Basketball team that laid foundation for program’s success joins Quaker Valley hall of fame

By: Ray Fisher
Sunday, October 8, 2023 | 11:01 AM

John Gaetano took over as Quaker Valley’s boys basketball coach in 1987-88.

He was employed as a guidance counselor at Northgate and brought 26 years of coaching experience with him.

“I was a different type of coach than they were used to (at QV),” Gaetano said. “I wasn’t easy to play for. I was very demanding.”

Behind seniors Mike Vescio, Tim Merrill and Joe Kotula, a 6-foot-7, 230-pound inside presence, the Quakers won 11 of their last 12 games in Gaetano’s first season at the helm.

“They started to understand me and I started to understand them,” Gaetano said. “It just built from there.”

Gaetano ended up coaching high school hoops for three decades; the last four years were at Quaker Valley where he was assisted for three seasons by Mike Mastroianni, QV’s current coach and athletic director.

In his second season in charge, the 1988-89 Quakers captured first place in Section 13-AA with a 13-2 record, qualified for the WPIAL and PIAA playoffs and finished 24-5 overall.

The Quakers won 20 of 23 regular-season games then advanced to the WPIAL semifinals and PIAA quarterfinals. The team is recognized as one of the best in QV school history.

When recalling the historic season, the first thing that came to the 81-year-old Gaetano’s mind was the team’s tireless work ethic.

“They worked very, very hard,” he said. “They were a very close group and they had a very strong desire to be successful.”

“I thought we were going to be very good that season. We had a nice mix, and they were all good kids.”

The 1989 boys basketball team will be inducted into the QV Sports Hall of Fame on the weekend of Oct. 13-14; the 2023 class will be recognized Oct. 13 at the Quakers’ home football game against West Mifflin.

A banquet will be held in honor of the inductees at 11 a.m. Oct. 14 at Edgeworth Club. For ticket information, email Christina Johns at johnsc@qvsd.org.

The Quakers were led back then by backcourt standouts Jeff Gaca, a first-team all-state selection, and Andre Farrington, who earned first-team all-section laurels.

“Without a doubt, in my 30 years of coaching, Gaca was the best shooter I ever coached,” Gaetano said. “Farrington was a slasher. He could get to the basket, and he defended well.”

Gaca and Farrington were joined by Reggie Bledsoe at guard, Rob Seymour at center and Neil Sisak at forward.

“Bledsoe was a very, very good athlete. He was a very good soccer player,” Gaetano said. “He was a strong kid. I could play him anywhere — at point guard, at No. 2 guard, at No. 3 guard.

“Seymour worked hard. He was very quick, and he rebounded and defended well. Sisak was an extremely good shooter from the corner.”

QV’s key reserves included guards Jim Seymour, Brian Smith and Phil Hall, plus Melvin Meade in the frontcourt.

“Hall turned out to be a very good player for me,” Gaetano said. “He played in college for four years.”

Dave Wick, Aaron Vescio, Patrick South, Mark Dhuy and Jon Stanley rounded out the team.

Gaca, now a heart surgeon at Duke University Hospital and the Duke Heart Transplant Clinic in Durham, N.C., continued his basketball career at Cornell in the Ivy League. He averaged 14.5 and 15.7 ppg as a junior and senior, and 10.9 ppg for his four-year career.

Bledsoe and Farrington landed scholarship offers to play in college while Rob Seymour and Sisak passed on a few Division II and III bids. Sisak attended Tennessee.

Seymour, a 6-4, 185-pound center in high school, currently lives in Scottsdale, Ariz. and is employed by Oracle as a NetSuite practice director.

“Neil Sisak went on to be a VP of Biogen in Switzerland,” Seymour said. “I still keep in touch with Neil and wish he was here, but unfortunately, the (HOF induction) dates didn’t line up for him.

“His brother lives in the Phoenix area like I do, so when Neil comes to visit, I’ll see him from time to time. Neil, my brother Jim and David Wick all went to Duke’s basketball camp each summer and got to be friends with Coach K (Mike Krzyzewski) and his daughter Debbie.”

The older Seymour brother wasn’t shocked when it was announced the 1989 boys basketball team would be added to the QV Hall of Fame.

“I knew teams were getting inducted for a while because my sister Kathy was inducted into it for her soccer team that won states,” Seymour said. “We didn’t win states, but QV wasn’t very good in basketball since 1972 and, with the help of coach Gaetano’s leadership, we made tremendous progress.

“Finally, my senior year, we were really good and put QV basketball back on the map to stay. Mike Mastroianni kept that methodology, modified it to his own, and the program was built for lasting success. So I knew we had a shot to make it and now we are finally here. I want to thank the (HOF) board in recognizing the accomplishments made by the hard work of our entire team.”

Two of the Quakers’ biggest wins in 1988-89 were victories over “a really good” Northgate team, along with a victory against Upper St. Clair, which competed in Class AAAA, the WPIAL’s highest division.

Some of Seymour’s favorite memories from that winter involved the team’s unity, his brother Jim, and youth basketball.

“My brother was our sixth man and we pushed each other to be better for three years,” Seymour said. “Also, we came in on Saturdays and coached the younger kids, teaching them the main strategies, which was the start of building a long-lasting, successful program.”

Behind an all-senior starting lineup, the Quakers averaged close to 70 points per game in the 1998-89 season. Defensively, their goal was to limit opponents to 14 points or less per quarter.

“The most important thing was they defended well, and they were eager to do that,” Gaetano said. “They just bought into what we were doing. I was lucky. That was a great bunch of kids that I had for four years. And Mike was a Quaker Valley guy. He made the transition for me very, very easy.

“The best place I ever coached was at Quaker Valley. They’re very good people to work for.”

Two of Gaetano’s “bosses” were Dr. Jeanne Johnson, QV’s high school principal, and athletic director Ed Perry.

“Dr. Johnson was very supportive,” said Gaetano, a Ross Township resident. “Ed Perry was the best AD I ever worked for. He was on top of everything.”

After 37 years as an educator, Gaetano left his position as guidance counselor at Northgate in 2001, which was 10 years after he coached his final basketball game.

What prompted his “early” retirement as a coach?

One of Gaetano’s coaching idiosyncrasies was the fact he never took a seat during a team’s practice session.

“My last year at Quaker Valley (in 1990-91), I looked around during a practice and I saw I was sitting down,” Gaetano said.

He knew it was time to go.

Tags: Quaker Valley