The following story recently appeared in the spring 2019 issue of M, the Manhattan College magazine.
By Tom Pedulla '78
Manhattan alumnae who gathered to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the College's varsity women's basketball team made sure to acknowledge the grassroots effort that launched the team as a club sport in 1975.
Lisa Toscano '79, Ed.D., professor of kinesiology at Manhattan, never imagined the significance of her actions when she cofounded the club with Kathleen McCarrick-Weiden '79. The two just wanted to play ball — and they went to great lengths to do it.
At first, they received a bare-bones budget from student government. Jerry Fahey, a physical education major, coached. Players used their own cars for transportation to road games. When they needed T-shirts, everyone chipped in.
The team was restricted to night practices, and allowed to take the floor at old Alumni Hall only after the men's team completed practice. Without their own locker room or restroom, the players changed in a closet with a large window, and teammates took turns holding a towel across the window while the others dressed. Fahey's halftime instruction was often superseded by the need to run to a women's restroom at Manhattan Hall (now Miguel Hall) before dashing back to the gym, leaving players all but breathless for the start of the second half.
"You can't make this stuff up," Toscano says. "And, you know, we just did it. You didn't think twice about it."
The team initially suffered the ignominy of losing to some of the area's better high school rosters. But the Lady Jaspers, as they were called, grew through adversity and closed their ground-breaking first season with a two-point victory against cross-town rivals from the College of Mount Saint Vincent.
"You'd have thought we won the Olympics," Toscano says.
Challenging times continued after the move to varsity in 1978-1979 and the hiring of Michelle Blatt as coach.
Marianne Reilly '82, the team's first recruit and now the College's athletic director, recalls resentment among male athletes after their budgets were reduced to accommodate women in compliance with Title IX. Each member of the Lady Jaspers received one pair of high-top sneakers. Reilly, a power forward, referred to them as "boots" because they were inordinately heavy.
"We were always fighting for equity, let's put it that way," Reilly says. "We didn't get a lot, but we certainly appreciated things. And sometimes we didn't even know what we were missing."
Those remain treasured times, for they laid the foundation for an essential Division I program that has enhanced the lives of countless women, empowering them to assert themselves as leaders in the workplace and their communities.
"To see the women come back for the 40th anniversary of the varsity program, they've all gone on, and they're successful and they love what they do," Reilly says. "The impact it's had on our women is tremendous."
The program always has been about more than wins and losses.
"I do believe Manhattan has always emphasized the student and the athlete, and sometimes it's really tough in Division I when the athlete piece gets pushed on the student part," Reilly says. "We definitely put the student in front of the athlete."
The reward is women who make a difference.
Sheila Tighe '84, whose ability to thread the needle with passes was so uncanny that she would admonish teammates to "keep your hands up," made an indelible mark on Manhattan basketball.
Tighe arrived in the program's third year as the most heralded recruit in New York since Nancy "Lady Magic" Lieberman. She justified that billing, guiding the Lady Jaspers to a 17-12 record. That included a victory against archrival Fordham, which had advanced to the Elite Eight in the NCAA Tournament only two years before. Tighe remains Manhattan's all-time leader in points (2,412) and steals (310). Later, she turned qualities developed on the court into corporate success. Her Los Angeles-based company, City Films, produces television commercials.
In a sense, not all that much has changed since Tighe alerted teammates to be ready for her slick passes.
"You face adversity every day in the workforce, whether you're bidding to get a job or you're hustling to find a director," she says. "Some days the sun is shining and other days it's rainy. And that's what sports is."
Stacey Jack Edwards '87 sees it as no coincidence that she earned her degree in chemical engineering and left behind a 1987 Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference championship team to join another seamless unit at Swiss multinational ABB Lummus in Bloomfield, New Jersey.
Jack Edwards says of her time at Manhattan: "It taught me a lot about working with others, being a team player and contributing what you could for the good of the team. That really carried into my working as an engineer. Everyone has to pull their part to get the project done on time."
Amani Tatum '18, who became the coordinator for student-athlete academic success services after graduation, says she thrived in Manhattan's family atmosphere after transferring to the College and learning about "pushing past limits."
The future seems bright, with nearly 70 percent of last season's minutes devoted to freshmen and sophomores.
Courtney Warley '21, a 6-foot-3-inch sophomore center and the conference's reigning Defensive Player of the Year, leads the young core. The team graduates only one player in 2019.
Seven current players under third-year coach
Heather Vulin achieved a GPA of 3.20 or higher, qualifying for the MAAC's All-Academic team. Players regularly participate in community service.
The aspirations of today's players are reflected in their motto, "Play Green."
"I'm incredibly excited for the future of the program," Vulin says. "Everything we do, we try to do it at a championship level."
Perhaps the greatest sign of progress through more than four decades is that the name Lady Jaspers was dropped some time ago in favor of Jaspers.
Manhattan's community is one, after all.
Gallery: (3/2/2019) Women's Basketball 40th Anniversary
