Ken Black and Michelle Fahy played a huge part in the Cork basketball success story of days gone by

Ken Black, Jerome Westbrooks, Michelle Fahy and Shane Coughlan will be inducted into Basketball Ireland's Hall of Fame in 2026. 

The quartet will formally take their place as the 23rd, 24th, 25th and 26th members of the prestigious hall at the Basketball Ireland Annual Awards ceremony on Saturday, May 23rd at The Osprey Hotel in Naas.

Westbrooks, Fahy and Coughlan all left their mark on Irish basketball as players, with Coughlan becoming the first Irish men's player to be inducted into Basketball Ireland's Hall of Fame. 

Meanwhile, Black has brought huge success in particular to Neptune in the role of head coach, while also bringing his expertise to Irish schools basketball through Chanel College and Loreto Swords over a period of decades.

Ken Black is one of the most influential coaches in the history of the Irish national leagues as well as being a tremendous servant to the game at schools and the grassroots level.

A native of South Carolina, Black first came to Ireland in the autumn of 1984 having been recommended to the Burgerland Neptune head coach position by Terry Strickland, a former player of his at the University of South Carolina at Aiken. 

Together with Ray Smith who Black recruited, a cast of exceptional young Irish players and veterans whom Black empowered and a progressive club executive that would unveil its own Stadium that same season, they transformed Neptune into not just the leading basketball team in the country for the remainder of the decade but one of the most beloved and watched teams in all of Irish sport.

That initial 1984-85 season Neptune won both the league and Cup after two buzzer-beaters from Strickland against arch rivals Blue Demons. 

The highly charismatic and animated Black was also central to that triumph. By assembling the best American tandem in the history of the national league, he introduced a thrilling fast-break game, often initiated by a javelin pass the length of the court from Strickland or Smith. 

He was also the first coach to fully embrace the three-point line introduced that season, allowing Tom O’Sullivan and Tom Wilkinson to show their prowess from that range.

In 1985-86 he led Neptune to another league title as they became the first team in league history to average more than 100 points a game. 

After a stint then with St Vincent’s Dublin, Black returned to Neptune midway through the 1987-88 season to act as an assistant to head coach Bob Stephens and inspire the club to another National Cup and an unprecedented and still unmatched fourth consecutive men’s league title after Gerald Kennedy’s famous 74-foot buzzer-beater against Killester.

By then Black was based in Dublin where he and wife Joan have remained and made a huge contribution to all levels of the game. 

For decades Black coached at Chanel College and Loreto Swords, guiding the latter to the U19B National Cup in 2008. 

He was also instrumental in the progression of Swords Basketball Club, coaching multiple teams and his own children, including daughter Peggy who now captains their women’s national league team.

Michelle Fahy is largely considered the best post player in Irish basketball history for her magnificence at collegiate, national league and international level.

After coming up through the ranks with Maree and Calasanctius College in her native Galway, Fahy played NCAA D1 ball with Iona College, New York, where in her senior year (2003-4) she averaged a conference-leading 19 points a game.

Following a stint playing professionally in Switzerland, Fahy returned to Ireland in 2005-2006 and duly become the most valuable player in the domestic game; for the following eight years there wasn’t a season which she went without winning at least a National Cup or the Superleague, bar a gap year she took in 2010.

Prior to signing her, Glanmire had yet to win a national senior title. 

With her on board, they immediately won the 2006 Superleague (as she picked up the Superleague Player of the Year), followed by the 2007 Cup, and then Cup and League doubles in 2008 and 2009.

When Fahy then moved to Limerick in her work as a Garda and duly fell in with UL Huskies, the balance of power duly moved with her: in her time playing under James Weldon and alongside Olympian Rachael Vanderwal, Fahy and UL duly swept up three consecutive Superleagues (2011, 2012 and 2013) and two National Cups (2012 and 2013) in a stretch that included a remarkable 44-game unbeaten run.

In total, during her seven seasons playing with Glanmire or UL, Fahy accumulated an astonishing six Superleagues and five National Cups (including the 2012 final MVP). 

Admired by all for her remarkable post play and vision and loved by teammates for her humility and leadership, Fahy’s temperament was exceptional, epitomised by her knocking down a couple of free-throws in the closing seconds of the 2008 Cup final to help Glanmire edge Waterford Wildcats by a single point.

During her college and Glanmire years Fahy was also a standout player on an exceptional Irish senior national team that included BI Hall of Famers Susan Moran and Michelle Aspell and came just shy of qualifying for Eurobasket.

After UL swept the boards in 2013, Fahy stepped away from national league basketball, but a few years later came out of retirement to help her hometown club Maree win the 2017 National intermediate Cup and subsequently play some national league and Superleague basketball for them over the following couple of seasons. 

Back home now living in her native town, she continues to serve the club as a coach in its underage section.