New Richmond – May 20, 2021 isn’t a day Angie Boninsegna and Hannah Blankenship will soon forget.
It’s a day they nearly lost each other.
Leaving Wyoming East, Blankenship’s truck fishtailed on a gravel path, flipping into the river. Boninsegna, the tennis and girls basketball coach at East, remembers hearing the crash.
“I thought I lost her.” Boninsegna said “When we saw that she was okay I was relieved but I didn’t want to leave her sight. The signal down here is lovely so I had to try and get a call off but I wanted to stay where I could see her.”
With her mother and father in Oak Hill for her younger brother’s baseball game, seeing Boninsegna was a huge relief.
“I told her after the wreck I’m thankful you were there because you’re the closest thing to family that I had,” Blankenship said. “I mean my mom and my dad were at a baseball game with my brother so I was here alone. When I saw her I was like ‘Well I’m alright because she’s here with me. It’s going to be okay.’ She stuck right there by my side. I call it a bonding experience but she doesn’t call it that. She says it gave her a heart attack so we’ll leave it at that.”
The experience, while grim, was another chapter that strengthened the bond the two have had for years.
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Boninsegna has always been revered amongst current and former players for her kind heart. Each have their own bond with her stemming largely beyond what she’s accomplished with them in gyms across the state, and at times along the eastern seaboard.
But still Blankenship and Boninsegna’s relationship is unique past that.
For starters Boninsegna hasn’t coached any player as long as she has Blankenship. Following the departure of a class headlined by 2018 Mary Ostrowski co-winner Gabby Lupardus, the Pineville girls basketball job was left vacant. With nobody left to take it, Boninsegna stepped up to the plate, inserting Blankenship as a fourth grader.
“She was such a likable kid,” Boninsegna said. “You could fuss at her and she’d shake her head and say ‘yes ma’am’ and move on. For two years I was trying to get her – and I’ve said this many times – but there was a left side of the court. She always wanted to go right and she’d just grin and go on and never say anything. She’s a kid that really wanted to learn the game though.”
“You can ask her about it but she always said she didn’t know I had a left hand because I’d never go that way. I don’t know that I’d give her that much credit for figuring it out,” Blankenship laughed.
The pair went their separate ways on the court after Blankenship moved up to 7th grade, but reunited in 2018 when she earned a spot on Boninsegna’s roster as a freshman at East.
Blankenship’s freshman season ended with a disappointing loss in the Class AA championship game, but also afforded her the opportunity to help reload the program with the graduation of four starters.
Until an unknown illness took Blankenship out of the game in the fall of 2019.
After deciding to run cross country, the then sophomore’s legs began to hurt all the time, forcing her to go through a series of tests over the next several months to diagnose the problem. After several misdiagnoses, the problem was identified as Cushing syndrome with a tumor on her pituitary gland.
The illness leads to weakness, nausea, weight fluctuation, headaches and vision loss – symptoms Blankenship struggled with during her sophomore campaign. It led to a frustrating year and a low point for her.
“I think the biggest thing is that I couldn’t control it,” Blankenship said. “No matter what I did I didn’t have any say over it. I’d come to practice and some days I’d be fine where you couldn’t ever tell I was sick. Then other days I would just sit on the bleachers and I would cry.”
For Boninsegna it was tough to watch.
The veteran head coach has had numerous players tear their ACLs but this was a new territory that didn’t have the same light at the end of the tunnel that many physical injuries do.
“They thought she had something wrong in her legs at first,” Boninsegna said. “They were still trying to figure it out and we were trying to play her on the offensive end. We’d sub her out with Colleen (Lookabill) on the defensive end because she’d give us all she had but she went through it like a trooper. She’d try to stay positive but some days were better than others. She always tries to look for the good in everything and I think that’s done her good. I always tell she’s got keep the faith because good things are coming.”
After wearing the No. 3 during her freshman campaign, when Blankenship was able to play her sophomore season she made the switch to the number she currently wears – No. 42. Naturally Boninsegna played a roll in that decision as it was her number when she played at Pineville.
“I was proud of her to have my number,” Boninsegna said. “She’s a good kid and we’ve been through a lot together. The car wreck was traumatic for us and we’ve been fortunate she’s been able to walk away from us. I wasn’t fortunate enough to have a child of my own but I feel like I’ve had about 3,000 or 4,000. I think I worry about them as much as their parents do.”
“Part of it was because I was sick but when we were picking numbers Angie said ’42 was my number so I think you should pick it’ and I chose 42,” Blankenship said. “That’s when I started going on my streak and I shot really well when I started wearing that jersey my sophomore year, so I was like ‘Alright, we’re going to roll with it’ and I’ve worn it ever since.”
Blankenship served as one of the team’s elder statesmen that year, helping them reach the regional co-final where they fell. It motivated East for the next year – one that almost didn’t come to fruition.
A week after her sophomore season ended, the Covid-19 pandemic set in and basketball was shelved around the state for the next year. A season that was supposed to begin in November was pushed back to January and then again to March with the possibility of canceling it altogether on the table if one one more postponement was issued.
For Blankenship the year off was an aid. Despite still struggling with some physical limitations, she was able to work re-acclimate herself.
“It allowed me to get in shape mentally and physically,” Blankenship said. “It was tough physically but it was even harder mentally. Having to go through all of that as a teenager, it’s just not what you want to do – it’s not your idea of high school. But it was my high school career so I had to make the most of it but like I said we knew our time was going to come and it did come.”
It did indeed.
After averaging just 5.2 points in 15 minutes per game, Blankenship had a career performance in the Class AA state championship game. She scored 11 points and hauled in 10 rebounds, hitting a crucial pair of 3-pointers in the second quarter as the Lady Warriors left Charleston with a title.
“She had a really rough year,” Boninsegna said. “But one thing about her is she’s always low-key, even keeled and humble. She’s kind of risen. All state tournament last season I kept telling her ‘Just relax Hannah, just relax!’ When she hit some crucial 3s for us I’m glad she got to experience the high because she’s had to experience some of the lows that come along with life.”
Blankenship’s hardships didn’t end there are as 18 days later the wreck occurred. As a result, she sustained a shoulder injury that was discovered earlier this season and it impacted her play.
Over the first six weeks of the season she struggled on offense, failing score in double figures. A gifted 3-pointer shooter, the injury impacted a crucial component of her game but after rehabbing in-season, the senior broke her snide, scoring in double figures four times in the final five games of the regular season.
She capped that stretch with 23-point showing in a sectional championship win over Summers County in her penultimate home game.
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As important as the basketball chemistry the two have is, the connection Boninsegna and Blankenship have off the court transcends anything the pair could achieve on it. Both are highly respected by their fellow coaches and teammates for the people they are and the impact they make off the court.
Boninsegna has long believed in the concept of expressing gratitude. Each year she gets thank you cards for the media and others who have supported and covered the program throughout the year. Each year the entire team signs them and Boninsegna adds a heartfelt message, expressing her gratitude.
It’s a concept that above all, she hopes resonates with her players after they leave the program. For Blankenship it’s already ingrained into her being.
“She definitely has had an impact on my life and she holds me accountable,” Blankenship said. “That’s something you want in a coach. I don’t want to walk in and have somebody that’s going to let me do whatever  I want. I want to be held accountable and told when I mess up and told when I’m wrong. But we are very similar in the way we handle life and our personalities. The thank you cards, that’s something she takes very seriously so I got the team together and we were able to get her a thank you card and some other stuff and it meant a lot to her for us to show appreciation back.”
The gesture caught Boninsegna off guard, but served as affirmation that her overall goal has been a success. It wasn’t a surprise that Blankenship engineered it though.
“It really touched my heart,” Boninsegna said. “I thought something was wrong when they all gathered around me. They said some kind words and all the kids signed it. I’m a big thank you person. I think it’s the least you can do if somebody does something nice for you. Just thank them back. Over the years kids have texted me and it might be in the offseason and said ‘Ang, I think we need to do a thank you card or a sympathy card’ and we send them. Jazz (Blankenship) has done that. Hannah did it with a janitor here who lost her house to a fire. She was the first one to call and say ‘I think we need to send a card that we’re thinking about her.’ That to me is just as important as the wins. The wins are great and our program has been very blessed but to have kids that go out, go through college, get a degree, do positive things in the world – that matters a lot too.
“My dad always told me you treat your athletes as people first and athletes second because you hope they turn out to be better people further down the road. He coached for many years and we still hear stories about how he impacted people. As a coach you don’t know what you’ve done in kids lives. You honestly don’t. You hope you’ve been a positive influence on them but you really don’t know. They gave me that card (Wednesday) and wrote so many kind words. I’ve loved every 28 years I’ve been doing this.”
As the pair enter state tournament play this week, the seven years the two have spent on the hardwood will come to an end on the biggest stage. Blankenship plans to continue playing basketball next season nearby at WVU Tech.
Boninsegna will still be there from time to time, but will do so purely as a spectator and friend.
“It’s going to be hard not having her,” Blankenship said. “I mean she’s fussed at me but I know it’s all out of love. She’s always there to push me and she just wants the best for me and I know that. We have a special bond for sure and I wouldn’t be where I am today without her. She’s straight up with me and honest. When I need to hear something even if I don’t want to hear it I go to her cause I know she’s going to tell me what I need to hear like with my left hand in the fourth grade.”
The experiences the pair have shared have shaped their views and outlooks on life. Boninsegna treasures each moment with her senior after they were nearly capped in May. She’s also helped Blankenship grow as a person with the overarching message that what you do off the court matters far more than the accomplishments achieved on it. The hardships and adversities have opened her eyes to that as well. But like a true Warrior, she’s tackled and battled through each challenge, keeping the faith.
“I think being sick really opened my eyes to a lot in that aspect,” Blankenship said. “I know it’s going to come to a point where my body’s going to be done with basketball. I have bigger goals outside of basketball as far as my education and stuff like that but the whole reason I stuck through it was because of my friends, my teammates and my coaches that kept me going. I couldn’t give up for them. I know how hard life gets sometimes but you have to keep pushing. I have been through a lot but I wouldn’t change it.”
Email: tylerjackson@lootpress.com and follow on Twitter @tjack94