On the court, the visiting Skyhawks — the No. 2-rated Division I team in the Dayton Daily News rankings — upped their record to 11-1 by pushing aside their hosts 40-21.
Eight rows up from the floor — sitting by herself at the far end of the bleachers — was Colonel Amanda Gladney. Folks here know her as both the 88th Air Base Wing and Installation Commander at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base and the mother of two Fairborn players, Amanda and Brianna Gladney.
But a little over two decades ago, Col. Gladney was then Amanda Williams, the star point guard of the women’s basketball team at the U.S. Air Force Academy.
The guys there would pack the stands to watch her thread-the-needle passes and her ability to score. She reminded them enough of a certain Los Angeles Lakers guard back then that they would chant “Maaaa-giiic!” and the nickname stuck.
“I’ve heard stories from our neighbor on the base and my grandpa and other people,” said Amanda, the daughter who is a senior guard for the Skyhawks. “They said Mom could handle the ball and shoot and do everything. She was a beast.”
The colonel rolls her eyes at such talk, but she was accomplished enough in basketball that the Academy kept her on to coach and recruit after graduation.
Although she could have continued coaching for Air Force, she said she wanted to see how far she could advance as an officer.
After more than a dozen assignments across the U.S. and to England, she came to WPAFB last summer and now is in charge of more than 5,000 military, civilian and contract employees.
In the process, an already-promising Skyhawks team added two tested players in her daughters. Last season, both Amanda and Brianna started for their Fairfax (Va.) High girls team.
Well-traveled girls
Whether it’s Col. Gladney or her daughters, basketball has always been more than just a game for them. It gives Mom a release from the pressures of the job, and it helps the girls adjust to always being the new kids in school.
“I’ve been to 12 different schools, four different high schools,” 18-year-old Amanda said matter-of-factly. “I was born in Maryland, moved to Virginia, North Carolina, Alabama, Georgia, back to Alabama, then Virginia again, then to England, Texas, Virginia again, down to Florida at the end of the summer and now here.”
Except for the Florida stop where she lived briefly with her dad who is an Air Force pilot, Amanda has followed her mom’s moves up the command ladder.
And yet while the addresses changed, there was always one constant. Wherever Col. Gladney has been stationed, she’d find a gym to play pick-up basketball. In fact, until sidelined by rotator cuff surgery in December, you could see the 44-year-old commander hooping it up regularly in one of the gyms on the base.
“I love basketball — it’s like an old friend to me,” she said. “It’s the one place where I’m happy, stress-free and I get in some good PT (physical training). It’s absolutely a joy for me to be out on the basketball floor.”
That love was instilled by her dad, Col. Henry Williams, who was quite a basketball player himself and then taught the game to his three kids — besides Amanda, Andrea played at Texas A&M and is now an associate commissioner in the Big Ten and Henry played college football — as well as his two granddaughters.
A prep standout and class valedictorian at Moon High in Pittsburgh, Col. Gladney was recruited by all three service academies and schools like Yale, Brown and Vanderbilt. She fell in love with the Air Force Academy and her name can still be found in the basketball record books there.
When it came to her own daughters — while happy they embraced the sport she loved — she also pushed them in other directions.
“Academics is first with her,” said Brianna, an A-student. “And she tried to get us into music, too.”
Amanda smiled: “Mom played the piano, so we took lessons ... for a while. We both tried the violin, too. And I played the trumpet if you call it that ... But all that’s in the past tense.”
Basketball remains, and last spring Col. Gladney even coached the Fairfax High girls in a spring league. Had she not been reassigned to WPAFB, she would have coached the summer league team, as well.
“I’ve got to admit I still do love coaching,” she said. “If anybody is looking for a high school basketball coach, I’m their girl. That would be my dream job. Coming out of the United States Air Force and being a high school coach, I can’t imagine anything better.”
‘Good kids, players’
Steve Hannaford, the Fairborn High girls coach, said adding the Gladney sisters this season was both a blessing ... and a rarity:
“Truthfully, we haven’t gotten that many kids from the base in recent years. If they were girls basketball players and came to town, word was don’t bother with Fairborn. Go on to CJ, Carroll, Beavercreek, Springboro or someplace else ... But now I think we’re changing that.”
Under Hannaford, a 1974 Fairborn Baker grad, the girls basketball program has made great strides the past four seasons. From 10-11, they’ve gone 14-8, then 18-4, and this season their only loss was by nine points to top-ranked Fairmont.
Monday, the Skyhawks beat back-to-back Division II state champion Shaker Heights Hathaway Brown in the prestigious Classic in the Country tournament in northeast Ohio.
The Fairborn team — led by players like 6-foot-1 Jaymee Veney, point guard Brooklyn Pumroy and sophomore Alexis Gassion — got added depth with the addition of the two Gladney sisters.
“AG is instant energy and hustle,” Hannaford said. And Brianna, a sophomore whom he calls “Shoelaces” or “Shoes,” is a promising cornerstone for the future.
Being the two new girls on the team can be daunting enough, but then there’s the fact that they are the base commander’s daughters. It’s like being the preacher’s kids.
“Our mom was the base commander in England, too, so we’ve lived the lifestyle before where everybody knows who you are,” Amanda said. “Mom tells us. ‘You represent me, your family and the Air Force. Hold your head high, but mind your Ps and Qs.’ ”
They do that and much more, said Hannaford:
“They’re everything you’d expect them to be. They’re polite, respectful, hardworking. They’re good kids and good basketball players.”
As to how they would fare against their mom, both girls smiled and kind of juked the question. Brianna finally shrugged: “When she was our age, if we went 1-on-1 she’d beat me.”
Amanda smiled: “Even now when she plays in the gym on base some guys start to ease off because she’s their boss. But she’ll tell them, ‘While we’re on the court, we’re equals. I’ve got my shoes on, my shorts on and I’m here to play’ — and she can play.”
With a little laugh and a moment’s hesitation, she added: “She might be a little old, a little slower, a little crippled with the shoulder now, but yeah I’d say she’s still got some magic left.”
Thanks to her daughters — and their embrace of the game — maybe more than ever.
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