HIGH SCHOOL

New Castle's Ray Pavy remembered for positive outlook on life. 'We truly lost a legend.'

Kyle Neddenriep
Indianapolis Star

New Castle mayor Greg York first got to know Ray Pavy in the early 1980s, when Steve Alford was the star basketball player at New Castle and on his way to an IU career that would culminate with a national championship.

York and Pavy developed a lasting friendship, traveling the road to Bloomington for IU basketball games together for many years as season-ticket holders. York called Pavy, who died late Monday night at age 80, “literally the strongest person physically and mentally that I’ve met in my life.” But it was maybe not until the funeral of Jimmy Rayl, a man forever intertwined with Pavy, in January of 2019 that York fully understood the scope of Pavy’s impact on people.

“There was a group of young men there and one of them said, ‘Mr. Pavy, I’ve never shook a legend’s hand before — can I shake your hand?’” said York, who is brought to tears when he tells the story. “He shook their hands and patted them on the back and asked them where they were going to school. He talked to them like he’d known them forever. Has just a caring, loving man. We truly lost a legend.”

From Kyle in 2018:Car accident nearly took everything from Ray Pavy — everything but love for basketball

From Doyel in 2020:Ray Pavy's biggest victory came after paralysis

Pavy, a former basketball player, coach, teacher and assistant superintendent at New Castle — a role he filled for 31 years — was a basketball legend in New Castle first. He starred in one of the most famous games in the state’s long and storied hoops history in a game that was dubbed the “Church Street Shootout” after the location of the gym in New Castle where it was played. On Feb. 20, 1959, in the final game of the regular season, Pavy scored 51 points to Rayl’s 49 and New Castle defeated Kokomo, 92-81.

The greatest scoring 1-2 scoring punch in Indiana All-Star history, Kokomo's Jimmy Rayl and Ray Pavy of New Castle talk over strategy in 1959.

“I don’t know what other people would think the best five Indiana high school games historically would be,” Pavy said in 2018. “But that one would probably be one of the five.”

Rayl was named Mr. Basketball. Pavy wore the No. 2 jersey for the Indiana All-Stars. Both went to Indiana, where Rayl would eventually star. Pavy worked his way into the starting lineup as a sophomore in 1960-61. But on Sept. 2, 1961, en route to a fraternity brother’s wedding in Whiting, a car Pavy was driving on Highway 52 in Benton County struck an oncoming truck. Pavy’s fiancé, Betty Sue Pierce, died in the accident. Pavy was paralyzed from the waist down and would never walk again.

Basketball, as a player, was over for Pavy. But he returned to IU to earn his degree and is believed to be the school’s first wheelchair-using student and graduated in 1965. Where there were certainly “why me?” moments for Pavy, he rarely showed anything but a selfless, sunny attitude.

“Education was important to him,” said Karen, his wife of 46 years. “Church was important to him. He didn’t know a stranger. Everywhere we went, we ran into somebody who knew him. He always had a story to tell. He could remember games back to the dark ages and could tell you who was in what position. He would travel the state with his nephew (Bill Walker) and visit old high school gymnasiums. Some of them were locked up, but there was always somebody with a key to let them in.”

Pavy coached basketball at Sulphur Springs, a Henry County school that then consolidated with Cadiz and Middletown to form Shenandoah. He coached Shenandoah for six years, winning two sectional titles and compiling a 90-43 record. Then? “I got fired,” Pavy said in 2018. “We had won 19 games that season. How are you going to fire a guy who did that? Well, they did.”

Pavy, at 31, took a job teaching and coaching as an assistant at New Castle in 1973. He married Karen, also a teacher, in April of 1976. Pavy took great pride in his work in education over the next three decades.

“If you can get teachers who are good teachers to help get kids on the right path, then you have really done something,” Pavy said. “We hired some teachers here at that time who were just dynamite. My kids (Sam and Dori) would come home from college and say, ‘That Mrs. Carmony really got me ready for college.’ I’d say, ‘Here’s the keys, go down to school and tell her.’ The pay isn’t great, but the satisfaction is wonderful if you tell them they made a difference in your life.”

Karen’s brother, Dave McCoy, said Pavy had a natural touch with people that was unique. He saw it often firsthand.

Former New Castle basketball standout Ray Pavy.

“He changed so many people’s lives by the way he conducted his own life after the accident,” McCoy said. “We would run into people all the time who would have stories and memories of him. He changed my life in the last 40 years. He didn’t lead people by force, but he led people with great enthusiasm and he knew how to handle people to get them to the next level.”

Pavy stayed up to date in the current happenings of high school basketball. He was a regular at New Castle Fieldhouse, which he missed in playing in by one year.

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“He was a faithful Trojans through and through,” said New Castle basketball coach Daniel Cox. “Ray was a bright light in our community. He always had a smile on his face when he’d greet you — just a positive guy. He lived a full life. For the cards he was dealt at a young age, he led a remarkable life. That shows what he’s made of.”

York said he saw Pavy on Saturday when he brought him a milkshake. Pavy was in hospice care in his final week and died peacefully at his home late Monday night. Funeral arrangements are pending.

In 2021, a portion of Church Street in New Castle was named “Ray Pavy Way.” He was inducted into the Indiana Basketball Hall of Fame in 1990.

“Ray was beloved friend to so many around the IU athletic department, and I will personally miss him enormously,” IU athletic director Scott Dolson said. “I always looked forward to seeing him every summer at our men’s basketball reunions and catching up, as well as at so many of our basketball games in years past. While his IU playing career was cut short prematurely due to a tragic auto accident, he’s very much been an integral part of our IU Basketball family for the last 60 years. No one has represented the program any better during those 60 years than Ray. I want to extend my deepest condolences to Karen and the entire Pavy family.”

York shared a story of when he and Pavy traveled to Hinkle Fieldhouse, then IU, for a Saturday afternoon doubleheader. After the second game, Pavy asked: “You think we would get back in time to see the Trojans play?” They did, capping the Saturday with a New Castle home game and completing the tripleheader.

But it was not the basketball York remembers as much from the day as the reaction to his friend everywhere they went.

“If you ever wanted to feel what it’s like to be a movie star,” York said, “all you had to do was spend some time around Ray Pavy.”

Call Star reporter Kyle Neddenriep at (317) 444-6649.