CUMBERLAND — Basketball took Abby Beeman and Kaitlynn Fratz from humble beginnings to across the country, and it landed them on the stage at the 75th Dapper Dan banquet on Sunday.
It’s not the first time the pair have graced that stage, but the last time was from a different vantage point. Beeman and Fratz were multi-time basketball Players of the Year at Frankfort and Northern, respectively.
On Sunday, Fratz was the dinner’s guest speaker, and Beeman was the George W. Stevenson/Nicholas A. Perlozzo Memorial Top Award winner — just the fourth woman to capture the award and the first women’s hoops star.
With 26 athletes sitting behind them being honored with 20 Player of the Year and six recognition awards at the Dick Sterne Memorial Dapper Dan Sports Banquet, there was a similar theme present in both speeches.
“Hard work, I know it sounds cliché,” said Beeman, the 2023 Sun Belt Player of the Year at Marshall.
“Many days, I didn’t feel like getting up and going to the gym. True character and your quest to be great is achieved when you don’t feel like it. A day I don’t get up and go the gym, somebody else is going to.”
Beeman, of Ridgeley, West Virginia, wouldn’t have become Frankfort’s first 2,000-point scorer without hard work, nor would she have earned a Division 2 scholarship at Shepherd, a Division 1 spot at Marshall or 2,236 combined collegiate points between the two spots — all at the height of 5-foot-4.
Her achievements are so numerous it would be impossible for them to go unnoticed, even by a Big Ten assistant basketball coach.
“I love that you led with your heart. It’s undoubtedly paid off,” Fratz said of Beeman. “Also, let me know if you’re positive you don’t have any eligibility left.”
The latter remark drew a laugh from the guests in attendance, but it’s not too far off from Fratz’s reality as a coach and recruiter at one of the top women’s basketball programs in the country.
With the advent of the transfer portal, Fratz was out recruiting on Sunday morning and was thankful Maryland head coach Brenda Frese allowed her to return to Western Maryland to speak at the event, which donates proceeds from the annual awards banquet to The Children’s League.
Fratz, Northern Garrett’s all-time leading basketball scorer, regailed the attendees with what happens when people from the world or major college basketball ask where she’s from.
“I say I’m from Accident,” Fratz said. “I say, it’s a ‘Town of 300, 299 now that I’ve left.’ Then I say I’m from Western Maryland, and they say, ‘So Hagerstown?’ I wish they knew the world west of Hagerstown. It’s truly a special place.
“I’m thankful for my time at Northern. Believe it or not, we were good. When I left, I couldn’t believe girls basketball wasn’t popular everywhere. We had sold out gyms every night.”
Both Fratz and Beeman have similar beginnings.
Both hail from small towns. With a population of 579 in the 2022 census, Beeman’s hometown of Ridgeley dwarfs Fratz’s Accident but few others.
Both began at Division 2 stops. Fratz at California University of Pennsylvania, which she led to the 2015 D2 NCAA championship, and Beeman at Shepherd, which she guided to a school wins record.
And both made it a point to follow their hearts and pursue their passions. It paid off.
“Nothing has been handed to me,” said Beeman, who wants to enter coaching like Fratz when her playing days end. “I’ve worked for everything athletically and academically.”
While basketball was an integral part of Beeman’s life, allowing her to earn a graduate and undergraduate degree for free, she also talked about the importance of prioritizing your identity off the court.
“I encourage everyone here to find an identity,” she said. “I had moments of it always being about basketball. Some day I’ll stop playing basketball. Faith, family and academics are the things that are the most important.”
Awards were presented by past Dapper Dan presidents James K. Cunningham, Fred Bartik and Erich Bean, President Lenny Webb, WCBC’s Garrett Eagan, Banquet Chairman Adam Sterne, executive board members Craig Bridges and Jeremy Irons and former Times-News sportswriter Mike Mathews.
Mathews began the proceedings with the invocation and concluded it with the benediction.
Cunningham paid tribute to Dapper Dan board member Mark Manges, who passed away last September.
Webb followed with the president’s message, in which he instructed the award winners: “Don’t take this moment for granted, you’ll never have it again.”
Eagan and Rock Cioni, who along with Jim Zamagias serve as the voice of Dapper Dan Little League, acted as toastmasters.
After Fratz spoke, Cunningham presented a donation to the Children’s League to Terri McCagh.
McCagh announced the 2023 Dapper Dan Child of the Year Keller Apple, a fifth-grader at South Penn Elementary who has right sided hemiplegia cerebral palsy.
Mathews followed with the introduction of Beeman and featured what’s possibly the dinner’s first mid-banquet selfie.
Beeman began by speaking to the guests about the young athletes behind her.
“I was once in their very shoes, and I know the hard work it took to get here,” she said. “I would encourage you to represent our area well.”
That shouldn’t be too hard with influences like Beeman and Fratz to look up to.