. Sallis plays with a point guard “trying to run the show.” Edgecombe has a variety of players, allowing for maximum versatility.
“[We’ll] be on the game 24/7,” Edwards said. “We’ll be on FaceTime, in the group chat, trying to see who wants to play. That’s a big thing that I feel like we didn’t have last year.”
When asked who is the best gamer of the bunch, most provided the politically correct answer. Yet when told that Edwards brushed it off, Walker quipped that “Justin should ‘no comment’ that question.” And while bringing his voice down to a whisper inside a mostly empty postgame locker room, Edgecombe eventually revealed, “I think I’m the best, though, to be honest with you. You can say [it].”
Gaming is how those youngsters also roped Sixers veterans — aka “Uncs” — George and Andre Drummond into their group. The 32-year-old Drummond said being around those players’ lingo — Edwards recently started calling him “Muddy,” an apparent reference from his New York City relatives — music tastes, and overall energy is “why I call myself a young man.” George, 35, added that being immersed in a virtual environment away from the facility or Xfinity Mobile Arena has encouraged them all to open up and bridge age gaps.
“That’s where kind of the trust and the relationship has grown,” George said. “ … We shoot the [expletive] on the game, but then it carries over the next day and we’re looking forward to seeing each other. We laugh about what happened the night prior, and who [stunk], and who was trash.
“It’s a fun way and I think, for us, [it’s] just kind of expressing ourselves outside of the grind of the season.”
Now, such connections fuel aspects of those players’ game-day routines.
Bona is the unofficial leader of the chapel “safe space,” which last season quickly added McCain. The invites then extended to Broome, Edwards, Edgecombe, and Sallis, who now file out of the locker room about an hour before any game’s tipoff.
“Everyone checks on each of us,” Bona said, “Like, ‘Yo, we’ve got five minutes!’ It’s amazing. It’s a really good bonding activity together.”
Added Broome: “Obviously, I’m a rookie, so things kind of get a little tough and frustrating sometimes. So it just kind of keeps me grounded, keeps me on the right path, in the right direction. Keeps me encouraged.”
Those relationships also are noticeable inside the postgame locker room. Following a Nov. 25 blowout loss to the Orlando Magic, for instance, Barlow, Walker, and Broome sat huddled in a corner, immediately dissecting how the game got so out of hand. And after Embiid’s 39-point outburst against the Indiana Pacers on Friday, he was enthusiastically chatting with McCain and Edgecombe before heading to treatment.
“I’m happier coming in here,” Embiid said later that night. “… You look at the guy next to you, you want to always joke around, talk to them, and hang out. Being on the road and just chill, that goes a long way.
“I love all these guys in this locker room.”
A fair amount of credit for such vibes can go to the “kids,” who quickly bonded with one another and then injected energy into the start of the Sixers’ season.
“I can go [down] the list of young guys,” Drummond said. “It really just keeps our whole team spirit high.”
When Tyrese Maxey flew down the court for his game-saving block on the Golden State Warriors’ De’Anthony Melton last week, it was not only an impressive burst of speed.
“That’s conditioning, too,” Doc Rivers, the Milwaukee Bucks coach who formerly was with the 76ers, said while commending Maxey’s play the following day. “If you’re tired mentally or physically, you can’t make that play.”
Maxey insists that, a quarter of the way through this season, he is not fatigued. But perhaps no Sixer is savoring this light stretch in the schedule before Friday night’s game with visiting Indiana more than their star point guard.
Maxey entered Thursday leading the NBA in minutes played, averaging 39.9 in 23 games. That is three minutes greater than the next player with a comparable number of games logged (the Los Angeles Lakers’ Austin Reeves’ 36.9 minutes in 21).
Maxey’s recent workloads have included playing the entire second half and overtime of a Nov. 20 win at the Milwaukee Bucks, when he scored a career-high 54 points. In a Nov. 30 double-overtime loss to the Orlando Magic, he played more minutes (52) than there are in a typical NBA game (48).
No NBA player has averaged 40 minutes or more per game since Monta Ellis with Golden State in 2010-11 (40.3). So conventional wisdom says this pace for Maxey is not sustainable for the 82-game grind. Sixers coach Nick Nurse hopes having the team’s four rotation guards healthy — and productive — will ease Maxey’s load moving forward.
Still, it has taken impressive physical fitness and mental fortitude for Maxey to pull this off for the season’s first seven weeks while playing at an All-NBA level. He entered Thursday ranked third in the league in scoring (31.5 points per game) and averaging a career-high 7.2 assists and 4.7 rebounds.
“He’s a warrior,” teammate Paul George said. “There’s no question about it. He’s a fighter. … [There’s] a leadership about him. And when he’s out there, I play for him. I do everything I can to make the game easier for him. He’s our guy. It’s inspiring. Me, as a vet, it’s inspiring for a guy to consistently do it — and to be efficient with all the minutes that he’s been playing.”
Nurse said Maxey’s relentless energy stems from him being “lost in the competitiveness” of the Sixers’ 13-10 start, that “it’s not like I’m sitting there saying, ‘Hey, you’ve got to come out.’ It’s the other way around. He doesn’t want to come out.”
It’s also a responsibility to which Maxey has become accustomed. Last season, he led the NBA at 37.7 minutes per game in 52 games. In 2023-24, he ranked second in the league in that category, with 37.5 minutes in 70 games.
Nurse’s top players racking up heavy minutes has also become a trademark of his coaching approach. Pascal Siakam, when he was a Toronto Raptor, led the NBA for two consecutive seasons, in 2021-23, while Fred VanVleet landed in the top five in both seasons. This season, fellow Sixers Kelly Oubre Jr. (34.8 minutes) and VJ Edgecombe (34.6) rank in the top 20, although their workloads have been diminished by injuries.
Though there may not appear to be a massive difference between 37 and 40 minutes on the court, they add up game after game. Especially when Maxey is so active in generating the Sixers’ offense with the ball in his hands, and he has become more of a defensive playmaker.
“He’s taken that challenge on a nightly basis, while being guarded by the best defender, usually,” George said Wednesday. “ … He’s doesn’t look for a night off, to go and sit in the corner and guard no one.”
Maxey, 25, credits sports performance consultant Alexander Reeser with building foundational offseason strength and conditioning programs that “[push] me to my max limit, every day.” Maxey also has gained a reputation for his early morning on-court workouts, and for sometimes clocking in for as many as three sessions per day.
Last season, Maxey added, was his first time “really locking in” on recovery, an effort to blend his present high performance with career longevity. Which means his routine between games in-season has become “very minimal work, for obvious reasons,” Nurse said.
Maxey said the goal of his individual sessions is not “running around” to get to his spots on the floor to shoot — or to execute elaborate dribble combinations — which expend more energy. Instead, he drills passing, touch layups, floaters, and jumpers from the midrange and beyond the arc.
“It’s the stuff you do after you do the move,” Maxey said. “Making sure it feels good.”
Added Nurse: “He’s maturing a little bit, to have the confidence to just understand he can roll [in games] without having to have a big day on the floor on the off days.”
Nurse has tinkered with when to rest Maxey, typically at the end of the first and/or third quarters or at the beginning of the second and/or fourth quarters. In that Nov. 20 game at Milwaukee, however, Maxey told Nurse, “Coach, let me go,” leading to him playing the final 29 minutes. Yet even within those lengthy on-court stretches, teammate Jared McCain has noticed Maxey going “straight to sit down” on the bench during timeouts.
“Give him his time to breathe and rest,” McCain said. “[It’s] definitely a responsibility … [that] all the guards take, and something we’ve got to help him with.”
Sixers coach Nick Nurse has started to lean on a three-guard lineup without Tyrese Maxey to give him much-needed time on the sideline.
The Sixers’ new-look offense, after all, has been built around its four rotation guards — Maxey, Edgecombe, McCain, and Quentin Grimes — who can score, push the pace, and pass in a variety of lineup combinations. But only recently did that full group reach full strength.
McCain got off to a rocky start after missing nearly a calendar year following knee and thumb surgeries, but now he looks like a threat to score from all three levels. Edgecombe, a hyper-athletic two-way player, missed three games with a calf injury. And, outside the backcourt, max players George and former MVP Joel Embiid remain limited after offseason knee surgeries.
“That’s kind of part of the reason we spread the floor out and we’re moving the ball a lot more,” Nurse said of those guard-heavy looks last week. “We’re trying to get them to play downhill and off the catch. We just haven’t quite got to it yet. There’s glimpses of it. …
“We’re just [spreading] them out, and they go back and forth and move the pieces a little bit and then, boom, one of them’s down the lane. I hope they make a good decision. They either take it forcibly to the rim, or they just kick it out to a shooter or start it all over again.”
Perhaps the start of the second quarter of Sunday’s 112-108 loss to the Lakers offered some encouragement, when the Sixers turned a tie game into an eight-point advantage while Maxey rested for nearly six minutes. But their latest poor third quarter followed, and then LeBron James’ shot-making buried the Sixers down the stretch.
That the vast majority of the Sixers’ games so far have been tight has also contributed to Maxey’s workload. They entered Wednesday having played the league’s third-most “clutch” games (16), which occurs when the score is within five points or less with five minutes remaining in the fourth quarter.
So when the Sixers staged a rare blowout win over the Washington Wizards last week — and Maxey logged a season-low 29 minutes — he chuckled when asked if he could immediately play another game.
“Yeah, I guess so,” he said.
Maxey followed that up by amassing 40 minutes against the Warriors and 37 at the Bucks on back-to-back nights. Then, another 39 against the Lakers.
After that game, how did Maxey plan to spend this lighter stretch in the schedule?
Tyronn Lue chuckled before the reporter could even finish the question.
Do memories of the 2001 NBA Finals — more specifically, being on the wrong end of Allen Iverson’s iconic step-over in overtime of Game 1 — flood back whenever he returns to Philly?
“Every single time,” said Lue, the former Los Angeles Lakers guard who now coaches the Clippers. “You never forget it.”
The 76ers will wear their black throwback jerseys throughout this season, as part of the 25th anniversary celebration of that Eastern Conference championship team. Donning them against the Lakers on Sunday night was most fitting.
Those jerseys are synonymous with that Finals series, and AI’s signature moment. Iverson sent Lue to the court by pulling back to fire a baseline jumper. After drilling the shot, Iverson stared at — while stepping over — a seated Lue in front of the Lakers’ bench. Though the Lakers won that series, four games to one, as part of the Kobe Bryant-Shaquille O’Neal dynasty, Iverson delivered an all-time highlight play in franchise and NBA history.
The Inquirer recently asked some of today’s Sixers about their memories of that sequence. Kyle Lowry was a North Philly kid at the time. Paul George was growing up in Southern California and would eventually be coached by Lue. Tyrese Maxey, whose exceptional start to the 2025-26 season is drawing comparisons to Iverson, was barely born.
And, of course, Lue also provided his perspective 25 years later.
Kyle Lowry: “I remember everybody driving around, beeping their horns”
Today, Lowry considers Lue “one of my closest friends in the world.”
Yet back in 2001, Lowry was a young teenager feeling like the basketball universe had counted out his Sixers. He was watching the game at home when Iverson went right, created the space for the shot, and “[stomped] with the big dogs,” he said.
“Everybody in the whole city of Philadelphia, at the same time, jumped up and cheered,” Lowry recalled. “ … And then after the game, I remember everybody driving around, beeping their horns.”
Now, it is “special” for Lowry to wear those black jerseys in his return to his hometown to (likely) close out his NBA career. He is tight with Lue, whom Lowry reminded may have changed that Finals series with his ability to guard Iverson full-court.
And Lowry “knows for a fact” that Iverson and Lue have a good relationship today.
“I don’t think it was nothing disrespectful,” Lowry said. “I think it was just a great moment for the game of basketball, and an amazing basketball play for the city of Philadelphia.”
Paul George: “He was the Man in the Arena”
George was an Iverson fan growing up. But as a Southern California kid, he said Bryant “was everything to us.”
So George was rooting for the Lakers during those 2001 Finals. He was “amazed” at how Iverson challenged the team led by his favorite player and the equally dominant O’Neal.
And when the step-over happened, “it kind of was just, like, ‘This smaller guy is a giant,’” George said.
Sixers star Paul George played for Clippers coach Tyronn Lue during his five seasons in Los Angeles.
“It just solidified how good he was and his magnitude and just his swagger,” George said. “That’s what I kind of took away from it, was just his confidence and his swagger. In that moment, he was the Man in the Arena.”
George then was coached by Lue during his five seasons playing for the Clippers. Though George said the step-over never came up in conversation, he is not surprised Lue does not view it as a source of shame.
“Kobe said it best: You play against the best players, you’re going to get embarrassed sometimes,” George said. “It comes with it. It’s fun. I look forward to being embarrassed, because I know I’m going to come back for you the next time. It comes with the territory of being a defender.”
Tyrese Maxey: “That was a crazy play”
Maxey was born Nov. 4, 2000 … aka, during that magical Sixers season.
Which means he obviously has no in-the-moment memory of the step-over. The first time he remembers watching it and “actually [knowing] what’s going on,” he believes, was in middle school.
“That was a crazy play,” Maxey said. “ … A wild moment in history. It will never be forgotten.”
Since becoming a Sixer, Maxey has gotten to know Iverson, who is a regular visitor at games and team functions. As a fellow scoring (and smaller-framed) lead guard, Maxey said Iverson’s best advice has been to “just be ultra-aggressive every single time you step on the court.” And Maxey’s torrid start to the 2025-26 season — through Sunday he ranked third in the NBA in scoring (31.5 points per game), while also averaging 7.2 assists and 4.7 rebounds — has been Iverson-esque.
It is poetic that, during this celebratory season, Maxey dressed up as Iverson for the team Halloween party. Asked why that was his costume of choice, Maxey said, “I just thought it was funny.”
Tyronn Lue: “It couldn’t have happened any better”
Lue said he can now thank Iverson for the step-over. Or, at least, for the opportunity to guard him.
Had the Toronto Raptors advanced to the Finals instead of the Sixers, Lue deduced, he likely would not have played in that series because their starting guards were the bigger-framed Vince Carter and Alvin Williams.
“I could have been out of the league,” Lue said. “ … It definitely was a blessing. Without that matchup [with Iverson], I probably wouldn’t have had as long of a career as I had.”
As that play unfolded, Lue did not think it would become such a “big deal.” After attempting to contest the shot, Lue slipped and fell in front of Iverson’s legs while turning around to see if the ball had splashed through the net. But then “Doug Collins went crazy” on the television broadcast, Lue said, generating even more buzz for those outside the arena.
Lue jokes that he and Iverson were “probably still mad at each other” a couple of years after the play. But since then, Lue confirmed they have become “really good friends.”
“We’re close in age,” Lue, 48, said of the 50-year-old Iverson, “but I still idolized him when I was coming up through college, and when I got to the league. Just idolizing somebody who was only two or three years older than you is kind of crazy, but I looked up to him.
“Having an opportunity to play against somebody you idolized was a great moment for me.”
That moment did propel Lue into a successful career as a complementary player, which spanned 11 seasons across seven teams. He is now regarded as one of the game’s most respected coaches, winning the 2016 championship leading the Cleveland Cavaliers and earning a reputation for impressive tactical adjustments.
Twenty-five years later, Lue looks back on that flashpoint of his career — which some might expect would spurn irritation or embarrassment — with fondness.
“It couldn’t have happened any better,” Lue said. “I tell people all the time, he could step over me 50 times, if I get the opportunity [to guard him] again.”
Inside the 76ers’ celebratory postgame locker room late Thursday, VJ Edgecombe received a phone call from Buddy Hield.
That would not normally occur between two players who had just faced off in a wild thriller. But it is not hyperbole to conclude that Edgecombe may never have made his game-winning plays against the Golden State Warriors — a steal, then a go-ahead putback in the final 8.2 seconds of a night that swung from Sixers blowout, to disastrous collapse, to chaotic 99-98 victory — without attending Hield’s basketball camps in their native Bahamas as a teenager.
Thursday’s crazy finish capped the first night that Hield, a respected 10-year sharpshooter, and Edgecombe, an electric two-way rookie, shared the floor as NBA peers. Edgecombe finished with 10 points, six rebounds, five assists, and three steals; Hield with 14 points, eight rebounds, and two steals. And as the postgame hubbub continued to swirl around them, Edgecombe and Hield met at center court to exchange jerseys.
“I love Buddy with all my heart,” Edgecombe later told The Inquirer. “ … He always had faith in me, and always was teaching me little points about the game.”
Good friends VJ Edgecombe of the Sixers and Buddy Hield of the Warriors play against each other on Thursday.
This Sixers-Warriors matchup was coincidentally full of reunions. Hield played 32 games for the Sixers after being acquired at the 2024 trade deadline. Tyrese Maxey’s game-saving block after Edgecombe’s bucket came against former teammate De’Anthony Melton, who spent a couple hours at Maxey’s home Wednesday to catch up as friends before making his season debut following knee surgery. Seth Curry and Al Horford are also former Sixers, and received drastically different receptions from the home crowd. So is Jimmy Butler, who sat out Thursday’s game with a knee injury.
But none of those players’ ties boast the roots of Edgecombe and Hield, who both described their relationship as little brother-big brother.
Edgecombe first attended Hield’s camp as a 13-year-old, aka the “smallest kid there” among a group of mostly high school juniors and seniors. But Hield immediately noticed Edgecombe’s skill and eagerness to be good. Then, Edgecombe hit a growth spurt and added muscle to his frame.
“The next year, I see him on the rim dunking on people,” Hield recalled to The Inquirer before Thursday’s game. “I was like, ‘Oh, [expletive]. He’s going to be really good.’”
Throughout the years, Hield kept in touch with Edgecombe to “[make] sure I was always good,” the rookie said. Hield would emphasize staying confident and working hard.
Then, Edgecombe and Hield became Bahamas teammates for the 2024 Olympics Qualifiers. On a roster that also included fellow Sixer Eric Gordon and Los Angeles Lakers center Deandre Ayton, Edgecombe provided “an aggressive downhill energy that we didn’t have,” Hield said. The team would allow a pre-college Edgecombe to run pick-and-roll after pick-and-roll, trusting that he would either draw a foul while attacking the basket or kick out to an open Hield at the three-point arc.
Golden State’s Buddy Hield (left) and the Sixers’ VJ Edgecombe exchanged jerseys after the Warriors played the Sixers on Thursday night.
Edgecombe’s performance in that high-pressure environment, while playing against grown men, helped ignite his ascension to coveted NBA Draft prospect. Then came his successful season at Baylor, an impressive pre-draft process, and becoming the Sixers’ pick at No. 3 overall.
“I was like, ‘Man, I watched this kid grow up,’” Hield said. “That’s kind of dope, you know what I mean?”
Through the first quarter of the regular season, Edgecombe has been one of the league’s top rookies.
He scored 34 points in a historic NBA debut. He has been an impact player on both ends of the floor for a 12-9 Sixers team that is now guard-heavy and stressing a fast-paced style. He regularly ignites the crowd with his high-flying athleticism. He entered Thursday averaging 14.7 points, 5.8 rebounds, 4.8 assists, and 1.4 steals in 17 games, before some recent limitations due to a calf issue.
Before Thursday’s matchup, a grinning Hield vowed he would “go at [Edgecombe] and test that water.” But other than a 27-second stretch to close the first quarter, they were never on the floor at the same time until that wild final frame. They approached each other when they came back to the court following the quarter break. Edgecombe trash-talked Hield’s “fake defense,” before playfully shoving him to create space to receive the inbound pass.
And though Edgecombe struggled for much of Thursday’s game, coach Nick Nurse put the rookie back in for crunch time. Edgecombe has already earned the Sixers’ trust with his knack for clutch plays.
So while preparing for a defensive possession with his team trailing, 98-97, with 10.1 seconds remaining, Edgecombe knew the Warriors were out of timeouts. He tried to read Pat Spencer’s eyes, because “people tend to telegraph their passes a lot.”
VJ Edgecombe did not have the best game of his rookie season against Buddy Hield (left) and the Warriors, but continued to make a substantial impact.
“He had to throw the ball somewhere,” Edgecombe said. “Everyone was just in that one little spot, and I just dove on the ball, to be honest.”
That gave the Sixers an opportunity for a final-possession shot, with Edgecombe making the inbound pass. His plan was to “give the ball to Tyrese, and get out of the way.” But when Maxey’s fadeaway jumper was tipped by Melton and began to fall well short of the rim, Edgecombe darted in to secure the putback.
Then Edgecombe sprinted the opposite direction as Melton attempted his own breakaway game-winner, and flexed after Maxey swatted the ball away.
“It’s what he does,” Maxey said of Edgecombe. “ … Whatever it takes for us to win the game, I know he’s going to make a play.”
Hield, meanwhile, had already entered the day proud that Edgecombe had become the latest Bahamian who, by making the NBA, could take care of his family and bring joy to his community and home country.
But after that wild finish — which capped the first time Edgecombe and Hield shared the floor as NBA peers — Hield needed to call his little brother.
“It brings more life to the youth, to uplift them,” Hield said of Edgecombe’s success. “For them to be like, ‘Yo, VJ did it. I can do it, too.’ They’re trying to write their stories, too.
“So I just hope he keeps on inspiring young kids, like I did for him.”
The banner made its way to the bottom of the student section, and a crew of security guards soon was hovering. Everyone had to go, they said.
“We were like ‘What?,’” said Luke Butler, who led the crew of Temple students that night at La Salle.
The fans — the Cherry Crusade — spent a few days crafting one-liners to paint onto 30-foot banners that would be rolled out during the Temple-La Salle basketball game. The “rollouts” have been a Big 5 tradition since the 1950s, even surviving a brief ban when the schools thought the messages had become too racy.
The rollouts often are a play on words or innuendoes that make light of the opposing school. You roll out your banner and then hold your breath while the other school shows theirs. Each student body takes turns dissing each other like kids in a schoolyard. The best rollouts, Butler said, are the ones that “twist the knife” just a little.
St. Joe’s students unveil a banner referring to Villanova finishing last in the Big 5 Classic last year.
But this one, Butler learned, twisted a little too much.
The Explorers entered that game in February 2010 on a seven-game losing streak, and Ash Wednesday had been two weeks earlier. Temple, down a point at halftime, raced away in the second half. And here came the rollout: “LA SALLE GAVE UP WINNING FOR LENT.”
The Temple students — the same crew who held a “funeral” a year later for the St. Joe’s Hawk — thought it was good banter. But a priest was offended, and security had instructions.
“They were like ‘Father is pissed. You basically affronted their faith, and they don’t want you in the building,’” Butler said. “That was a good example of a rollout where we said ‘This will get a good reaction.’ It did. It just wasn’t the reaction we were thinking of.”
70 years of rollouts
The rollouts trace back to the Palestra, when the building was the home of the Big 5 and basketball doubleheaders. The bleachers were filled, the basketball was good, and the crowds were lively. Philly was the center of the college basketball universe, and the Palestra was a scene.
The “rooters” who sat behind the baskets would roll out banners during the games about opposing schools. The messages were a chance for a student body to take a shot at their rivals from across the court. When La Salle students hung a dummy of their coach in the early 1960s from a campus flagpole, St. Joe’s rolled out a banner a week later that said “We Fly Flags on our Flagpole.”
The messages became more pointed, as the Daily News wrote in January 1966 that “the rollouts wandered from the realm of good taste.” The Big 5 athletic directors agreed to ban them, saying that “certain rollout subject matter has been offensive and detrimental to the best interests and continued success of the Palestra program.”
The president of the St. Joe’s student section protested the decision at the Big 5’s weekly luncheon, telling the athletic directors that they were ruining “the greatest spectator participation event in sports” and the rollouts were part of the “spectacular” that was basketball at the Palestra.
“It’s not a spectacular,” said Jack Ramsay, then the coach and athletic director for St. Joe’s. “We’re down there to play basketball. If the students want to join in, that’s fine.”
No longer allowed to roll out their messages, students at the Palestra began to shout what they would have written. Banner Ball gave way to Chorus Ball, the Daily News wrote. A year later, the students won, and rollouts were welcomed back to the Palestra as long as messaging was preapproved by the school’s athletic office.
The banners became as integral to a Big 5 game as a soft pretzel from the Palestra concession stand. You didn’t miss a basket during a doubleheader, but you also made sure you caught the dig the opposing students made during a timeout about your school.
The banners were the game within the game as the student sections planned their rollouts like a comedian preparing a stand-up skit. The jokes had to be fresh. How many times can you call the other coach ugly before it’s no longer funny? They had to be timely and tap into current events. That scandal involving a prominent alumni from the other school? Fair game. The football team stinks? That’ll work. A basketball player got arrested? There’s a rollout to be made.
And they had to be timed just right. You can’t come out swinging with your best bit. You have to build up the crowd with a few decent banners and then roll out the one you know will hit.
“You could tell from the other alumni if they were like, ‘Whatever,’ or if it really pissed them off,” Butler said. “Ultimately, that’s what you’re looking for. From brainstorming, to the making of them, to rolling them out, you’re looking for that reaction of them saying ‘Ugh.’”
A fading tradition
The rollouts, just like the Big 5, seem to be waning. Student attendance at local games is no longer what it was. The basketball programs have been down, the transfer portal has made players hard to identify, and conference realignment has introduced games with unfamiliar opponents.
Villanova — the lone Big 5 school to make an NCAA Tournament in the last five years — is the only team that regularly draws a large swath of students. Most schools fill up a student section for the marquee games but attract just a small group on most nights. Attracting students to a once-integral aspect of campus life has become a challenge.
Each school is trying to confront the decline of student participation, and Temple decided last year to revamp its student section. The Cherry Crusade does not have a student president, and the rollouts are made by athletic department staffers.
A banner made by the Olney Outlaw’s La Salle Student Section on Thursday.
They sold out their tickets two years ago when they reached the final of the Big 5 Classic and still fill the student section for a big game. The challenge has been to build a consistent presence.
“We want to find those passionate fans to bring back what the Cherry Crusade was,” said Katie Colbridge Ganzelli, Temple athletics’ marketing coordinator for on-campus initiatives. “They’re still there. We’re just trying to find those passionate students who want to be in charge of the student section like it used to be.”
Villanova’s rollouts earlier this week vs. Temple — “Rocky would’ve gone to Villanova,” one said — didn’t twist the knife. Penn’s student section is dormant, forcing the band to provide rollouts. The tradition seems to be fading across the Big 5, but credit La Salle for trying to keep the edge.
The school revived its student section this season, and the Olney Outlaws took aim at a Big 5 coach for being follically challenged and used another rollout to dunk on Villanova and St. Joe’s. They’re twisting the knife in Olney.
“We had noticed a lack of student engagement and thought this would be a fun way to get kids involved,” said Paige Mitchell, a senior marketing major who founded the Olney Outlaws. “I was working in the athletic department, and my boss at the time gave me a project to come up with something that would get everyone more engaged. It’s grown from there.”
Get your rollouts ready.
The road to the Toyota Big 5 Classic starts Saturday and ends at Xfinity Mobile Arena on December 6! 🏀 #Big5IsPhilly
The group of students — “I have a couple guys in the group who are pretty clever,” Mitchell said — brainstorm ideas for the rollout before they meet to paint their signs. They’re ready for Saturday, when La Salle plays Drexel in the Big 5 Classic.
“It’s stressful making sure they get rolled out at the right time,” said Mitchell, who’s also a center forward on the Explorers’ water polo team. “But I love seeing the way the students react. I have a couple friends who were sitting behind the rollout, and they’re blowing up my phone like, ‘What did it say?’ It’s just exciting.”
Perfectly Philly
Butler asked the La Salle security guard if he could talk to the priest, hoping he could ask for absolution. The priest was still steaming as Butler told him it was a misunderstanding. It was just some college kids making a joke, he said. The priest offered Butler penance: the Temple students could stay, but they had to hand over the rest of their banners.
But the Owls were going to clinch the Big 5 title that night, and the Cherry Crusade brought a rollout to celebrate it. Butler pleaded with the priest to allow them to keep that sign. He rolled it out to show the priest and security guard what it said. “Fine,” said the priest. The rollouts, once again, would not be banned. A perfectly Philly tradition lived on.
“There’s something in the Philly culture that rollouts hit a perfect vein,” Butler said. “The thing about people from here is that there is respect if you can dish it and you can take it. People love to twist that knife. When people did good rollouts against us, you were angry, but there was respect there.
“It’s making fun of people who appreciate it, but also hate it, and it gives you an opportunity to be a little bit of an a—. At the end of day, it’s all love. We all love Philly basketball, even though I’ll never root for St. Joe’s and I’ll never root for Villanova. But I still want them around. I want everyone to do well, so then the hate means something.”
NEW YORK — Maggie Doogan turned and launched a three-pointer from the top of the key, then yelled, “What?” when the ball splashed through the net to give Richmond a 13-point lead at Columbia last week. The former Cardinal O’Hara star grinned when she sank another deep shot to continue her team’s fourth-quarter surge.
After a cold shooting start, Doogan was Richmond’s leading scorer (16 points) and added nine rebounds, four assists, and three blocks in a key early-season matchup between mid-major programs that won NCAA Tournament games in March. And when a reporter in the postgame news conference suggested she had struggled offensively in the 77-67 road victory, coach Aaron Roussell playfully responded with, “Tough ‘evals,’ man.”
“I think it’s a pretty good stat line, with all due respect,” Roussell said. “ … I’ll take those ‘off’ nights from her.”
That illustrates the heightened expectations for Doogan, the reigning Atlantic 10 Player of the Year and perhaps the best mid-major player in women’s college basketball. The 6-foot-2 do-everything forward is averaging 23.1 points, 10.9 rebounds, 5.3 assists, and 1.4 blocks through the Spiders’ first seven games. That includes a monster performance in last week’s 72-57 victory over Temple, when she racked up 31 points, 14 rebounds, and nine assists.
Her ascent has coincided with Richmond’s, which last season won a second consecutive A-10 regular-season title and its first March Madness game in program history. The 5-2 Spiders, whose only losses so far are to No. 4 Texas and No. 8 TCU, were ranked in the preseason Associated Press top 25 poll and are receiving votes now.
Doogan acknowledges building this legacy is “not at all” what she envisioned when she signed with Richmond. But Roussell calls her a “perfect model” for player development, with the versatility to anchor the Spiders’ read-and-react offensive system. In this new era of college athletics, Doogan also made an increasingly rare decision to not entertain NIL opportunities from power-conference programs and stay at Richmond for her final season.
Richmond’s Maggie Doogan dives for a loose ball in a 2023 game against Villanova.
Also fueling Doogan’s rise? Her on-court diligence and quest for basketball intel. That sets the standard for everybody in the Spiders’ program — including its coach.
“You can’t fake anything with her,” Roussell said in a telephone interview last week. “You can’t be a teammate and not work hard around her. You can’t be her coach and not invest in her and not put the time in with the film. Because she’s going to have questions, and you need to be able to answer those.
“That’s probably been different for me coaching her than maybe any other kid that I’ve ever coached.”
Spiders?
When Doogan was a sophomore in high school, her mother, Chrissie, gave her a Richmond T-shirt as an Easter present.
“Mom, I’m not going to a school where Spiders are the mascot,” Maggie jokingly retorted.
But the Doogan family, based in Broomall, already had a connection to the Richmond coaching staff. Assistant Jeanine Radice, then at Marist, had recruited Chrissie (née Donahue) before she became La Salle’s second all-time leading scorer and member of the school’s athletics Hall of Fame. Then they stayed in touch as Chrissie entered coaching at La Salle, Cornell, and Cardinal O’Hara, where she currently is the school’s athletic director.
So Mom initially sent Maggie’s film, which highlighted her basketball IQ, to Radice. Maggie later demonstrated her outstanding shooting at one of Richmond’s camps, Roussell said. And the coach recognized untapped potential.
Maggie, meanwhile, was interested in branching out from the Philly area but remaining within a reasonable driving distance. She wanted strong academics and the opportunity to play right away. And while visiting Richmond’s campus, she fell in love with the “gorgeous” red-brick buildings.
“It was an easy choice once I really looked into it,” she said.
Cardinal O’Hara’s Maggie Doogan holds the the championship plaque as she celebrates with teammates after beating Archbishop Carroll for the Catholic League title in 2022.
Chrissie wondered whether Maggie’s lanky frame would be strong enough when she entered college. Roussell, though, deliberately took her early development slowly, because the coach “really wanted to make her earn” playing time. A broken hand kept Doogan sidelined for about five weeks, forcing her to step back and observe and pick coaches’ brains from the bench.
“I don’t know if they put something magic in my hand,” Doogan said, “but I was just kind of a different player and took that big leap. That kind of just gave me more confidence at the collegiate level.”
Her breakout game fittingly came in a nationally televised overtime victory over St. Joseph’s. Roussell called her “unguardable” as she totaled 28 points, six rebounds, five assists, three blocks, and two steals. By her sophomore season, she was the Spiders’ leading scorer for a team that won 29 games and the first A-10 championship in program history.
In Roussell’s positionless system, Doogan could be viewed as a post player with excellent perimeter shooting and playmaking skills — or a wing who can make an impact inside on both ends of the floor. She not only impressed with her commitment to the weight room and on-court work, but with her film study and tactical aptitude.
Roussell jokingly calls it “stressful” to coach Doogan because of the information she constantly demands. She is not afraid to approach her coach during a shootaround and respectfully ask why they have chosen a specific strategy against an opponent. And the Spiders have changed elements of game plans — before or during a matchup — because of something Doogan observed.
Roussell already says he hopes his “retirement job” is as an assistant coach on Doogan’s future staff.
“The level and the layers of which she thinks about the game is already like a coach,” Russell said. “ … I never want her to be bashful or not tell me what she’s feeling during a game or seeing during a game.”
Those qualities propelled Doogan’s numbers to jump again as a junior, to 17 points, 7.1 rebounds, 3.8 assists, and 1.2 steals per game. She shot 55.5% from the floor, including 40.6% from beyond the arc. She helped Richmond win a second consecutive regular-season A-10 title, and became the program’s first conference player of the year since 1990.
But after a St. Joe’s buzzer-beater upset Richmond in last season’s A-10 tournament — a game during which Doogan took just five shots and scored five points — she and Roussell had “frank conversations” about what the Spiders consistently needed from her. Doogan went home for spring break and “didn’t speak for three days. … She was miserable,” Chrissie said.
Roussell believes that gave Doogan an extra dose of motivation for a monster NCAA Tournament, after Richmond earned a No. 8 seed in an at-large berth.
She racked up 30 points on 5-of-8 shooting from three-point range, along with 15 rebounds and six assists, in a dominant 74-49 victory over ninth-seeded Georgia Tech. She totaled another 27 points on 11-of-18 shooting, seven assists, and six rebounds in an 84-67 loss to top-seeded UCLA, which advanced to the Final Four.
“I had a lot of pride. A lot of pride,” Doogan said of her team’s March Madness run. “ … Once you kind of step back, and a couple weeks later, I was like, ‘Wow, we really did that.’”
Richmond forward Maggie Doogan toward the basket as Georgia Tech guard Kara Dunn defends during last season’s NCAA Tournament.
Still, “literally the second we got back” from the NCAA Tournament, Roussell said, he and Doogan needed to have another honest discussion about her plans for the 2025-26 season. That is the reality in this transfer-portal era, because mid-major players regularly leave for power-conference programs that can offer more lucrative NIL deals.
Chrissie acknowledges she “got some calls on the side” to gauge Maggie’s interest in exploring options. She had to ask her daughter, “Would you leave for any certain amount?” Though Roussell received no indication from the family that he should be worried, he added, “I’m no dummy. I know the pursuers were out there.”
But Maggie and Roussell were aligned on how special this season could be for the Spiders — and that she wanted to finish her college career where it started.
“Not everybody would have made the decision that she did,” Roussell said. “There was a lot of loyalty involved. Now, do I think this was a great fit for her and this was the right answer? Yeah. But she left money on the table by coming back here, and that’s not something every 21-year-old is doing.”
Added Doogan: “Honestly, it’s home. And I wouldn’t want to spend my last year anywhere else.”
After Richmond’s win at Columbia, Chrissie sent Maggie a text about the two turnovers she committed during the game’s final minute.
“Wow, thanks for the love,” Maggie sarcastically responded.
Consider that evidence that the coach-player aspect of this close mother-daughter bond has never fully dissipated. Neither have other characteristics Maggie says she acquired while growing up as a Philly basketball kid. She immediately highlighted her toughness, that “I don’t really like to take a lot of B.S. from people, and I think I get that from back home.” She also credits her time at O’Hara with fostering her vocal leadership, which was on display while speaking up during timeouts throughout Richmond’s win at Columbia.
“I’m trying to calm everybody down, which hopefully works,” she said after that game. “I kind of know what [Roussell is] thinking, and I’m good at talking with everybody else. I think it’s kind of why I’m on the floor.”
She also is navigating life as a player who, before the season, was ranked among ESPN’s top 25 returners in the country.
She acknowledged after the Columbia game that she felt more defensive “crowding” while in the paint and a greater focus on wherever she was on the floor. Roussell is pleased that Doogan is executing on individual focuses, like better finishing, drawing fouls around the rim, and improving as a playmaker and rebounder. Being invited to last summer’s Team USA’s Women’s AmeriCup team trials, where she competed alongside some of college basketball’s best players, also boosted her confidence, Roussell said.
“She has not hit her apex yet,” Roussell said. “There is really good basketball in her future that will be better than what she is now.”
Yet the Doogan family is embracing Maggie’s final college season, which Chrissie compares to the ending of a book.
A group in Richmond gear swarmed Maggie for hugs following the Columbia win, then posed together for a photo op. Her grandparents make the four-hour drive to Richmond for nearly every home game. And whenever Chrissie visits, she notices children wearing No. 44 jerseys with “Doogan” on the back.
“As a parent, you’re like, ‘Wow, this kid,’” Chrissie said. “People all over Richmond know her.”
Richmond’s Maggie Doogan looks on after shooting as Georgia Tech center Ariadna Termis watches.
That’s the impact of Doogan becoming a perfect model of development and versatility.
And the player who stayed at her mid-major school through her entire career.
And the person who continues to set the standard for her program’s historic rise.
“It’s going to be awful whenever she takes off that jersey,” Chrissie said of Maggie. “I know there will be tears shed. But she’s got so much to be proud of, and so much to be excited for this season.
“We’re just trying to take it one game at a time, one practice at a time, and enjoy the ride.”
