The Dawn Staley Legacy award honors Philly’s Big 5 women’s basketball coaches
The Eagles' Jordan Mailata also received the newly renamed Montgomery-Wanamaker Citizen Award, which focuses on Philly sports figures' impact on the community.
It’s been 18 years since Dawn Staley stalked the sidelines at the Liacouras Center, and even longer since she dazzled as a player at Dobbins Tech and on blacktops in North Philly. But her influence and impact on women’s basketball can still be found across the city.
Staley’s lasting impact as a player, coach, and mentor led the Philadelphia Youth Sports Collaborative to establish the Dawn Staley Legacy Award, given to those who have demonstrated outstanding leadership in expanding opportunity and access in women’s sports.
The PYSC honored all six of the Big 5 women’s basketball coaches with the inaugural Staley Legacy Award at its Philadelphia Sports Legacy Honors at the Alan Horwitz “Sixth Man” Center on Wednesday night.
John Middleton, Fran Dunphy, Phil Martelli, and Harry Peretta were among the influential figures in attendance for the ceremony, which raised funds for the Philly Youth Sports Fund.
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St. Joseph’s coach Cindy Griffin, Temple coach Diane Richardson, La Salle coach Mountain MacGillivray, Drexel coach Amy Mallon, and Penn coach Mike McLaughlin were all on hand to receive the award. Villanova coach Denise Dillon was unable to attend, but assistant coach Michelle Sword accepted the honor on Dillon’s behalf.
“Dawn Staley has enriched all of us,” Griffin said in an acceptance speech given on behalf of all six coaches. “It is quite an honor to receive an award named after Coach Staley.”
Staley, the only three-time recipient of the John Wanamaker Athletic Award, was unable to attend Wednesday night’s celebration. Mallon took Staley’s scheduling conflict as an opportunity to take a lighthearted jab at her longtime friend over text.
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“I said, ‘Listen, I’m not taking this award unless you hand it to me personally,’” Mallon said. “Unfortunately for her, she’s not Superwoman. She can’t be everywhere.”
Mallon and Staley crossed paths as college players at Richmond and Virginia, respectively, and spent one season playing together on the Philadelphia Rage in the short-lived American Basketball League.
The two were roommates during their time with the Rage and forged a friendship that has remained through their coaching careers. Mallon said her relationship with Staley makes receiving the award all the more meaningful.
“I’m just honored to receive it in her name,” Mallon said. “I had no doubt, as a teammate, and as a friend, and as a colleague in this work, that what she was going to do was going to impact women’s basketball. She certainly has done it at the highest level.”
Mallon knows the impact grassroots youth basketball programs like the ones supported by the PYSC can have on young people.
The first time Mallon met Amaris Baker, a Cardinal O’Hara graduate who spent two seasons playing for Mallon at Drexel, was in 2012 at a Philly Girls Got Game clinic run by the PYSC. Mallon was an assistant on Dillon’s Drexel staff, which had volunteered to coach during the clinic.
“She has a picture of us, when she was 8, with the team,” Mallon said. “I look back, and then this year, I have her as my star, and one of the stars of the CAA this season. To have it come full circle again, that’s why I do what I do.”
Mailata receives first Montgomery-Wanamaker Citizen Award
Jordan Mailata became the first recipient of the newly renamed Montgomery-Wanamaker Citizen Award.
The PYSC renamed the award to honor the late David Montgomery, former chairman of the Phillies. Through its renaming, the PYSC also shifted the focus of the Montgomery-Wanamaker Award from success in athletics to impact made in the Philadelphia community.
“It’s the first of its kind,” Mailata said. “The fact that I would get to be first is a huge honor. When you get into the space of community service, you don’t do it for the awards. To be recognized for my work in the community, it’s pretty cool.”
Mailata has been involved in philanthropy since moving from his native Australia to join the Eagles through the NFL’s International Player Pathway Program in 2018.
Mailata said charitable outreach was a good way early in his career to get to know the rabid Eagles fan base.
“As a rookie, I would get involved with so many community events, outreach, just to get experience with who we’re dealing with,” Mailata said. “That’s how it all began … My love for community service, and then, now, my love for the fan base, it just makes it easy for me.”
The Eagles offensive tackle records a Christmas album with Lane Johnson and Jason Kelce every year as the “Philly Specials.” Proceeds help to fund Operation Snowball, which gives gifts to school children in Philadelphia.
Mailata recently started his own charitable organization, the Mailata Family Foundation, alongside his wife, Niki. The foundation, which will benefit underprivileged young people, will launch with a benefit concert at Stateside Live! on June 11.
“I see myself in a lot of kids in Philadelphia,” Mailata said. “If it’s having access to equipment, or even just lacking the opportunity to be able to play those sports. I relate to that. Having that kind of hurdle to get through or jump over. That’s why I think it’s so important to look at what PYSC’s doing, giving these kids access.”