A look inside the Pep Band’s legacy on Hawk Hill

Tim Laushey is perched in the first row of seats in the east corner of Hagan Arena, his back to the court, gesturing to a group of musicians above him. Outfitted in hockey-style St. Joe’s jerseys, the band members cleanly execute the notes to “When the Hawks Go Flying In” and “Mine Eyes” as they inject the arena with the soundtrack of college basketball. 

In fact, as one of five pep bands to appear in EA Sports’ “NCAA March Madness 2005” video game, the St. Joe’s Pep Band once really did provide EA Sports with the music of college basketball.

The band’s nationally recognized acclaim is hard to spot by taking a peek inside what could easily be mistaken for a janitor’s closet outside of Section 209 in Hagan Arena. 

Laushey, the Pep Band director, runs his operation out of this humble room, which measures about 40 cubic feet and is overflowing with instruments, cardboard boxes that once held food for the 30 band members, and enough St. Joe’s band and basketball memorabilia to keep a basketball historian busy for hours. 

Laushey swung open the door and somehow finagled a fold-up table the size of the room itself out of it and set it up in the hallway. He sat behind it with his wife, Sue, who helps him run the band’s day-to-day operations. The couple reminisced about the journey the band has taken them on.

It all began 25 years ago when Laushey was approached by a group of diehard St. Joe’s basketball fans who wanted to up the school’s game, so to speak. 

“St. Joe’s was really playing, as they do now, a very high level of basketball,” Laushey  said, “but they had no band besides a bass drum, a trumpet player and a guy with a cowbell.”

 Sue Laushey continued the story. 

“They said, ‘We’re playing Division I basketball and don’t have a Division I Band,’” she recollected.

Nicholas Rashford, S.J., then president of St. Joe’s, along with athletic director Don DiJulia, attended the Final Four in 1993 and decided that acquiring a band would propel the program to the next level. Laushey was recommended by a group of alumni and was brought in to meet with DiJulia and former assistant athletic director Ellen Ryan.

“I walk out, and I’m thinking to myself, ‘That did not go well,’” Laushey said. “Mr. Dijulia caught me in the hallway and said, ‘Why don’t we try it for a year?’ At the end of every meeting for the last 25 years, he’s said ‘Well, do you want to try it for one more year?’ And so that ‘Let’s try it for a year’ has turned into 25.”

The last 25 years have witnessed an Elite Eight appearance, Atlantic 10 championships, NCAA Tournament runs, the stand-out careers of numerous St. Joe’s basketball legends and a lifetime of stories. Laushey, who admittedly was not a big basketball fan when he accepted the job, has turned into a St. Joe’s basketball fanatic himself.

For a man whose tenure standing courtside at Hawk basketball is only outdone by the legendary duo of DiJulia and head coach Phil Martelli, the memories are endless.

Laushey remembered the time in the historic 2003-2004 season during the NCAA tournament in Buffalo when one of the musicians forgot his trumpet, so he bought an antique off of the wall at the Anchor Bar, where buffalo wings were invented. Another time in 2016, he cut down the net after an Atlantic 10 Championship at the Barclays Center. Once he received a ring after the women’s A-10 Championship. 

There was that time NBA legend Bill Walton personally commended the band’s playing, and the time the band had to trade an A-10 Championship celebration for a red-eye bus ride back to Philly to play for a women’s game. 

On any given game day, the Pep Band consists of about 24 current students and five or six alumni playing percussion, bass guitar and an array of brass instruments. The numbers vary depending on the game, but Laushey always finds a way to electrify the arena with songs that have become a cornerstone of Hawks basketball.

The Pep Band plays both the women’s and the men’s games, making for a travel schedule that is among the most demanding on campus. 

They also invoke the services of alumni, an aspect that is unique to a few schools. Laushey pointed out that without a football team that uses a marching band and without a prominent music program, they are always happy to see old faces – and their instruments – return to Hawk Hill. 

 “There’s always that open invitation to come back,” said former Pep Band president and current alumni trombone player Caitlin Naylor, ’11, M.A. ’12. “They’re so understanding and welcoming, and it’s been awesome to be able to come back, play music and cheer on my Hawks.” 

A diehard among Pep Band fans, Ed Fisher ’03 has not missed a game in 10 years, according to Laushey. Fisher is blind, but Laushey said Fisher “knows the ball is going in the basket before it goes in.”

Fisher has been a mainstay at men’s basketball games since the magical 2003-2004 season, his first year after graduating, which he said gave him a completely different perspective on St. Joe’s basketball and kept him coming back ever since.

“I don’t know that alumni anywhere else in the country get this chance to come back after they’re done and keep on playing,” Fisher said. “I love going to the games, and I love playing the trumpet, so it was a no-brainer to come back and continue playing every year.”

One of the draws for members of the Pep Band are the Lausheys themselves. 

“Tim and Sue have built the program into a family,” Naylor said. “They really care about you and that really goes with cura personalis and the Jesuit ideals. I’ve met my best friends through the Pep Band, and the older alumni that come back and play have been huge role models to me.”

Anthony Savarese ’19, the incoming Pep Band president, also lauded the unifying power that the Pep Band has, touching on the solidarity between the band, the players and the students.

“The team is putting on the show,” Savarese said of the basketball players. “Then it’s the band’s job to fire them up and fire the student section up and really help with that community aspect.”

Like many of the band’s members, Savarese didn’t come to St. Joe’s to study music, but he brought his passion for playing the saxophone with him and uses the Pep Band as an outlet for that passion. 

“I’m not sure how aware I was of Pep Band before coming, but once they said you get to go to all the basketball games and get to play music, what’s not to love about that?” Savarese said with a laugh.