City of Basketball Love

By Josh Verlin (@jmverlin)
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Two years ago, Aidan Langley faced a life-altering choice.

The Coatesville native could stay at her public high school, where she would undoubtedly be one of the Raiders’ standouts for the next three seasons. Or, she could go to the Westtown School, where she’d be just one piece on a high-level Moose roster that was only getting better and better. 

Playing time was no guarantee for Langley, who only started taking basketball seriously in eighth grade, but the academics and chance to pit herself against some of the best prospects in the country on a daily basis were certainties. 

“It was a tough decision,” Langley said. “It took a very long time for me to decide if I wanted to go or not, but obviously going to Westtown was a good decision.”

Now entering her senior year at Westtown, Langley feels secure in knowing that for her, she made the right choice. Following a spring that saw her garner more than a dozen Division I offers, Langley picked her college this week, committing to Towson on Monday. 

“When I went on my visit there in June, I felt they really wanted me,” she said of head coach Laura Harper and staff. “They were persistent from the first time they talked to me, they were always contacting me, and I just felt the love and I really felt it when I was on the visit; I felt really comfortable with the players that were there, it was nice to meet them and everything. 

“From the visit, I kind of knew because I was just comfortable with everybody.”

Langley has spent most of her two years at Westtown as a reserve forward on a team that easily won the Friends’ Schools League and PAISAA state championships both of her years there. It didn’t help that she suffered an injury just a week into her first practices with the Moose, her ankle sidelining her into November, putting her behind the rest of her teammates in chemistry and conditioning.

But she flashed some intriguing ability when she was on the court, able to stretch the floor with her shooting and finish at a good clip around the rim while rebounding well and defending both frontcourt spots.

She was really able to shine in the offseason, playing with Books & Basketball (BBA) on the Girls’ Under Armour Association (GUAA) circuit. Starting and playing big minutes on a shoe company circuit, she was able to display the full range of abilities she’d been honing over the last few years.

“I give a lot of credit to Aidan and to her family, sticking with it, because I’m sure things didn’t go last year, especially in the beginning, the way they would have hoped for and all that,” Westtown coach Fran Burbidge said. “They stuck with it, and Aidan stuck with it.

“I think the last two months of our season and then our open gyms after the season, you could just see it building and building and building with her.”

Langley’s first collegiate offer came in last year, from Temple. It was static from that point until April, when Charleston and Rider became the first two of a dozen schools who offered in the past few months. 

It was a recruiting deluge that, for Langley, showed all the work she’d been putting in behind the scenes was paying off. 

“Yeah I didn’t play much at Westtown, but I feel like playing at Westtown helped me develop because I played against people that are really good like Jordyn [Palmer], Jessie [Moses], Atlee [Vanesko], all those other people,” she said. “And playing with all my teammates helped me improve, I just felt like it made me more confident that I can play at that level, and I got all those offers from May to now and it really brought up my confidence.”

She took her only official visit to Charleston, taking unofficial visits to Towson, Rider, Fairleigh Dickinson, UMBC, Stony Brook, St. Joe’s and Fordham — all of whom offered — along the way. Though she only did the one overnight, she learned plenty from her visits about just what it was she was looking for. 

“I definitely wanted it to be a mid-sized school, I didn’t want it to be too big or too small,” she said. “And I wanted it to be at a school that was either in the city or by a city, where there were things to do, because it would help with my major, which is business, there’s better opportunities because I’m closer to a city. 

“I was looking for a school that I knew I’d be able to play coming in, my first year, obviously with putting in the work to earn that.”

Harper, a Cheltenham native, is going into her third year as Towson’s head coach. The Tigers have won 21 and 20 games in her first two years, finishing in fifth in the Coastal Athletic Association (CAA) this past season with an 11-7 league record. 

Langley wants to contribute to that winning culture from the moment she steps on the floor; to that end, she’s continuing to work on being able to play both the ‘4’ and ‘5’ at the next level from the get-go.

“The things I want to work on are running the floor better, rim-running, being more consistent with my outside shot,” she said, “and being more confident with my handle.”