Cabrini University Athletics

After more than three decades, Joyce McCreesh finally has come clean about her secret past. How she crept across Eagle Road and played field hockey for none other than archrival Eastern, while she led Cabrini’s basketball team in scoring.

"My freshman and sophomore years, I played for Cabrini’s field hockey team," McCreesh explained. "My junior year, we didn’t have enough players come out. But if you took two classes at Eastern, they let you play for them.

"In my concentration [physical education], you had to take courses at Eastern anyway since we didn’t have the facilities. It was done all the time. So I played for them, and we had a fabulous team. I remember we won a big tournament at Franklin Field."

When she could tear herself away from her Eastern friends, Joyce McCreesh had a pretty nice career at Cabrini as well. She was a long-range bomber who could hit from Harrisburg and put up startling numbers in an era when 35 points was a respectable team total.

In 1973 McCreesh struck for 30 points in a 38-35 loss to LaSalle. The schedule also included St. Joseph’s and other big names.
McCreesh’s name would be all over the Cabrini record book except for one thing. Virtually no records exist.

"Back then, no one thought of adding up all that stuff," she said. "That’s why I’m beyond thrilled at being singled out for the Hall of Fame. We had no accolades, no awards, nothing.

"I played because I loved basketball and competing. Nothing was better than beating colleges much larger than Cabrini. They didn’t think much of us until the final score."

McCreesh honed her shooting touch in backyard 3-on-3 games with her family. She was the youngest child by six years, and driving to the hoop was asking for trouble.

"You got beat up," she recalled. "My brother’s 10 years older than me,
and he never gave me a break. That’s why I learned to shoot from far away."

After five years as a teacher, McCreesh embarked on a successful restaurant business and retired early. Which gives her plenty of time to kick butt when the neighborhood boys in Broomall stop around for a game of H-O-R-S-E.

"They think they can show up an old woman," she crowed. "Then they realize, ‘Hey, she’s not too bad.’"