For 19 years, Kevin Curley relished coaching the McDaniel men’s basketball program. But he always prioritized his family of wife Allison and children Caroline, Nathaniel and Gabriel.
“He would schedule his practices around things that we needed to do,” Allison Curley recalled from her home in Westminster. “On Halloween, we would trick or treat first, and then he would have practice at night. For Thanksgiving, we would have dinner, but then he would always take the kids to the gym.”
Mr. Curley, who amassed 214 victories to become the winningest coach in the Green Terror’s basketball history, died of esophageal cancer on May 27 at a hospice in Westminster. He was 54.
McDaniel athletic director Jeremy Shepherd described Mr. Curley as “a servant leader.”
“No matter what we were trying to do in the department as a community service initiative like the Boys & Girls Clubs, raising money for cancer, Kevin was always willing to give us time and be part of that,” he said. “So for me, he leaves a legacy of building a really strong basketball program, being very successful, never having a problem.”
A native of State College, Pennsylvania, Mr. Curley and his younger brother Greg dabbled in a variety of sports but gravitated toward baseball and basketball. They grew up rooting for the Pittsburgh Pirates in baseball and Penn State in everything else.
“We didn’t miss a football game, we didn’t miss a basketball game,” said Greg Curley, who is 2 1/2 years younger. “Probably one of the things that we used to do the most that we loved was we would go to the Atlantic 10 tournament at the Palestra every year and watch Penn State play there.”
After playing two seasons of basketball at Penn State-Altoona, Mr. Curley graduated with a bachelor’s in labor and industrial relations from Penn State in 1994 and earned a master’s in physical education with a concentration in athletic coaching from West Virginia University in 1996. He then began an assistant coaching career that included stops at Bethany College in Bethany, West Virginia, from 1994 to 1998 and Colgate University in Hamilton, New York, from 1998 to 2007.
In 2003, Mr. Curley and the former Allison Russin, who was teaching in New York, were matched on a blind date by a mutual friend. They married on May 28, 2005, and welcomed twins Caroline and Nathaniel two years later.
Shortly after their birth, Mr. Curley interviewed for the opening at McDaniel, which lost coach Bob Flynn on Jan. 12 to a sudden heart attack. Brett Foelber, a shooting guard who was a member of the search committee, said the panel was impressed when they noticed Mr. Curley still wearing the hospital bracelet on his wrist that provided access to visit his children.
“That was really honorable of him to come and meet with us,” said Foelber, a Sykesville resident and Cardinal Gibbons graduate.
Mr. Curley led the Green Terror to the Centennial Conference Tournament seven times and the Eastern College Athletic Conference Tournament five times. He was named the Centennial Conference’s Coach of the Year in 2009 and 2014.
Greg Curley coaches the Juniata men’s basketball team and is that school’s career leader in wins with 320. At times, he and his older brother battled to recruit the same players, and they agreed to scrimmage each other every preseason, but that was the limit.
“There’s two different instances when we got into fights in the scrimmage, and our assistants looked at us like we were nuts,” the younger Curley said. “And then five minutes after the game was over, we were asking about what’s going on with the kids and when are we getting together for this and what’s going on.”
A few days after expressing some discomfort during a home game against Swarthmore on Jan. 17, Mr. Curley was diagnosed with Stage 4 metastatic esophageal cancer. But he insisted on continuing to coach during a meeting with Shepherd.
“He immediately turned to making sure that he was taking care of his guys and making sure that the season was going to run the way it was going to run,” Shepherd said. “He was going to be here every day doing his job like normal.”
While wearing a chemo pump, Mr. Curley coached McDaniel to its first victory over six-time Centennial Conference titlist Johns Hopkins on Feb. 11. Fatigued, he agreed to be transported by his wife to and from the team’s 81-62 loss to Ursinus on Feb. 24 in the first round of the league tournament, the school’s first appearance since 2016.
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Allison Curley said the swiftness of the cancer’s spread stunned loved ones.
“His body deteriorated fast,” she said. “And Hopkins had told us that. There wasn’t a cure. We were just going to give him time.”
Since Foelber created a GoFundMe page on March 3 to help offset medical costs for the Curley family, donors have contributed more than $51,600 toward a $60,000 goal. Foelber said the community’s support has been overwhelming.
“People have been coming out of the woodwork,” he said. “It’s been amazing how supportive everybody has been.”
A complete list of survivors was not available. Visitation is scheduled for Thursday (June 4) from 4 to 7 p.m. at Pritts Funeral Home and Chapel in Westminster. A Mass of Christian Burial will occur on Friday (June 5) at 11 a.m. at St. John Catholic Church in Westminster. Interment will be private.
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