'I miss her dearly.' Cancer awareness night carries special significance for two coaches
Minutes before tipoff for the first game of the high school basketball season at Beech Grove, Greenfield-Central coach Luke Meredith looked to the bleachers to see his father, Jeffrey. Next to his dad was an empty spot.
It is where his mother, Brenda, normally would cheer on the Cougars.
“It got me in my feelings a little bit,” Meredith said. “She didn’t miss a game. She was a great mom and I miss her dearly.”
Greenfield-Central, the last undefeated team in the state, has not lost a game since Brenda Meredith died at age 66 on Aug. 19, the end of a three-year battle following her diagnosis with stage 4 colon cancer. On Saturday night, the Cougars will wear pink shooting shirts with “BM” initials on the back with the words “Beat Cancer #nevergiveup.”
Saturday is cancer awareness night at Avon, where the coach trying to hand Meredith his first loss has a similar story. Drew Schauss’ mother, Elizabeth Schauss, died at the far-too-young age of 53 in May 2018. Just 10 months earlier, she was diagnosed with ovarian cancer.
“She was my sounding board,” Schauss said. “She meant the world to me.”
Meredith, in his fifth season at Greenfield-Central, was previously an assistant at Avon. Though he had no prior connection to Schauss, in his third season at Avon after two at Logansport, Meredith reached out about a cancer awareness night before last season’s game at Greenfield-Central to honor both of their mothers and anyone else in attendance.
Brenda Meredith attended last year’s cancer awareness game at Greenfield-Central. Luke was hopeful she would be able to attend this year, too. But her health deteriorated quickly in August, and she was placed in hospice care. Luke and his father were with her when she passed away.
“She’s the toughest person I ever met,” Luke said. “She was going through chemo for three years and you would have never known. I don’t think she ever let on how bad it was affecting her. We thought she was going to be able to get out in August, but it didn’t happen. It made this last Christmas really tough for all of us.”
Brenda Meredith, who retired as a project manager from Eli Lilly in 2016 after 28 years, lived in rural Hendricks County with Jeffrey, her husband of 44 years. She enjoyed playing host to her six grandchildren (Luke and wife Jessica Meredith have two sons and daughter Kelly and husband Brian Roth have a son and three daughters).
Luke credits his mother as a big reason he is in coaching now. In 2017, when Jeff Holloway was tabbed to replace current Avon athletic director Jason Young as boys basketball coach, Meredith wondered if it might be time to get out of coaching and try something else.
“I remember talking to my mom about that,” Meredith said. “She said, ‘Go out there and prove them wrong.’ I’m glad she did. Ultimately, it worked it out. I got hired at Greenfield-Central (in 2019) and she became a big supporter for us. I catch myself looking up all the time to where she used to sit.”
Beth Schauss never did get the chance to see Drew as a head coach. He was hired at Logansport in 2019, a year after she died. But she would not have been surprised; coaching and teaching is in the Schauss’ blood. Drew’s father, Rick, coached at Centerville and now assists Drew’s brother, Matt Schauss, at Columbia City.
Drew, who played at Division II Brevard (N.C.) before transferring to Bethel for his senior season to play with his brother, said his mother’s viewing in 2018 represented a fork in the road moment. He was 27 at the time had been coaching college basketball as an assistant at Bethel, Holy Cross College and John Brown University (Ark.) before returning to Bethel as a full-time assistant. Beth Schauss, a graduate of Hagerstown and Ball State, had taught for 31 years, including her last 21 with Centerville-Abington Community Schools.
Beth’s passion was literacy; she led the reading recovery program at Centerville.
“During her viewing there were so many people there whose lives she touched,” Drew said. “It made me think that’s what I should be doing. I think she be proud that I’m a public school educator because that’s what her career was all about. I think my brother and I both get our heart for helping kids from her and my dad.”
Like Brenda Meredith, Beth Schauss rarely missed her son’s games.
“She was the ultimate supporter,” Drew said. “Even when I was playing basketball in North Carolina in college, she still made it to at least 10 games a year. When my brother and I were playing at Bethel, she never missed one.”
Schauss and Meredith encourage anyone who is battling cancer or would like to recognize someone who is fighting cancer or lost someone to cancer to attend Saturday’s game. They will be recognized and honored with a carnation.
“We want to honor them and bring awareness to anyone going through any type of cancer,” Schauss said. “It impacts a lot of people.”
Including the coaches who will be on the sideline Saturday night. Through a common bond, Meredith and Schauss have become friends.
“He’s a good man,” Meredith said of Schauss. “We might be coaching on different sides (Saturday), but we bounce ideas off each other a lot. Hopefully, this cancer awareness night is something we can continue to do together because it means a lot to both of us.”
Call Star reporter Kyle Neddenriep at (317) 444-6649.
This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: IHSAA basketball: Cancer awareness night deeply personal for two coaches
