It’s good to be a ‘Villain’
KERNERSVILLE — It was a moment hoop dreams are made of. One by one, Coach Brian Robinson took his five seniors out of the NCHSAA 1A championship game to offer each girl a “flower” for dedicating four years of hard work, perseverance, laughter and tears to Lady Villains basketball. Ahead by nearly 30 points in the fourth quarter, the team’s second state championship win in as many years was in the bag.
Coach Brian Robinson instructs the Lady Villains during the 2023 1A state championship game in Raleigh. He had the help of assistant coaches Trish Grant, Laurie Mulqueeny and McKenzie Rochford. In elementary school, Rochford (pictured behind Robinson) was a ball girl for the team’s first two state championship games and later played for the team from 2010 to 2014, winning four state championships. (Photo provided by Laurie Mulqueeny)
The poignancy of the moment was not wasted on senior twins Charley and Tate Chappell.
“When the fourth quarter started, I could feel my career coming to a close and that in itself is a very emotional thing,” said Charley Chappell. “I made a point to look around and enjoy the next few possessions. When Coach R started subbing us out, I wanted to remember those moments of my teammates, but it was tough to watch them sub out, knowing I would never play with them again.”
Tate Chappell noticed something extraordinary, too.
“When I realized it was my turn to be taken out, I was at the free-throw line,” she said. “I had made the first one and looked over at the score table and saw one of my teammates ready to sub in for me. Before the referee handed me the ball to shoot my second free throw, I looked up at the clock. It read, ‘3:12.’”
Tate explained the significance: “My twin sister and best friend, Charley, has always been number 3; whereas I have always been number 12. I pointed up to the large jumbotron. Charley understood what I meant.”
Despite feeling emotional, Tate made the free throw.
“It is rare to have a final game, as intense as a state championship, where teams are given the opportunity to do something like this,” she said.
DOUBLE TROUBLE
In their first two seasons at Bishop McGuinness, the Chappell twins, Grace Harriman, Katie Deal and Isabella Ross missed their shot at a state title in two heartbreaking buzzer beaters. Stung twice, the girls and their coaches set out to work that much harder. It paid off.
They clinched the title their junior and senior years, bringing the school’s record in state championship appearances to 11-0, a state record that puts them second in the nation for number of state championship titles. All of this has been accomplished with Coach Robinson, who has led the team for 21 years.
The 2023 championship game ended with Bishop McGuinness besting Chatham Charter 73-43. Sophomore Adelaide Jernigan contributed a game-high of 21 points and earned Kay Yow MVP honors and a spot on the all-state team. Three other players scored in double figures: Ross, Kiersten Varner and Tate Chappell. Charley
Chappell earned Most Outstanding Player, with eight points, six assists and six rebounds. On March 21, Harriman and Tate Chappell both signed letters of intent to play in college. Harriman is headed to Virginia Wesleyan University and Chappell signed with Appalachian State University. Charley Chappell plans to focus on academics in college and study biochemistry to become an anesthesiologist.
MEANT TO BE
In that stirring scene at the end of the championship game, the girls surely could hear their coach’s motto: “Everything happens for a reason.”
It’s his succinct way of imparting the wisdom he’s gained over the years. The recipient of a host of coaching awards, Robinson is the founder of the Winston-Salem Stealers AAU program and is a USA Basketball coach. He is a professional speaker and author with many credentials, including a business degree from Appalachian State University.
He surpassed his 500th win with Bishop McGuinness early in the 2022-2023 season and has helped 26 players at Bishop and 180 from the Stealers earn spots on college teams.
“Whether you play two minutes, or you play the whole game, Coach R wants you to be the best player you can be,” said Jernigan who has played for Robinson since fifth grade. “We just soak it all in because he’s so wise in the game, and it’s really an honor to play for him.”
Robinson is legendary in the world of basketball. And that’s not hyperbole – he earned a Living Legend Award from Winston-Salem Recreation & Parks in 2010 and was named as a Top 100 Coaches to Remember in the NCHSAA in 2013. Sometimes Robinson is runner-up, but he doesn’t mind.
“You put state championship plaques in the champion case,” he said. “You don’t put Player of the Year or Coach of the Year there. As upset as some people were when I didn’t win the conference award, I told them that is perfectly fine because it allows me to provide a real, tangible example to the girls.”
A baseball player at R.J. Reynolds High School in Winston-Salem, Robinson says he would have never become involved in basketball if it weren’t for the encouragement of a friend who told him he was a good player.
Still, Robinson didn’t make the Reynolds team until the second year he tried out. When he did, he was hooked on the sport.
Everything happens for a reason.
He went on to have a successful basketball career and was especially impacted by varsity coach Howard West. Robinson took various coaching positions after college starting as an assistant at his alma mater in Winston-Salem. He was head coach for the varsity boys at Starmount High School in Yadkin County when something changed.
It was down to the wire in the game that would qualify the team for the state playoffs. Robinson called a time-out the team unfortunately didn’t have, which resulted in a technical foul that lost them the game.
Already considering a different career, he felt dejected by this event. The next day, he decided to catch the end of the game at his former high school. When he couldn’t get in, he headed down the road to Kernersville to watch the game at Bishop McGuinness.
“Bishop lost at the buzzer,” Robinson recalled. “After the game was over, my friend Coach Marc Pruitt said, ‘You know what? You’d be a much better girls coach than boys coach, and I think you should take my job here because I’m moving on after this year.’ I said, ‘No, I don’t want to coach girls in high school, I’m pretty much done.’”
Pruitt put Robinson’s name in anyway.
“They called me three times. I turned them down three times in a row and said, ‘No, I think I’ll do something else,’” Robinson said.
Persistence paid off. “By the fourth time, they won, and I pretty much fell in love with the place,” he continued. “The rest is history since that day 21 years ago. It’s kind of odd how all that worked out because it came really close to never happening.”
It’s a fitting motto.
LIFE AND BASKETBALL
Throughout Robinson’s tenure at Bishop McGuinness, he has coached 95 girls, 85 of whom have come from Catholic feeder schools — area middle schools in Greensboro, Winston-Salem, High Point and Burlington. Through building those programs and the nearby Stealers AAU teams, Robinson is creating a something of a basketball dynasty at the school.
Yet he knows life is so much more than basketball. Robinson’s appreciation for the whole person is an important part of what keeps him at Bishop McGuinness.
“Being around a school that makes religion a focal point – prayer before school, prayer after school – it was really important to me. When I was at Reynolds, we used to do that all the time. We used to have prayer at school, and they got rid of it for whatever reason,” he said. “It’s refreshing to me. The culture fits me perfectly because the girls have their religious and academic foundations. It makes for a well-rounded person and athlete.”
Robinson is Moravian but has always had familiarity with the Catholic faith.
“My parents and my family are Moravian, but there has always been a lot of the Catholic religion around,” he said. “With the team, it’s open, but it’s not something the girls and I talk about all the time. However, when it needs to be talked about, it is. We bring up having faith in what you’re doing and believing in yourself, and I think it’s the perfect atmosphere for them — and for me.”
Each day the coaching staff is trying to teach the girls some type of life lesson, whether it’s how to handle teammate relationships or how to handle their successes and failures.
“All these things are going to play out in their lives someday,” Robinson said. “People think it’s a straight shot to success at the start, but there are lots of ups and downs, twists and turns, and you have to be able to handle and manage those things really well.”
Robinson keeps in mind that each player has life circumstances she’s facing. Some are small, and others are much bigger. In the fall, forward Grace Harriman dealt with a deeply saddening loss when her mother passed away from cancer. Grace and her mother Sarah had designed new team uniforms just before her passing.
Being part of the Lady Villains helped her get through this difficult time. In 2022, Harriman didn’t get to play in the state championship due to a concussion, but she played and won this year.
When it comes to basketball, Robinson takes time to celebrate but doesn’t look back too much. “There’s time for that when I’m done coaching,” he said. “I don’t want to sit back and reflect on what has happened in the past. There are more kids, more games to coach and more people it will affect, so I keep on moving forward.”
— Annie Ferguson
Why are Bishop McGuinness teams called the ‘Villains’?
The origins of Bishop McGuinness High School and its mascot began in 1954 when Villa Marie Anna Academy for girls opened as the successor to the Villa grade school on Country Club Road in Winston-Salem. Under the leadership of the Sisters of St. Joseph from Philadelphia, the school had only five students the first year.
In its third year, the school opened to boys and reached an enrollment of 46, half of whom were boys. Thanks to the dedication of the sisters and $30,000 from Mary Ann Robertson of New York, each year the enrollment grew towards a new school.
On Sept. 8, 1959, just two days after the birthday of its namesake – Raleigh Bishop Eugene McGuinness – Bishop McGuinness Memorial High School opened its doors on Link Road with an enrollment of 96. The school mascot, the Villains, is a nod to the school’s origins at Villa Marie Anna Academy, more colloquially called the Villa.
Technically, it is pronounced “Villane,” but most folks call it like they see it.
