Sag Harbor Native Niamh Scanlon Secures Multiple Career Milestones in One Night

When Marc Riley took over as head coach of the Stony Brook School’s girls basketball team this past offseason, he sat down with one of his top players, Sag Harbor native Niamh Scanlon, and asked her what her main goals were coming into this season. Among them was eclipsing the 1,000 career point milestone so many high school basketball players strive for.

Having a good relationship with Scanlon from having coached her on AAU teams in the past, Riley joked with Scanlon that when the time comes that she reaches 999 career points, he’s going to take her out of the game.

On February 6, with Stony Brook hosting Martin Luther in a Public School Athletic Association game, Scanlon came in with 963 career points, 37 points away from that all-important goal. It was going to take a special game for it to happen that night, but it became clear from the onset that it was going to become a reality.

After making a three-pointer in the third quarter, Scanlon was one away from 1,000, and Riley, as promised, sent in a substitution.

“I said, ‘You’re kidding, right? And he said, ‘Nope, go sit your butt down,” Scanlon said.

“I told her, “You look a little tired,” Riley said, with a laugh.

Eventually, with Stony Brook up big, Riley put Scanlon back in the game, and in the opening minute of the fourth quarter, she had finally accomplished her long sought after goal. Her teammates swung the ball around to Scanlon who drained a three-pointer from the right wing and she became just the seventh girls’ basketball player to eclipse the 1,000 point mark, and only the fourth to score all 1,000 points in a Stony Brook uniform.

But she wasn’t done there.

On the same exact play of reaching 1,000, Scanlon also tied the program’s single-game scoring record, which she surpassed just moments later on a layup. The senior finished with 44 points to break the previous record held by Stony Brook Hall of Famer Kristyn Dunleavy, who happened to score 39 points twice in 2006 against Scanlon’s hometown school Pierson.

Senior Night, a single-game scoring record and reaching 1,000 career points all in one night. Plus, with the lopsided victory over Martin Luther, and additional victories to finish the regular season undefeated at 10-0, the regular-season title and top seed in the playoffs, which start this week.

Not too shabby.

“I actually didn’t,” plan on that happening all in one night, “as strange as it seems,” Scanlon said. “I had a home game the very next day and I was planning on spacing it out between those two games.

“After scoring 1,000, I had figured coach would take me back out but he told me I was at 36 points, or close to breaking the single-game record, so he had me stay in and with two minutes left I broke that record as well.”

Riley said Scanlon is the ideal player for a first-year coach like himself to have on a team.

“First of all, there are three sides to Niamh — her basketball/athletic side, her student/academic side, and then the social/crazy side,” Riley joked. “But she’s everything as a first-year coach you want to have in your program because she’s the first person to be there, she’s respectful, she’ll help mentor the younger players, and for a lack of a better term, she handles her business. You see all of those little traits in an athlete and then throw in her academics, I know she’s applied to numerous schools, but she’s top of her stuff.”

Scanlon started attending the college preparatory school in seventh grade and has attended ever since. She lives on campus during the school year and on breaks and in the summertime lives back home in Sag Harbor, where she said she works out with the Pierson/Bridgehampton girls varsity basketball team.

Scanlon said she’s inspired by her two brothers, Seamus, 21, and Colin, 20, as well as her parents, Allison and Michael. She hopes to one day join her brothers in California, where they attend college, Seamus at Marymount University and Colin at Claremont McKenna College, where he runs track.

“All I can say really is that I’m really so driven because of the support system I have at my school and my home,” she said. “I’ve been told by my parents that I can go as far as I wanted to go, and with a lot of it, my brothers have pushed me and encouraged me, even when they weren’t here in the same state. My brothers and my dad have been tallying and calculating my points. It’s really sweet.

“I’ve been at the school for so long, the girls basketball team has been cut down over the years, so much of the faculty and students look up to me to stick with it,” Scanlon added. “I can encourage teammates and other girls to come out and play even though we’re not necessarily playing the competition we really want to be playing.”

Scanlon isn’t only a standout basketball player at Stony Brook. She’s been at a part of five straight undefeated league championship seasons for the volleyball team, earning two All-PSAA honors in the process. She’s earned two All-PSAA recognitions in track and helped the 2019 team win the PSAA title. And she’s helped lead the basketball team to a trio of league titles while earning three All-PSAA nods and a League MVP award.

While Riley said she has the skill to play collegiate basketball, Scanlon puts her athletic prowess on display maybe most notably on the track, where she competes in the long and high jumps, 100-meter hurdles and 400-meter dash. She said she plans to compete in track in college and hopes to join her brothers out in California.