Berks Catholic Girls Basketball Coach Bob Birmingham Reflects on Lloyd Wolf, His 627th ‘Personal’ Career Victory

Fresh out of college, Bob Birmingham returned to Holy Name High School, his alma mater, and became a teacher.

Interested in coaching, Birmingham received encouragement from boys basketball coach Holy Name Lloyd Wolf, whom Birmingham played under a few years previously.

“He and (Holy Name football coach) Rick Keeley really convinced me to take over the girls’ program,” Birmingham said. “It was the best thing that ever happened to me. Without their encouragement, I would never have accepted this position.

Thirty-four seasons later, Birmingham is now the Berks Catholic girls’ basketball coach and he passed the late Wolf on the county’s all-time basketball winning list with his 627th career victory so that the Saints outscored Twin Valley 63-28 on Tuesday night.

“He was probably the biggest influence in getting me to coach,” said Birmingham, the all-time leader in women’s basketball coaching wins at Berks. “I respected him a lot and he had a big influence on my coaching style. It’s a bit bittersweet. I would have loved him to be there. »

Berks Catholic picked up the home win playing in the gym named after Wolf. His granddaughter, Lily Wolf, scored six points.

“It was very, very nice to be able to do it there, to be able to do it on that floor,” Birmingham said.

Wolf, who died aged 77 in 2017, went 626-381 as Holy Name boys’ basketball coach. He retired at the start of the 2006-07 season after almost 40 seasons at the helm. He set Berks’ record for boys coaching wins, which was broken by Snip Esterly at Berks Catholic in 2015 – with Wolf sitting next to Esterly on the Saints’ bench to witness it.

While Holy Name had success on the pitch, Birmingham said Wolf’s impact extended far beyond victories.

“We looked up to him with such respect,” Birmingham said. “He worked you hard. You wanted to play hard, you wanted to win because he cared about you, not just as a basketball player, but as an individual.

When Birmingham returned to Holy Name and began coaching the women’s team, it was Wolf who once again took Birmingham under his wing.

“I was a head coach when I was 23 and I didn’t know much,” Birmingham said. “I was able to bounce things off him. He was always there for a word of encouragement or if I needed to be lined up he was always ready to do that too.

Birmingham coached for 22 years at Holy Name and 12 seasons at Berks Catholic, since the school was founded in 2011 with the merger of Holy Name and Central Catholic. Birmingham is 627-300 and has won five Berks titles and three District 3 championships.

“It’s a big accomplishment,” Birmingham said of the No. 627 win. for me.”

The Saints are 10-4 this season and are one of only two Berks teams — Wyomissing is the other — still undefeated in the league (6-0 at Berks I). With all his success, Birmingham said he learned from Wolf that coaching is about much more than what happens on the pitch.

“We train them to be better citizens and better individuals,” Birmingham said. “When we teach these things in the gym, we’re really teaching them life lessons.”

With family, friends and former Birmingham players in attendance on Tuesday night, the Lloyd Wolf Gymnasium crowd celebrated the achievements of one coach, while remembering another.

“There are so many people who say they wouldn’t have been the person they are without his influence,” Birmingham said. “I hope I had that influence on some of the players I had too.”