Quincy's Gormley sisters gearing up for Div. 1 college basketball journeys

Defending one Gormley sister on the basketball court is enough of a challenge. Taking both of them on at one time might make you give up the sport entirely.

"We have an older brother (Eoin, pronounced like "Owen") who's at BC right now," Aoibhe Gormley said. "He doesn't play basketball (in college), but he was a very good player at the high school level. It was 2-on-1, me and Orlagh versus him (in the backyard) for a while, but it got to a certain point where that wasn't going to work out for him anymore."

Aoibhe paused to laugh at the memory.

"Then it got to continuous 1-on-1's" between Orlagh and me, she added. "We've played a couple of (1-on-1) games in our day, but we'd always have to have mom or dad on the deck (watching us) so it wasn't getting too loud or too physical."

The Gormley sisters, both point guards from Quincy, don't square off against each other anymore – and they don't double-team their brother – but soon both will be playing Division 1 college basketball. Just the way they drew it up in those backyard brawls?

"I guess you could say that," Aoibhe said. "It's probably been a goal for a while now."

Aoibhe Gormley (her first name is pronounced like "Ava") will jump into the D1 world first. The former Thayer Academy star is a freshman at Boston University and will kick off her college career Nov. 6 when the Terriers face UMass-Lowell.

"I'm probably going to be nervous when it comes around," she said of her debut, "but I'm excited."

Orlagh Gormley, whose breakout sophomore season at North Quincy High captivated the city, still has a year of high school left – at Dexter Southfield School in Brookline, where she transferred for her junior year. But she recently took a big step by committing to Providence College.

"For me, I really like the Big East Conference," Orlagh Gormley said. "I felt like I could fit in well there. It's really high-competitive basketball, so I definitely wanted the opportunity to play in that type of environment. And Providence is really close, so a bunch of my friends and family can come watch me. And the coaching staff is amazing. They had a vision for me and they have trust in me."

Orlagh Gormley said having an older sister go through the recruiting process first helped her. Orlagh was inundated with offers – 24 by her count, including Vanderbilt, Harvard, Penn State, Michigan, Loyola (Chicago), Buffalo, Pittsburgh, Northeastern, George Washington and Florida Atlantic.

"She definitely guided me through," Orlagh said of Aoibhe. "She had a lot of tips through the whole process."

"You can have friends and people you know who have gone through it," Aoibhe said, "but to have someone in the same house who knows how many calls you're taking and how much pressure there is to try to make the right choice (helps). My main message to her was just don't rush into it. And she obviously didn't. She committed pretty late. She really took her time and explored all her options."

By contrast, Aoibhe's recruitment was simple. She got multiple offers, but her heart was always set on BU. Drawn by the combination of proximity to her home and good academics, she's joining a Terriers program that's on the rise under the direction of third-year coach Melissa Graves. BU was 24-9 last season and made it to the Women's NIT for the first time since 2012.

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The Terriers were fifth in the nation in 3-point shooting a year ago at 38.1 percent. Asked if she will join the long-range party, Aoibhe just laughed.

"I'm a pass-first point guard, I would say," she said. "But having shooters around you makes it so much easier. And then obviously we have (6-foot-4 senior forward) Caitlin Weimar, who's the preseason Player of the Year (in the Patriot League). She's going to have a lot of attention on her this year, so that opens the game up for the guards, which is really exciting."

Aoibhe Gormley, who is 5-foot-8, was the NEPSAC Class A Player of the Year as a junior at Thayer, when she averaged 15.2 points, 7.1 rebounds and 6.7 assists. She was a Class A All-Star as a senior when she scored 16 ppg.

Orlagh Gormley tore up the Patriot League (the high school one) as a North Quincy sophomore in 2021-22, averaging 27.7 points, 8.7 boards and 6 assists while leading the Raiders (24-1) to a spot in the Division 2 state quarterfinals. Her signature moment that season came on March 5, 2022, when she scored 56 points in an 80-57 win over Masconomet Regional to break the single-game city scoring record (boys or girls, Quincy or North Quincy) that had been set by NQ's Brian Ross (54 points) in 1998.

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"My whole sophomore experience, I would never change it for the world," said Orlagh, who's 5-foot-6. "That season was unforgettable – those girls and all my coaches there. The (56-point) game itself was amazing. I can't remember (many details) because I was just in the moment. But it was an amazing run."

The switch to prep school last season lowered her scoring average (to 16 per game) but that was by design as Dexter Southfield boasted a star-studded roster that included three future D1 players – Stoughton's Sheyenne Swain-Price (Temple), Kay Armbrister (FAU) and Blake O'Grady (Missouri State).

"We have a lot of really good players on the team," Dexter Southfield coach Kristen Campopiano said. "And she liked that, too. She is such a good passer. For her not having to score every single time (down the court) and be able to make those passes and get other kids involved, she really enjoyed that."

Campopiano calls Orlagh Gormley, who played for Ireland's Under-18 team last spring, "one of the biggest competitors, on and off the court, that I think I've ever coached. She's just so clutch and she gets it done, regardless of how."

Dexter Southfield lost in the NEPSAC Class AA (elite) final to Noble and Greenough last season. Graduation hit hard, so the 2023-24 version of the team is shaping up to be a young one.

"She really wants to have a really great (senior) season – not just for herself," Campopiano said. "She's a very unselfish player. She really helps bring up a lot of other kids if they're having a bad game. She's very good at finding people shots. Of course, we all know she can score, but she's also very good at finding out who's on that game and who she can get open. She wants the best for everyone on that team and she wants redemption from last season."

The Gormleys crossed paths last winter when Orlagh scored her 1,000th career point in a win over Aoibhe and Thayer. Orlagh called the moment "really cool but a little weird."

Could another sister vs. sister matchup be looming down the road – this time BU vs. Providence?

"It's not on the schedule right now," Aoibhe said, "but my coach had asked me about it. She said, 'If you want us to schedule (Providence) for a non-conference (game), we'll do our best.' It could be something that happens in the future, for sure."

This article originally appeared on The Patriot Ledger: Quincy's Gormley sisters are both headed for D1 college basketball