How Brooklyn’s South Shore kept its high school basketball dynasty alive through the pandemic

The 2020 basketball season ended on the ultimate cliffhanger for the boys and girls teams at South Shore High School in Canarsie, Brooklyn. Both squads were defending champions in the most competitive division of the city’s Public Schools Athletic League.

The boys team had just advanced to the citywide semifinals, and the girls had earned a spot in the finals in March 2020 when the arrival of COVID-19 shut down high school sports.

“We played our last game on Wednesday, March 11,” recalled South Shore girls basketball coach Anwar Gladden. “That game sticks in my head. We won. That night, the NBA shut down. I knew at that point it was going to be tough for us to continue.”

The teams never got a chance to compete for their titles — a particularly crushing blow for the seniors.

“We had nine seniors,” said Gladden. “To have their next game, playing in Madison Square Garden or Barclays Center, and for that to be taken away from them ... that was really tough for them.”

But the players and coaches who remained resolved to turn the disappointment and frustration from the truncated 2020 season into fuel to keep themselves motivated during the pandemic — and propel them right back to championship contention when school sports resumed.

Two years later, they got their shot.

Last month, the boys and girls teams claimed the titles the pandemic had snatched away.

“It felt super surreal … it was a full-circle moment,” said Max Ragusa, an 18-year-old senior on the South Shore boys team of the recent championship win. “The fact we won a championship together on that stage … all of our hard work and sacrifice, it just made it feel worth it.”

As soon as the coronavirus closed schools and prematurely ended the basketball season, Gladden and boys basketball coach Shawn Marks realized they had a unique opportunity — and responsibility — to use basketball to help their students weather the challenges of the pandemic.

Gladden and the girls junior varsity coach set up team calls where players would “just discuss our feelings,” recalled Zhara Adeyemi, a 16-year-old junior.

Adeyemi said the players were “confused, anxious and just missing being together ... not knowing how long it would take for us to get back ... we all just wanted to get back to basketball and each other.”

Marks, the boys coach, secured space at private gyms in East New York and Williamsburg where his players could go to shoot around while the school gym was closed. When the team couldn’t get in a gym, Marks led his players in outdoor exercises and dribbling drills over Zoom. And in summer 2020, when the city Parks Department reattached the rims on outdoor basketball courts, Marks set up camp at a public court, holding scrimmages in the beating sun.

“There was a whole bunch of days when guys wanted to quit,” Ragusa said of the grueling summertime workouts, “but we all stayed strong, all 10 guys.”

Keeping active during the early months of the pandemic wasn’t just about the physical exercise. It also provided a much needed outlet from the isolation, loneliness and loss many of the teens experienced , coaches and players said.

Several of Marks’ players lost their homes or shuffled through homeless shelters, while another “was stuck in the house just trying to nurse his family back to health.”

Marks believes his coaching must go beyond the court. He aims to show teens “how to train themselves, not just physically, but mentally, on learning to live through the environment we deal with with COVID.”

School sports resumed in spring 2021, and brought COVID-19 restrictions including a mask rule, a vaccination requirement for students and spectator limits.

Some of those changes, especially the transition from playing in front of cheering crowds to holding games in empty gyms, were difficult to get used to.

“No spectators is just a completely different environment,” said Adeyemi. “You go from having your friends, parents, teachers … to having no one.”

But Gladden was steadfast about encouraging his players to follow the health guidelines — and reminding them why they were there.

“If your energy is, ‘This is what’s best for everyone,’ they’re going to buy into that as well, and the players definitely did that,” he said. Gladden and Marks said all of their players got vaccinated.

The winter omicron surge threatened to disrupt the season once again, canceling several games and leaving multiple players sickened.

But Gladden credited the PSAL for rescheduling the canceled games and hosting the championship games at the Barclays Center in front of a crowd on March 17.

For players like Ragusa, it was the perfect culmination to a turbulent but rewarding two years.

“Having our staff and family members and students there, to be appreciated, it made me feel like I’m a part of something,” he said. “That I’m adding to a legacy.”