EAST SYRACUSE MINOA CENTRAL SCHOOL DISTRICT – The East Syracuse Minoa Central School District’s student club for emerging entrepreneurs and leaders in management once again held its “Costello Classic” fundraiser Saturday, Dec. 16.
Through the evening of basketball games, there were all the fadeaways, putbacks and behind-the-back passes anyone could ask for, but the event’s purpose extended beyond entertainment value, as proceeds were donated to the V Foundation for Cancer Research in memory of Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame inductee and 1949 Minoa High School graduate Larry Costello.
For the cause, ESM DECA had 31 alumni from graduating classes dating back to 1995, 15 junior and senior students, and 14 teachers from throughout the district volunteer to suit up for the event held in the gymnasium of the high school on Fremont Road.
Always proud to have grown up in Minoa, Costello was inducted into the Naismith Hall of Fame in 2022 for his contributions to the NBA as both a player and coach.
A six-time All-Star as a point guard, he helped the Philadelphia 76ers triumph over the San Francisco Warriors in the 1967 NBA Finals, and as a coach, he took the Milwaukee Bucks to their first championship when they secured the 1971 title in their third year as a league expansion team.
Costello also returned to the area to serve as the Spartans’ first basketball coach around the time the East Syracuse and Minoa districts merged to become ESM, leading the local team to a county championship.
The V Foundation was jointly founded by ESPN and late basketball coach Jim Valvano 30 years ago this year, and to date it has raised over $353 million for life-saving cancer research according to v.org.
Formed several months before Valvano’s passing from metastatic adenocarcinoma, the foundation aims to accelerate the victory over cancer by putting the entirety of direct donations to research and nothing to administrative expenses thanks to an endowment established for its operating side.
ESM DECA’s charitable event the night of Dec. 16 began with a students-versus-staff game followed by an all-alumni game.
To supplement the event’s personal campaign page set up on the V Foundation website, purchases of limited-edition T-shirts and the 200-plus ticket sales at the door contributed to the fundraiser, while raffle entries for prizes like batting cage tokens and motivational frames went on to benefit the Chittenango organization Clear Path For Veterans.
After his club hosted events with a similar format in years prior, ESM DECA Advisor Bob Anzalone came up with the idea to hold the Costello Classic last year upon learning more about Costello and finding out that he died from cancer in December 2001.
A three-time cancer survivor himself, Anzalone thought a basketball-centered fundraiser raising money for research into the disease would be more than fitting, especially if it could be named after a local legend like Costello while benefiting the foundation started by Valvano, a man he considers another inspiration.
“Everybody gets together, and I like that you have the students and the staff and then you have the alumni too,” Anzalone said. “It’s like a whole-school, whole-community event.”
Trey Bova, the coach of the students team on Dec. 16, said it was an enjoyable evening despite his squad losing in a 96-35 blowout.
“You could see everyone having fun,” Bova said. “It doesn’t matter if we were losing. It was happy and it was a good time.”
During the break between the two four-quarter games, the participants posed for pictures and a special recorded message from Jim and Juli Boeheim was played through the gym’s public address system.
In the shared message, Jim Boeheim thanked ESM DECA for all they’ve done while praising Costello for “a spectacular career” and the V Foundation for its “great work” through the decades.
Costello was a mentor to Boeheim back when he was a ninth grader at Syracuse National Dolph Schayes’ basketball camp, and the retired coach of Syracuse Orange men’s basketball also knew Valvano personally, praising him for his North Carolina State team’s famous “out of nowhere” victory over a powerhouse University of Houston team for the 1983 NCAA championship.
“But he was even a greater person—one of the funniest human beings ever,” Jim Boeheim said. “When he was hit with cancer, he left something. He left the Jimmy V Foundation.”
Boeheim’s wife, Juli, said that Valvano’s legacy supporting the fight against cancer is now living on “stronger than ever.”
Austin Betts, an ESM senior and referee during the student-teacher and alumni games, said “it means the world” to put on the Costello Classic, adding that the words of Valvano’s ESPY speech “Don’t give up, don’t ever give up” resonated through the evening.
“Our event really spreads awareness, especially when we partner with local businesses as sponsors,” Betts said. He said he and his fellow DECA members sought to push Costello’s name further out into the community as they organized the fundraiser because “not too many people are NBA Hall of Famers.”
A three-sport athlete at Minoa High School, Costello is also a member of the New York State Basketball Hall of Fame, the Greater Syracuse Sports Hall of Fame, the Greater Buffalo Sports Hall of Fame, the Niagara University Athletics Hall of Fame and the ESM Athletic Hall of Fame.
ESM sold 222 admission tickets at the event, and 57 players participated in the back-to-back games. The high school also had 19 DECA volunteers helping out at the event, which raised a little over $6,000 this year.
