Even now, after more than 50 years, the memory is as vivid to Ed Trauth as if it were last Friday night. It was a 1975 sectional semifinal in a stifling, rocking Hinsdale Central gym in a tight game between Fenwick and heavily favored Lyons Township, the No. 3 team in the state at the time.
Needing a spark at a key juncture late in the game, 6-foot-5 coach Ed Galvin called Trauth’s number.
And he delivered.
“We were real stagnant at the time I was subbed in,” recalled Trauth, who was a junior and today lives in Naperville. “I got the ball, and I could have taken a step backward or to my left and I would have gone out of bounds.”
Instead, he stepped up, took his shot and made it, and was fouled by LT’s Tony Lollo, a kid he knew. That kept Fenwick in the game, but what happened next still brings a smile to Trauth.
“After the foul, there was a time out and after the time out, I didn’t make it,” he said, referring to his one-and-one. “I left it so short, it almost didn’t hit the rim.”
But minutes later? Pandemonium.
Fenwick had upset the mighty Lions and advanced to the sectional final against Proviso East – all in its first year in the Illinois High School Association.
It’s going to be one of many stories that will be recounted Friday night when the team reunites in conjunction with the current Fenwick squad’s game against De La Salle. In case you’re going, the game will be held upstairs at the old Lawless Gym.
TJ Cahill, who was a senior and now lives in Elmhurst, has tears come to his eyes when he thinks about that Lyons game.
“I was near half-court, watching the ball batted above the basket when the clock went off,” he recalled. “I saw coach Galvin coming toward me. I lifted him in the air, and he weighed 250 pounds.”
He even recalls the aftermath: the story that made the sports section of the Chicago Tribune – front page, right side – and the nickname the team got from the local press: The Irish Mafia.
“We took no prisoners,” he said.
It was a legendary four-plus months in the winter of 1974-75 for Fenwick, who went 21-9. The Friars won their first-ever Thanksgiving basketball tournament, then took third place out of 38 teams in the Mayor Daley Catholic vs. Public League Christmas Tournament. They went 4-1 and even beat powerful Morgan Park by 12.
Then there was the game at Oak Park and River Forest’s old field house. That contest drew an estimated 5,000 fans of both schools, while hundreds more milled around outside. But if you were lucky enough to get in, you’d have had to contend with netting along the entire outline of the court, along with bleachers at either end for the overflow.
Fenwick didn’t win that game, but competing against friends and would-be teammates from across town became a huge community event, recalled senior captain Mike Mullins, who went by the nickname Moon after the cartoon character.
“It was one of the most fun games I ever participated in in high school or college,” Mullins said. “We were all friends, and we were all competitors and it had never happened before. That was one of the benefits of joining the IHSA as a senior. It would be a great test for both of us.”
The communities of Oak Park and River Forest were awash in pride for the game. There were signs in the windows supporting one team or the other along Washington Boulevard and Lake Street, said Mullins, who lives in Downers Grove today.
“We played with these guys, not only in basketball but in softball; we went to parties with them,” he said.
As a junior, Neil Bresnahan was a key cog on that team. Bresnahan, who later went on to star at the University of Illinois and even signed a rookie contract with the Golden State Warriors before tearing ankle ligaments, said Galvin may have been stoic, but if you looked close, you could see the cement of resolve during the OPRF game.
“He was downplaying it until we got there,” he said. “He wanted to win this game as badly as any of the rest of us.”
While the Lyons game was electric, reality hit a few days later when the Friars played Proviso East in the sectional final.
There just wasn’t enough gas in the tank. Fenwick lost to Proviso East, which went to the state quarterfinals.
After that? The juniors had a year to go under Galvin, and the seniors would move on to college. Like every other high school kid, everyone would find their way in life. Bresnahan, who lives in Wheaton, worked until 2008 at Morgan Stanley. After a lot of help from Galvin sorting out collegiate offers, Mullins went to St. Mary’s in Winona, Minnesota. He eventually worked at the Chicago Mercantile Exchange.
Some of their teammates won’t be there Friday. Ed Kinsella, Barry Houlihan and John Powers are deceased.
But it’s going to be a special night all the same, Trauth said.
“Hopefully we can recognize each other,” he said with a laugh. “Everyone is going to have gray hair, or no hair. Hopefully everyone has kept themselves in good shape.”
Added Bresnahan: “I think it’s going to hit the whole spectrum. It’s going to be something where there are guys you haven’t seen, so that will be fun. At the same time, we did lose three guys since then, which is kind of sad, but this is where we are in our lives.
“I’m going to enjoy it, embrace it, relish the fact that I spent four years with most of those guys.”
