City of Basketball Love

Joseph Santoliquito (@JSantoliquito)
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Jackie Hartzell had just hopped into her car after a workout on a frosty Wednesday afternoon, February 10, 2021. Dabbing sweat beads from her forehead, the University of Sciences women’s basketball coach was greeted by her cell phone staring up at her on the passenger’s seat blowing up under an avalanche of text messages—not always a good thing.

Her first thought was, ‘Oh my God, did something serious happen?’

The text messages were from her players.

Something serious did happen, something serious to Hartzell and her players—University of Sciences women’s basketball program was finished, along with 11 other varsity sports at USciences when the news came out about a merger between USciences and Saint Joseph’s University.

“I cried like somebody died that day,” recalled Hartzell, 38, a former St. Hubert’s and Del-Val star who lives in Newtown, Bucks County. “The email from the school and a story in The Inquirer both came out around 12-noon that day. My class at the gym ran from 12-to-12:45. I didn’t know anything. My players were like, ‘Jackie what is going on?’ I remember looking down at my cell in a panic.”

Hartzell’s first call was to then-USciences athletic director Marc Caserio, who replied via text he was on the phone with his boss. A few minutes later, Caserio called Hartzell back to tell her the merger was happening. Bracing herself, Hartzell asked if USciences’ athletics would be done.

The answer was a cold ‘yes.’

The Devils got to enjoy one last season in 2021-22, with the women going 24-5 overall, and 15-3 in the Division II Central Atlantic Collegiate Conference, winning the conference tournament and reaching the second round of the NCAA D-II Tournament, while the men went 4-20 overall and 4-14 in the CACC.

Everyone has scattered since the schools officially merged June 1, 2022. Hartzell is now the head women’s coach at Division III Arcadia, and players like Tommy Gardler, have transferred into schools like La Salle, while still numerous players, like the nucleus of the women’s team, including Harlem Jennings and Isla Brennan, remained at USciences, which honored the scholarships of all student/athletes that remained.

Still, it was a biting experience to everyone who were once associated with the program.

“I was totally blindsided by the move. A big part of my life was taken away, and my biggest concern was for my players, because it affected them more than it affected me,” said Hartzell, who was a four-time CACC Coach of the Year (2015, 2018, 2019, 2020) in amassing a 186-57 record (.765) and earning five trips to the NCAA Division II Tournament, including making it to the Sweet 16 in 2018. “The people up top were not able to provide the answers my players wanted. It felt like a relative died. The players wanted answers what their options were. The players handled it very well. They were great. There were talks in the past of a merger, but we never thought if a merger would come, that it would dissolve athletics. It was tough talking to my team about it.

“We spoke on Zoom, and I had to be as honest as I could with them. My biggest concern was one more season. I was still on the Sciences. We even hoped to get two more seasons. I couldn’t be more grateful that we got at least one season. Winning the CACC was our main goal and we got it. But it was very difficult, knowing it was our last season. We didn’t talk about it. I never wanted to remind those girls this was their last season. Personally, I felt a lot of extra pressure, because I wanted that team to go out on a positive note.

“Those players were amazing. It was awesome to be a part of, and emotional when we won. I’m so happy we had our final season.”

Hartzell took a couple of her former players with her to Arcadia, fifth-year seniors last year Jess Huber and Shannon May. She’s still in contact with her former players who remained at USciences.

Jennings, 22, a senior majoring in biomedical sciences/medical laboratory science and maintains a 3.6 GPA, has strong basketball roots. Her mother, Anita Jennings, is an assistant coach at Fordham who played for St. Joe’s in the mid-1990s, and her father played at Penn State. Harlem played at Carroll.

She was in the Southwest Philadelphia off-campus apartment she shares with her former Sciences teammates Brennan, Gisella Romeo, Kerry Patterson and Riley Vingsen when she originally heard the news in February 2021 about the merger. She received the email like everyone else and was concerned where basketball stood.

“There was no information about the basketball side of things and Jackie tried telling us as much as she could,” said Harlem, who eventually wants to work in pathology. “It was difficult to let basketball go. Personally, basketball has been such an important part of my life, but I was comfortable with my decision to stay here, because I’m alongside amazing people. I’m still around basketball. My mom coaches and my sister plays.

“I still have a love for the game. We’re all still together. I went to my mom’s first exhibition game, and I wanted to get on the court and be a part of a team again. My mom tried to let me know I had a spot at Fordham if I wanted it, but she knew and I knew, my education here comes first and this path is what I dreamed about my whole life. But basketball got me here. I say basketball saved my life. The game got me here at Sciences, I have lifelong teammates and friends because of basketball.”

Like Jennings, Brennan is heavily entrenched in basketball. Like Jennings, she, too, has a double-major in biomedical sciences/medical laboratory science and intends to become an orthopedic surgeon. Brennan, 21, played for her father at Middletown South (N.J.). She came off the bench her junior year at USciences and had some big games for the Devils, chosen CACC all-tournament and led Sciences with a team-high 15 points in their first-round NCAA Tournament victory over Le Moyne.

Isla (pronounced I-La) started playing basketball when she was five. The game shaped who she is. It’s the first time in 16 years she won’t be playing. She heard about the merger in class when the cell phones were going off.

“I personally found the transition of not playing to be extremely challenging,” admitted Brennan, who maintains a 3.77 GPA. “I come from a super-basketball family. I played for my father for four years and have been around the game my whole life. Actually, Harlem’s mom and my dad knew each other before Harlem and I knew each other. We have so much in common. I had to learn and find my way this last year into different hobbies and find a way to use that competitive energy into different avenues of my life.

“I considered transferring for a couple of days but transferring out at our age wouldn’t make any sense, especially with my major. Transferring might have set me back a year because those credits might not have transferred over. I got emotional when I heard the program was going to end. Harlem, me, we all did. It was almost like losing a loved one. We already lost a year to COVID, and I was now losing my senior year. I cried like everyone else.”

When the college basketball season opened on Monday, Brennan said her friends were able to help her get through this time and move forward without basketball. In the summer, she trained players in her spare time at home in Middletown South.

Gardler is from a strong basketball-tradition family, too. Unlike Jennings and Brennan, he wanted to continue. Gardler, the grandson of Cardinal O’Hara legendary coach Bud Gardler, son of former St. Joe’s Hawk Chris Gardler and older brother of current Marple Newtown star Matt Gardler, had no doubts he would continue playing. Tommy was in his living room in February 2021 when he got word from Devils’ coach Mike Connor that the program would end.

“I wanted to enjoy my last year at Sciences,” said Tommy, a 6-1 guard who is academically a junior majoring in biology at La Salle and has three years of eligibility. “I loved it at USciences. We had five freshmen who I was really close with and we were waiting to be seniors to see how that was all coming together. Basketball played a huge part in my decision to transfer. It’s a huge part of my family and when I heard coach (Fran) Dunphy took over La Salle and they were down players, I gave him a call and here I am.

“I never questioned it. I was going to play basketball. I don’t think I would be happy if I didn’t have basketball in my life. I’m a preferred walk-on here at La Salle and my role is to work here and build the culture that we need. We’re working hard to win, and it’s always been my dream to play for a Division-I team. Coach Dunphy said that I would get what I deserve. Sciences helped me immensely. It helped prepare me for this experience at La Salle.

“I’ll always remember my time at USciences. It was a lot of fun. I’m 100-percent happy where I am. I would call it a win-win.”

This past September, Hartzell and her former Sciences players had a group dinner where they were given their CACC Tournament championship rings. That was the last time they were together as a whole team.

“I’m at peace that we accomplished what we did last year,” Brennan said. “It still hurts. I still miss the game. I’m a huge Duke fan. We would have been so good this year with everyone coming back. When you’re a senior, you get to build that new legacy with the players coming in. The one regret is not playing with the remaining group that was left. The hardest part is watching people I played with and played against in high school. People that I had a direct relationship with are still playing and I’ve been cut shy of that my senior year.”

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Joseph Santoliquito is an award-winning sportswriter based in the Philadelphia area who began writing for CoBL in 2021 and is the president of the Boxing Writers Association of America. He can be followed on Twitter here .