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John Wildhack began his call with Felisha Legette-Jack this summer by telling her about the Carrier Dome’s renovations. Then, the Syracuse Director of Athletics said he wanted her to come see the Dome and contribute something to the new look.

“I’m like, of course,” Legette-Jack said. “(You) give anything you ask from your alma mater, and I said, ‘Sure sir, anything you need.’”

But what Wildhack asked for next was something Syracuse has never asked a former female athlete for before. He wanted to raise her No. 33 jersey in the rafters of the Dome as the first female athlete to have their number retired at SU. Legette-Jack began crying during the “surreal” moment that caught her off guard.

The shock she felt was a culmination of her lifetime of work. To Legette-Jack, it showed that Syracuse was ready to recognize 50 years of women’s athletics, and that someone had finally done enough to earn that honor. It showed her that a kid with a dream of playing for Syracuse from Nottingham Senior High School under the “hill” of the university can go up the hill and find success.

As Syracuse celebrates 50 years of women’s sports, Legette-Jack will be one of three female athletes to get their jerseys retired, alongside rower Anna Goodale and former lacrosse player Katie Rowan Thomson. Legette-Jack’s jersey will be retired Sunday before SU plays Notre Dame.

“I’ve never done this for me. I just think that I am the vessel that (Wildhack) chose for others to be recognized as well,” Legette-Jack said. “Now other women are going to be recognized for the work that they’ve done as well.”

Megan Thompson | Design Editor

After leading Nottingham to two straight New York state championships, Legette-Jack became a top-40 high school athlete in the country. She said she could’ve gone anywhere, but for her, the goal was always to climb the hill and play for her hometown team. After four seasons with the Orange, she finished with 1,526 points and 927 rebounds, graduating as the all-time leading scorer and rebounder in SU history.

Legette-Jack exuded confidence as a player, fueled by her adoration for the university. Before her freshman year, the team was practicing at Manley Field House when Legette-Jack told everyone that they were going to win the Big East Championship. Former head coach Barbara Jacobs disagreed with her about the statement, but Legette-Jack was coming off an undefeated high school season and said she “didn’t know what losing (was) supposed to feel like.”

That season, Legette-Jack went on to win 1985 Big East Freshman of the Year, and the Orange beat Villanova by one point to win the conference championship.

“I can go ahead of myself a little bit sometimes,” Legette-Jack said. “ I didn’t live to eat my words. I kind of put it out in the universe.”

When Legette-Jack played, the women’s basketball program was barely recognized as a team, Jacobs said. No one thought she’d get her jersey retired because “the only people to have that honor would be men,” Jacobs said.

SU received criticism for the absence of retired female jerseys, but with Syracuse’s announcement celebrating 50 years of female athletics, the university has begun to recognize some of the “incredible” accomplishments of female athletes, Jacobs said. Acting head coach Vonn Read said his team will be right alongside her in support.

“To see that you chose me, first I’m a woman, second I’m an African American woman,” Legette-Jack said. “It just opens the door for so many more women to be noticed.”

Megan Thompson | Design Editor

Legette-Jack empowers women, Buffalo forward Summer Hemphill said. As head coach of Buffalo’s women’s basketball team, Legette-Jack consistently tells her players not to fall to the level that society wants women to be at, and that through playing basketball, they can tell their stories of what they’ve been through as female athletes.

“She’s very passionate about us owning our womanhood, knowing that we matter as women,” Hemphill said. “Through this game of basketball, we can let each of our individual stories be known to the world.”

With talk swirling about Syracuse unretiring the coveted 44 for Sean Tucker, Legette-Jack couldn’t help but think why there’s no female athlete’s number that wields as much power as 44. She knows what players such as Ernie Davis and Floyd Little mean to the university but hopes that her 33 can mean something too — that women have arrived.

Legette-Jack hopes it means that a girl in the Syracuse public school system can look up at the number 33 and see women rising above it all, that women matter, that women are powerful beyond measure.

“I hope what happens with that 33 is it signifies what I call P-dubs, which is phenomenal women,” Legette-Jack said.

Legette-Jack doesn’t know how she’ll feel on Sunday when her jersey is officially raised alongside the other 21 male numbers, but she will be surrounded by family, the same one she climbed the hill to make proud. She gets to watch her jersey raised in front of the community that she still gives back to.

She’s working with Nottingham’s superintendent to “not let this moment go by.” She wants to ensure that kids know they can climb the hill and do something. She’s a witness, Legette-Jack said.

“That’s what I’m hoping we can accomplish, where I can get somebody to dream a little bit harder and believe a little bit longer,” she said.

Published on November 11, 2021 at 1:11 am

Contact Anthony: aalandt@syr.edu | @anthonyalandt