Column: Faith and family part of the legacy of Janet Drew
Bittersweet reunion at the ARC on Thursday as Drew family returns to Valparaiso to honor late wife and mother
I knew when Isaiah Shaw signed with the Valparaiso men’s basketball program earlier this spring it would mean the eventual return of the Drew Family to the Athletics-Recreation Center.
I just never thought it would happen this fast, and under these circumstances.
Homer Drew was back on the court that bears his name on Thursday afternoon, signing autographs for youthful campers and observing practice. The legendary architect of the Valparaiso dynasty wasn’t the only family member in town.
Bryce Drew was back in Northwest Indiana along with his wife, Tara, and their son Bryson. Dana (Drew) Shaw and her husband Casey were in the ARC watching their son Isaiah, along with their daughter Anna and sons Caleb and Luke.
The reunion didn’t stop with the Drew and Shaw families. Roger Powell Jr.’s family was in the building. Tara Drew and Tara Powell picked up right where they left off from years of friendship built up when Bryce and Roger were on staff together at Valparaiso and Vanderbilt. Bryson and Liam Powell, sons of the two coaches, and best friends, ran through every corner of the ARC, just as they did when they were younger. Bria Powell and Audrey Garrison, the daughter of Valparaiso special assistant Quintin Garrison, held jumping competitions to see who could touch the bottom of the net.
Everywhere you looked on Thursday there was family. It’s exactly how Janet Drew would’ve wanted it.
It’s heartbreaking to me, and to all in attendance, that she wasn’t there to see everyone together.
Janet passed away last Saturday and the loss is seismic.
It’s not my place, nor am I a good enough writer, to properly eulogize “the Rock of the Drew Family.” She deserves more than a beat reporter who was really only around for the basketball. There will be a Celebration of Life for Janet held at the ARC this Saturday from 2-5 p.m., and remarks will be made at 4 p.m.
There won’t be a dry eye in the building on Saturday and those tears already started to flow on Thursday. I’ll admit that I got choked up sharing an embrace with Homer at center court and the lump never really left my throat through conversations with Bryce and Dana. Where it hit me the most however was during my conversation with Isaiah.
I have to tell you, there is just something special about having Isaiah Shaw in a Valparaiso uniform. Maybe it’s an awful amount of pressure to put on one college kid, but being a bridge to the Drew legacy at Valpo means something. It was never more evident on Thursday as the family gathered on the sidelines at practice and beamed as he went up and down the court with his new teammates.
When I thought about how I wanted to, or if I even should, write about Janet’s passing, I decided that a look through Isaiah’s eyes was the right way to go. After all, once Saturday’s Celebration of Life is complete and Janet is buried in Valparaiso on Sunday, the family will leave town and only Isaiah will remain. Even then, he’ll never be far from family. He’ll never be far from Janet.
“I have a chain that she gave me three years ago and it’s a cross pendant,” Isaiah said. “I wear it because of her and I’ll have it in my shoe before every game. She’ll always be on the court with us.”
There are two hallmarks of Homer and Janet’s life together. Faith and family. They were on display in the fall of 2011 when both were diagnosed with cancer and the pair would sit together with tubes hanging every which way. They’d pray and they’d be together. Lessons that were passed down through the generations.
“Family is one of the most important things in my life,” Isaiah said. “Jesus first and second is my family. My family means the absolute world to me. For me to be at a spot where Valpo is my family and Valpo is my home, it’s something that only God could have written. Being able to play on my Grandpa’s court and being able to wear my Uncle’s number that has been retired, it means something special.”
Isaiah has found strength through his faith and his family over the last week. He had just finished up his first week of practice with his new teammates on Saturday when he received a call from his brother that Janet was on the way to the hospital.
“I hung up the phone and got on my knees and started praying,” Isaiah said. “I prayed and prayed and then I got up, I looked at myself in the mirror and I could almost feel her presence missing. It wasn’t 20 seconds later that I got the call from my dad saying she had passed. It’s bittersweet because while she is now gone, you can’t deny the impact she has had on so many lives.”
I was at a wedding for Scott Drew’s godson last Saturday when the word came down that Janet had passed. It stopped all of us in our tracks. We shared stories. There were laughs and there were tears.
Those stories continued through the week as former Valparaiso basketball players reached out to confirm the news. I debated asking each of them for their favorite Janet memories, but it really wasn’t time for me to put on my reporter hat. That said, former Valparaiso point guard Erik Buggs shared a story with me that is worth repeating.
“It was Wright State my freshman year and I got a concussion,” Buggs said. “Ms. Janet made me come over to the house and she stayed up all night with me. She made me soup. She made sure I wasn’t dizzy. She was a saint. Every interaction I’ve ever had with her was great.”
Buggs is now an assistant coach at Tennessee State and has an understanding of the family backbone that is needed to keep things running smoothly at home in a chaotic industry.
“As a coach in college basketball, your wife is an extension of you to the players,” Buggs said. “Ms. Janet was every bit as important to the Valpo program as Homer or Bryce or Scott. You could tell where Homer got his fiery spirit. It was her.”
As Homer, Bryce and Scott led the Valparaiso basketball program from 1988-2016, Janet was always in the background serving as the rock of the family. Isaiah got to see that close up in Nashville and Phoenix, where Homer and Janet moved after leaving Valpo.
“My dad said something that he might have got from somewhere, he said that the mom is really the heart of the family,” Isaiah said. “She’s the one at the house making sure everything is working. She’s the heartbeat of the family that takes care of the kids, the home, the meals, really just everything. Then my Grandma was a step ahead of that because she was the heart of three households. Bryce’s house. My mom’s house. Scott’s house. That makes this so much harder.”
“I have so many memories. Just getting Culver’s together or getting ice cream. Swimming at her pool in the summer. She’s the one who taught me how to shoot a layup. Playing knockout with her. Going over to her house when she’d make her Steak San Marco.”
While Isaiah’s immediate family members will go their separate ways after Saturday, he’s already feeling the blessing of a new family. The Valpo men’s basketball program has been together for two weeks and the players and coaches are already buzzing that it feels like two months. Bonds have quickly been made and it’s coming from a lesson that Janet Drew has passed on: faith and family.
“The word I’d say in these first two weeks is ‘brotherhood,’” Isaiah said. “I’ve been part of two March Madness teams, championship teams, and both of those teams had a championship feel in the locker room. It had this camaraderie, this brotherhood, this feeling that guys wanted to be together, and we have that here at Valpo this year. Coach Roger has done a tremendous job recruiting the players that fit what he wants in a culture and in a program.”
“My roommate, Jefferson De La Cruz (Monegro), is an unbelievable human being. The first night we moved into our apartment we prayed together. We’ve already gotten our Bibles together. We’ve had guys in the room and we’re planning on doing Bible studies together. I think the underlying foundation of what we have so far in these first two weeks is our faith in Jesus Christ. Jeff is a strong believer. Darius (DeAveiro) is a strong believer. You can go a step further and look at our coaches. The foundation of all of it is being family men and being with Jesus. That’s what I’ve been relying on this week and that’s what we’re going to rely on this season when it gets hard.”
(Photos courtesy of Valpo Athletics)
Honestly, I couldn't read this article with dry eyes. Well done.
This is another award-winning quality story, Paul.
Thank you for writing it.