The fatal shooting in Hempstead of 19-year-old Amira McCleod shocked her teammates on the Monroe University women’s basketball team and left them devastated.
No one would have blamed the team had they chose to skip Tuesday evening’s matchup in Selden against Suffolk County Community College. But, by unanimous decision, the Express elected to play in honor of McCleod, a sophomore guard from Queens.
They did their fallen teammate right. Amid the tragedy, Monroe was able to keep it together and beat Suffolk, 69-48.
Coach Damel Ling told Newsday before the game inside Brookhaven Gymnasium that the Rochelle-based college’s administration asked him Sunday morning if he wanted to cancel.
“I said, ‘It’s not on me, it’s on them.’ I asked the question to them, and in less than five minutes they, as a collective group, said, ‘No. We’re going to play,’ ” Ling said, adding of McCleod: “She would wants us to play. We got a purpose to play, so we want to do it.”
“She would wants us to play. We got a purpose to play, so we want to do it,” Monroe University women’s basketball coach Damel Ling, above Tuesday evening courtside, told Newsday of his player’s unanimous decision to play against Suffolk County Community College in Amira McCleod’s honor. Credit: Morgan Campbell
Suffolk held a moment of silence before the game, and Monroe players were visibly emotional. In the middle of Monroe’s bench, someone had placed a framed picture of McCleod alongside teammate and fellow sophomore guard Salimah Williams. McCleod’s black-and-gold No. 11 jersey was draped over the chair.
“We talk a lot about how lucky we are to get to play basketball, but more times than not what we do is bigger than just basketball, and this is one of those instances,” Suffolk coach Rebecca Levy said. “Being able to provide a space that’s hopefully therapeutic for them is important, and we send our condolences to the school, to the family, to the athletic program.”
Said Ling: “I couldn’t ask for a better opponent on this day because of the way they treated us.”
The Nassau County Police Department said McCleod and two Nassau Community College students, both 20-year-old men, were shot just before 11 p.m. Saturday at a house party near Willow and Kennedy avenues in Hempstead. McCleod was pronounced dead at the scene by paramedics, police said. The two other victims were wounded but expected to recover. Police have so far said little about their investigation, including any information about a potential suspect or suspects and the circumstances that led to the gunfire.
In a statement, Monroe University President Jacqueline Ruegger said: “As our women’s basketball team takes the court tonight at Suffolk County Community College, they do so in her memory — carrying forward the strength, joy, and determination she brought to everyone around her.”
Monroe players were not made available for comment.
When asked to describe McCleod, Ling immediately brought up her “infectious smile.”
“That’s the first thing that pops in your head,” he said. “No matter what room she walked in, her smile lit up the room. That’s probably going to be something I miss on a daily basis.”
But on the court, according to her coach, McCleod would guard the opposition’s best player. She had four steals and four rebounds in her final game, a 67-44 victory over upstate Dutchess Community College on Saturday.
Amid her second season at Monroe, a two-year college, McCleod was being recruited by NCAA Division III schools. She wanted to move to Baltimore, Maryland, to be closer to her mother.
“It’s an unimaginable pain and something that none of us know how to deal with, honestly, and nobody wants to deal with this at all,” Monroe athletic director David Spiegel said. “But they’ve done such a good job rallying around each other. Just to even make it here tonight is such an accomplishment.”
Ling said his team is the most connected group he has had in his 27 years of coaching. The team traveled from the school’s Bronx campus to its dorms at the New Rochelle campus, where McCleod was living, on Monday to spend time with each other and McCleod’s other friends in the dorms, according to Spiegel.
Monroe, 9-1 after Tuesday’s win, already was aiming toward a special season. The players will do so in honor of their beloved teammate.
“Before I can even give my coach spiel, that’s kind of what they came up with,” Ling said. “So we can do something real special. Let’s go out and be special.”
Ben Dickson is Newsday Sports’ general assignment reporter. He joined Newsday’s high school sports staff in 2023 after graduating from Maryland, where he covered several of the Terrapins’ teams.
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