Sherry Levin was recently appointed head coach of the US Women’s Open basketball team that will complete at the World Maccabiah Games next year in Israel.
The 53-year-old Newton native has coached, and played on the world stage before. But her perspective, as the US prepares to defend its title, is different now. And her resolve has never been stronger.
Two years ago, the Newton North High and Holy Cross Hall of Famer was diagnosed with breast cancer. That fall, she underwent intense chemotherapy, yet rarely missed time as the varsity girls’ coach at Beaver Country Day School in Chestnut Hill.
“Everyone who battles cancer says that it changes their outlook on things. It does. Every positive moment becomes cherished, while every negative one you let wash away and forget,’’ said Levin, who, in April, was hired for her second term as girls’ basketball coach at Worcester Academy.
In her previous stint at the Academy, from 2001-2008, her teams won two New England championships.
An inductee to the New England Basketball Hall of Fame, Levin scored a program-record 2,253 career points (before the introduction of the 3-point line) at Holy Cross. She was a Kodak District I All-American and two-time first team Division I CoSida Academic All-American.
Levin has earned two gold medals as a head coach: with the Open Women’s Basketball team at the 12th Pan American Maccabi Games in São Paulo, Brazil in 2011; and with the USA’s U-18 Girls’ squad at the 19th World Maccabiah Games in 2013.
The 20th World Maccabiah Games is scheduled for July of 2017. Levin will conduct tryouts July 30-31 in Ardsley, N.Y.
The Newton resident has previously worked as a television basketball analyst and run a basketball camp at Brandeis University. She once held the girls’ basketball scoring record and the javelin record at Newton North (Class of 1980).
She played on the silver medalist US Open team in Israel in 1981, was coach and athletic director at Beaver Country Day for seven years (her 2013 team was 25-0 and NEPSAC Class C champs) and the girls’ coach at Milton Academy last season.
“Coaching through the 2014-15 season was the most difficult thing I have done. Sometimes barely able to stand, sometimes without a voice, my players and assistant coach, Caleigh Crowell would support me,’’ said Levin, whose daughter, Marcia and mother, Leona, helped her get through the rough times.
Marcia, 19, a Beaver graduate and rising sophomore at Johns Hopkins University, “was my rock through it all,’’ Levin said
“She was and is an inspiration to me. We would come home each day exhausted and I would head to bed. She kept track of my medications, cooked dinners and encouraged me to be strong.’’
When experiencing what she described as “the lowest of lows,’’ she drew strength from her resolve as a player at Holy Cross and from the positivity of her college coach, the legendary Togo Palazzi.
She hopes that resolve, “in some small way,’’ has inspired her players and said the Worcester Academy position heralds a return home.
“My roots run deep in Worcester, my personal connections are there and I hope to help lead our team to prominence in New England girls’ basketball — with one off-court battle behind me.’’
Marvin Pave can be reached at marvin.pave@rcn.com.
