Storrs, Conn. — Izabel Varejão embraced Dyaisha Fair first, holding her teammate’s face to her chest. UConn coach Geno Auriemma did the same in the handshake line. So did opposing star Paige Bueckers.
Once they were done, Syracuse head coach Felisha Legette-Jack offered a hug too.
They comforted the Syracuse women’s basketball star because for the past year they’ve watched her pour every ounce of herself into basketball, more than anyone would ever believe could come from a 5-foot-5 body.
When the final whistle blew on Fair’s Syracuse career at the end of a 72-64 loss to UConn in the second round of the NCAA Tournament, she tucked her face into her jersey.
“You just want to keep protecting her,” Legette-Jack said. “She’s getting ready to go out there as this little, young lady, who some don’t really notice and who some don’t give a fair chance. … I know she’s ready. But it won’t be easy for either one of us.”
Legette-Jack calls her player a daughter. And an inspiration.
Fair calls Legette-Jack her mother-away-from home. And her best friend.
Together, they have reached heights few imagined for them. They shared a path. They shared a will.
Legette-Jack grew up in the Pioneer Homes neighborhood of Syracuse, dreaming of attending SU. Now, she is the leader of its women’s basketball team.
Fair grew up in a similarly distressed part of Rochester. It’s a place, she said, where few find a way out. She will soon be a professional women’s basketball player.
“Our relationship and the bond that I have with her is unmatched, and I know that it’ll never be like that with anyone else,” Fair said. “Our relationship, the things that we’ve overcome, the things that you guys will never know about that we’ve gone through, it’s just something that’s helped our relationship grow.”
The things we do know tell us plenty.
As a remarkable season has gone on, they have shared more of them, showcasing just how much a player and a coach can mean to each other.
When Legette-Jack found herself recovering from surgery to remove a non-cancerous tumor from her pituitary gland before the season, Fair was the one who defied orders and showed up at the hospital anyway.
Over the past week, Legette-Jack talked about how Fair grew up as the oldest child in her family. Raised by a single mom, Fair was sometimes tasked with helping parent her younger siblings, ensuring they were fed, bathed, did their homework and attended school.
Sometimes, Legette-Jack said, Fair was too tired to go to school herself. Her grades suffered.
As Fair’s recruitment unfolded, Legette-Jack was the only Division I coach who remained engaged, believing an undersized guard was gifted enough to both improve her academics and become a program-changing player.
Legette-Jack promised Fair that if she took care of school, she’d give her a home.
“When we got her we said, ‘You have to be selfish because we need you to come in the front door of Buffalo, not the side door or the back door, and we’re not going to give you a special permit, you have to do the work,’ ” Legette-Jack said. “She believed in us because we believed in her. She trusted us because we were putting trust in her.”
Because of that trust, Fair traveled with Legette-Jack from Buffalo to Syracuse two years ago, picking her coach over offers from some of the most powerful basketball schools in the country.
She picked Legette-Jack again this offseason, choosing one more year of college basketball at Syracuse over the start of her professional career.
Together, the pair stabilized the Syracuse women’s basketball program after the uncertain end of the Quentin Hillsman era.
Fair became an All-American. The Orange returned to the NCAA Tournament. Syracuse matched its school-record for regular-season wins.
Fair scored 11 straight points in the Orange’s first NCAA Tournament game, leading a late rally over Arizona. She was at her best in the fourth quarter, delivering repeatedly when it mattered most, when it felt like only she had more to give.
The Orange fell just a few plays short of being the second team in program history to reach the Sweet 16 on Monday night. It was nearly the first team to beat UConn before the Sweet 16 in more than 30 years.
In her final game, Fair passed a pair of WNBA All-Stars on the all-time Division I scoring list. She finished her career ranked third with 3,403 career points.
In this final season, Fair has talked about trying to learn how to enjoy some of what she has accomplished in her life. After spending much of it hiding her emotions, the SU coaching staff is proud that she has begun to show her joy.
When the final whistle blew Monday night, it was clear Fair had given everything.
Said Fair: “I didn’t know that this would be the best year of my career.”
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