Ann 'Nancy' Coyle, 84, basketball coach

Ann "Nancy" Spellman Coyle, 84, a retired athletic director and winning basketball coach, died of pneumonia Thursday, July 15, at The Lafayette-Redeemer, a retirement residence in Northeast Philadelphia.

Mrs. Coyle retired in 1994 as athletic director at St. Basil Academy, a Catholic girls school in Jenkintown. She coached the school's basketball team to Athletic Association of Catholic Academies championships every year from 1966 to 1969 and from 1979 to 1985. Between stints at St. Basil, she won a championship in 1971 for Villa Joseph Marie High School in Holland, Bucks County.

In the mid-1970s, while coaching at Villa Joseph Marie, she also coached the Holy Family College women's basketball team. And for two seasons, she coached the Holy Family men's team, becoming, according to the Philadelphia Evening Bulletin, "perhaps the nation's only female coach of a collegiate varsity men's basketball team."

Holy Family, which was founded as a women's college, went coed in 1972. By 1975, "the boys wanted equal rights," she told the Bulletin. That year she coached the men's first game against the junior varsity at Community College of Philadelphia. Holy Family won.

As rules for women's basketball changed, she was able to develop new techniques, said Mary Soboleski, who played for Mrs. Coyle at Holy Family. "She had no elaborate playbook," Soboleski said. "Her moves were simple but very effective."

Mrs. Coyle coached at summer basketball camps and coached women's basketball at Manor College for several seasons.

She coached basketball, volleyball, field hockey, swimming, and golf and taught gym at St. Basil, said Kathy Bieker, who was hired as the school's basketball coach when Mrs. Coyle became athletic director in 1991.

Mrs. Coyle once had to teach a home economics class at St. Basil, which was a family joke since she never had time to cook, said a granddaughter, Catie. Mrs. Coyle told her she used the same philosophy as she did coaching. "You show them where to go and what to do, but don't actually shoot the ball."

Mrs. Coyle played basketball for Little Flower High School in Philadelphia and helped coach the team after graduating. Her career got a boost, her son, Joseph, said, when she met a nun on a trolley. The nun told her St. Hubert High School was seeking a basketball coach and gym teacher and urged her to apply. Since Mrs. Coyle didn't have a college degree, the nun suggested she register for classes at Beaver College (now Arcadia University).

Mrs. Coyle took the advice and got the job. For years she took courses at Beaver but fell three or four credits short of graduating, her son said.

Mrs. Coyle's husband of 57 years, Joseph P. Coyle, died in 2009. In addition to her son and granddaughter, she is survived by a granddaughter, Annie, and two sisters.

Friends may call from 6 to 8 p.m. Tuesday, July 20, and from 9:30 a.m. followed by a Funeral Mass at 11 a.m. Wednesday, July 21, at St. Christopher Roman Catholic Church, 13301 Proctor Rd., Philadelphia.

Memorial donations may be made to the Nancy Coyle Scholarship Fund, St. Basil Academy, 711 Fox Chase Rd., Jenkintown, Pa. 19046.