GO BIG RED
By LISA M. GILLARD HANSON
GOOD CHEMISTRY
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Girls’ coach Grey Simpson P’20 ’22 and his daughter, Taylor ’22, are bonded by basketball.
any coaches will tell you that their team’s success is often fueled by good chemistry. Grey Simpson P’20 ’22, who happens to teach chemistry at Lawrenceville, is also the School’s head girls’ basketball coach. On the court as in his classroom, Simpson is concerned with bonds and reactions, but in this case, the “matter” is his players, the most experienced of whom this winter is his daughter, Taylor Simpson ’22. And when it comes to basketball, they are both in their element. The Simpsons have been a father/coach and daughter/player duo since Taylor began playing at age 6. Grey has coached girls’ hoops for over two decades, including seven years at The Hill School. “I basically grew up on the [Hill] basketball court, just going to his practices and shooting around when there was a water break, or watching them play,” Taylor says. Grey’s leadership of the girls’ team was “the number one reason” Taylor decided to attend Lawrenceville, where she’s been a four-year varsity player for Big Red.
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T H E L AW R E N T I A N
Big Red played no football games in 2020 due to the pandemic, but head coach Harry Flaherty and his staff still had more than two months to focus on football fundamentals and skills development. Four-year varsity player Taylor Simpson ’22 says one of the many reasons she attended Lawrenceville was the chance to play basketball for her father, coach Grey Simpson P’20 ’22.
