Moravian Mourns the Passing of Legendary Head Women’s Basketball Coach & Director of Athletics Mary Beth Spirk
BETHLEHEM, Pa. – Moravian University Athletics mourns the passing of legendary Head Women’s Basketball Coach and Director of Athletics Mary Beth Spirk, who passed away on Friday, April 10.
BETHLEHEM, Pa. – Moravian University Athletics mourns the passing of legendary Head Women's Basketball Coach and Director of Athletics Mary Beth Spirk, who passed away on Friday, April 10.
Services for Coach Spirk are as follows:
A Mass of Christian Burial will be held for Mary Beth at Saint Theresa 1408 Easton Road, Hellertown on Friday, April 17, 2026 at 10:30am. A viewing will be held at Steel Club 700 Linden Ave., Hellertown on Thursday April 16, 2026, from noon to 3pm and from 5pm to 8pm. A private interment will follow at a later date at the convenience of the family.
In lieu of flowers, the family requests contributions be made in Mary Beth's memory to the Kay Yow Cancer Fund at www.kayyow.com.
Obituary from Connell Funeral Home.
"Mary Beth Spirk didn't just coach basketball — she shaped the soul of Moravian athletics for nearly five decades. I knew her first as a coach when I was a student-athlete here, and over the years she became a dear friend, someone whose fierce devotion to her players and to this place inspired everyone around her. Her 659 victories tell one story, but the thousands of lives she changed tell the fuller one. That she returned to the sideline this season, leading her team into the postseason one final time, surprises no one who knew her heart. We have lost a legend, and I join our entire Moravian community — and the broader world of women's athletics — in grieving her passing. We will carry her forward in everything we do," commented Moravian University President Dr. Bryon L. Grigsby '90.
This past February, Spirk announced her retirement as Head Women's Basketball Coach after the 2025-26 season, and that she would be stepping down as Director of Athletics on May 1. She arrived at Moravian University, then College, in October 1981 shortly after her graduation from Dickinson College as an assistant women's basketball coach, and she worked for five decades at the school including 38 seasons as Head Women's Basketball Coach as well as Director of Athletics & Recreation since June of 2017. Spirk's tenure at Moravian has also saw her serve as an assistant softball coach, head softball coach, associate professor of physical education, assistant athletics director beginning in 2001 and moving to associate athletics director and Senior Woman Administrator in 2011.
Spirk, who returned to the sideline in 2025-26 after missing the 2024-25 campaign with her cancer diagnosis, guided the squad into the postseason for the 34th time in her career this season, and she completed her coaching tenure a 659-360 record in her career, ranking 20th in total victories in NCAA Division III history. Spirk coached the Blue & Grey to seven Middle Atlantic Southeast titles, three Middle Atlantic South Championships, two Middle Atlantic Conference crowns, nine NCAA bids, three "Sweet 16" appearances, an ECAC Championship in 2007, and the 2010 Landmark Conference Championship. In 2019, Spirk surpassed the 600-win milestone with a 13-point rally over rival Muhlenberg College. She coached 24 1,000-point scorers, 15 All-Americans, countless All-Conference performers, and a National Player of the Year in Kathy Beck.
The 1991-92 season saw the Greyhounds enjoy the most successful season the college has ever experienced. Their 31-2 campaign culminated in hosting the Final Four, an article in Sports Illustrated and a National Runner-Up finish. Spirk's efforts that year netted her the Women's Basketball Coaches Association National Coach of the Year award, as well as MAC and Mid-Atlantic Region Honors. She is a ten-time Conference Coach of the Year including Landmark Conference Coaching Staff of the Year in 2010.
Spirk was instrumental in helping Moravian lead NCAA Division III in fundraising for the Kay Yow Cancer Fund over the last 18 years with the Greyhounds raising more than $281,582, including a high mark of $28,172 in 2026. The Hounds have led DIII in Play4Kay each year since 2009, and the Kay Yow Cancer Fund donated $50,000 in Spirk's name to the St. Luke's Hospital Cancer Center to the fight against Cancer in February 2025.
In March 2025, Spirk was selected as one of the 28 winners of the 2024-25 National Association of Collegiate Athletics AD of the Year Award. Since she took over as Director of Athletics & Recreation, Spirk guided major growth in the department. Since 2017, Moravian added three varsity sports (men's & women's swimming in 2021-22 and women's golf in 2023-24), finished making all head coaching positions full-time staff members, worked on a proposal that will ensure all sport program have at least one full-time assistant coach by 2026, began Moravian's successful annual Athletics Giving Challenge in 2019 that has raised $1,020,188 in seven years including a record $181,988 in November 2024, revamped the athletic department's mission statement, core values and brand standards in 2024, move the department to strictly online ticket sales through HomeTown Ticketing in 2023 and signed a contract to transition the entire department to Teamworks in 2025.
Spirk oversaw many facility upgrades in her tenure as AD including new turf at Rocco Calvo Field in 2018 along with a digital scoreboard and a new track surface in 2024, a state of the art golf simulator room for the golf program in 2023, new bleachers and a digital scorer's table in Johnston Hall in 2021, a new Mondo surface in Timothy Breidegam Fieldhouse in 2020, a new scoreboard on John Makuvek Field in 2023, a new indoor hitting area for baseball in 2025, upgrades to the athletic training room, equipment room, student-athlete performance center, a new turf surface on John Makuvek Field in 2025, the lobby of Johnston Hall and the conference room in Johnston Hall in the last two years.
Her leadership roles also extend to the Landmark Conference where she served as Vice-Chair of the Athletic Directors group from 2020 to 2022, and Chair from 2022 to 2024. During her tenure as chair, Spirk helped the Landmark Conference work a deal to play basketball games at the historic Palestra in Philadelphia, assist with a media rights deal with FloSports, develop the conference football media day as the Landmark added the sport in 2023 and assist with expanding the conference's membership to ten schools.
Spirk was an ambassador for women's athletics speaking at local schools as well as attending national conferences on gender equity and Title IX. She has volunteered at the NCAA sponsored "YES Clinic'' during the women's Final Four five times. The "YES Clinic" provides basketball instruction to underprivileged youth in the city of the Final Four. Spirk served her eighth and final year on the Women's Basketball Coaches Association Board of Directors, one of only three Division III coaches on the Board, in 2018-19. She is also a member of the WBCA Coach Mentor program, and Spirk has served as the Chair for the WBCA All-American Committee for over 10 years.
On the softball diamond, Spirk took over the program in 1988 and guided Moravian to a 104-57 mark in six seasons including a then school record 23 victories in 1991. She coached 14 Middle Atlantic Conference Southeast League First Team All-Star selections.
