MT. MORRIS TOWNSHIP, MI – Mose Lacy was considered royalty in the Beecher community so it’s appropriate that he received a send-off fit for a king.
Lacy, who died Aug. 19 at age 82, lay in state Friday at center court of the Beecher field house that bears his name and several hundred people showed up to pay their respects. He was laid to rest Saturday after a funeral service inside the gym.
The former Beecher basketball coach is being remembered fondly not only for the success his teams enjoyed but for the lives he touched in the community and the men he molded after moving to the Flint area from his native Alabama in 1969.
Lacy was beloved in the Beecher community not for his basketball success but because he helped mold hundreds of boys into productive men.
He treated everyone the same, whether it was a star player, somebody who rode the bench or just a stranger he crossed paths while going about his daily business in the community, according to younger brother Solomon.
“The thing that made him in this community is his relationship with the whole community,” said Solomon Lacy, who replaced his brother as Beecher’s head coach when Mose retired. “Daddies, uncles, guys on the street. He had something for all of them.
“He had the kind of personality to address all of them. He didn’t overlook anybody.”
On his basketball teams, none of his players were treated with star status.
Nobody Lacy coached was more talented than the late Roy Marble. He was the 1985 Mr. Basketball runner-up to Northwestern’s Glen Rice after leading the Bucs to a 27-0 record, played in the McDonald’s All-American game, starred at Iowa and played in the NBA.
But Lacy didn’t hesitate to tell Marble when he wasn’t meeting expectations.
“Nobody got treated any differently because of their skilled level,” Solomon Lacy said. “I saw him ream Roy Marble up one side and down the other. He said, ‘You know what you can do if you don’t like how I run things.’ Roy said, ‘I ain’t said nothing, Mr. Lacy!’”
Courtney Hawkins was among the most gifted athletes ever to come out of Beecher.
He was All-State in football, basketball and track, played football at Michigan State and in the NFL for nine seasons, and eventually became Beecher’s athletic director and football coach before returning to MSU this year as the Spartans’ wide receivers coach.
But Lacy once told Hawkins after a regional playoff game to take off his uniform and leave it in the locker room if he wasn’t going to play the Beecher way. Hawkins later said he had just committed to Michigan State and Lacy was bringing him down a notch.
Hawkins was devoted to Lacy and Friday, he was the final person to said his goodbyes, speaking to him in private before kissing his old coach.
“There’s so many great memories, so many life lessons,” said Hawkins, who became emotional while recalling Lacy. “There’s things I that I teach my kids now, there’s things I’m teaching up at Michigan State right now, that came straight from coach, about discipline and having things in line.
“We’ve always been looked down upon because we’re little, small Beecher. But coach made sure we knew we were important, that we were special, that we could be great and we could achieve whatever goals we had and our dreams.
“Some chose to listen and some didn’t but he gave you the road map. Without coach, there’s so many of us that are successful, it just wouldn’t have happened. I’m not shooting any smoke, it just would not have happened.”
Lacy wasn’t shy about speaking up when he thought his players weren’t being treated fairly and that rubbed many people the wrong way. He was often at odds with referees whom he thought were doing a sub-par job, leading to public reprimands.
He could also be intimidating to people who didn’t know him.
But away from the basketball floor or football field, where he was an assistant offensive line coach, Lacy was a big softy in many ways.
“Just a misunderstood diamond,” Hawkins said. “He was funny. Just things that people don’t know. He was a funny, funny guy. His bark was way bigger than his bite. He’s got a huge voice that would scare the hell out of some people.
“But once you get to know coach and you understand his angle and where he’s coming from, that huge voice was yelling out love. I was able to live my dream, college football and then pro football. Every step of the way, this is the guy that I would call on.
“‘Coach, what do you think? Should I do this, should I do that?’ I was a free agent. ‘Coach. you think I should play here or go play there?’ He never steered me wrong.”
In his Twitter tribute to Lacy on Facebook last week, Hawkins called his former coach a “father to the fatherless” because of the way he looked after athletes who came from single-parent households.
But Lacy was more than that, according to daughter Sophia Lacy. He also filled the role of mother for her.
“My dad was my backbone,” said Sophia, Lacy’s only child who lives in South Carolina. “He was always there for me. My mother died when I was 18. He was my father and my mother. He flew me up here every summer. My mother never had to put him on child support or anything. He sent money when he wasn’t supposed to send money. ‘Get yourself some extra stuff.’
“I remember some of these kids sitting on my dad’s porch. I’d see Courtney or Carl (Banks, a former New York Giant) sitting on the porch waiting to talk to him. I remember he would buy tennis shoes and do stuff for other people that didn’t have enough food or stuff like that.
“As I got older, I understood what he meant to Beecher. It touches my heart.”
Lacy made Sophia’s oldest daughter, India, promise to finish high school and go to college. He would often drive her to Michigan State and today she’s a certified public accountant.
“He was real proud of that,” Sophia Lacy said.
While he was battling prostate cancer for the past couple of years, Lacy would tell his youngest granddaughter, 13-year-old Kamya, not to shed any tears over him and instead celebrate his life.
While Lacy was demanding of his players – how many great coaches aren’t? – he also had a soft side that not everybody saw.
When a player had a bad game on a Friday night, Lacy would often show up unannounced on Saturday morning, drive the player to McDonald’s, buy him breakfast and talk about what had happened the previous night.
As thrilled as he was to see the likes of Marble, Hawkins and Banks enjoy professional success, Solomon Lacy said his brother was proud to see several of his former players become ministers.
“That was special to him,” Solomon Lacy said. “And the other thing that was special to him is how many of his kids turned out to be good, contributing people to the community. Courtney, Earnest Steward, Aaron Williams. He was proud of them.
“He said, ’I don’t take a lot of credit for the ones who went pro. But I’d like to think I made the difference between these men being a good daddy, a good husband. If I played any role in there, that’s as important to me as them going pro.’”
Lacy won Class B state championships in 1985 and 1987 as Beecher’s head coach after helping the Bucs win one in 1976, when he was an assistant coach.
Current Bucs coach Mike Williams has far surpassed that level of success after leading the Bucs to five state titles in six years. But Lacy never resented that. In fact, it was just the opposite.
“He’s been a mentor to me, like a father figure,” said Williams, who replaced Hawkins as Beecher’s AD. “He’s just someone special that we’re really going to miss. He was there for all the victories but the most special moment I had with him was after we lost in 2008 in the state championship.
“I was down, I was out, and he was the first person to call. He told me everything was going to be OK. He told me that I would win multiple state titles, just keep doing what I was doing. He was my biggest fan and he always helped uplift me.”
Like Hawkins and Sophia Lacy, Williams will remember Lacy for his sense of humor.
One of Williams’ favorite memories involves point guard Keyon Menifield, who will be the Bucs’ top player this season. It happened three years ago when Menifield, who has since grown to be 6-foot-2, was a diminutive freshman playing in his first varsity game.
“Keyon’s first free throws, his legs were shaking,” Williams said. “Keyon was about 5-foot-2 at the time. A lot of people questioned why would I have a kid that small on varsity. Mose came into the locker room after the game and said, ‘Where’s the little dude at? Mike, I want to see the little dude!’
“Keyon had no idea who coach Lacy was. He just grabbed Keyon and he hugged him and said, ‘You’re going to be all right.’ Coach Lacy took those big old hands and smacked him on the butt and it looked like Keyon lifted up two feet off the ground.
“Coach Lacy left the locker room and we looked at Keyon and said, ‘Do you know that is?’ He said no. ‘That’s who this building is named after and he said you’re going to be all right.’ We just laughed. It brought joy to the room and that’s what coach Lacy did.
“Whether he loved you hard or whether he loved you soft, he always brought joy to the room.”
MORE:
Beloved Beecher coach Mose Lacy dies at 82
Mose Lacy touched lives, molded men at Beecher
State titles, discipline, tough lough part of Lacy’s legacy
COVID-19 claims llife of new Beecher AD Mike Williams
Courtney Hawkins named MSU assistant coach
The Link LonkAugust 30, 2020 at 02:20AM
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Beecher gives legendary basketball coach Mose Lacy send-off fit for a king - MLive.com
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