The Bishop McNamara boys basketball team defeated Chesterton Academy 62-18 at home Wednesday night, a win that improved the Fightin’ Irish to 15-3 on the year. In past years, it might be a result – a no-doubt win ahead of a trio of big games next week – that might get overlooked. But for head coach Adrian Provost and the eight seniors on this year’s roster, no memory this winter is being wasted.

A group that’s grown up since well before high school playing together, culminating in a runner-up finish at the IESA Class 8-2A State Finals as eighth graders, this season is their last one together.

And it’s also the last season Provost will coach his alma mater, announcing his upcoming retirement last month.

“It would be awesome for the last year for all of us, a lot of seniors and obviously coach,” said Coen Demack, who matched Richard Darr with 16 points apiece on Wednesday. “It’s been a good four years and to end it with a bang would be awesome.”

With seven seniors last year too, depth was the primary strength for a Fightin’ Irish team that won a school-record 26 games and played for an IHSA Class 2A Sectional championship. With an entire starting lineup of contributors back from that team – Demack, Darr, Teddy Fogel, Callaghan O’Connor and Karter Krutsinger – their current record isn’t too surprising.

For O’Connor, a Notre Dame baseball commit, while seasons like last year and their grade school state run serve as proof of their potential, the Irish have to keep looking ahead and not backwards.

“We really don’t talk about it too much,” O’Connor said. “We know what we’re capable of, so we feed off of that and talk about what’s in front of us and what we can do to get there.”

And while he decided to announce his upcoming retirement ahead of time, Provost doesn’t want this to be remembered as his last year, but as the seniors’ last year.

“It’s their year,” Provost said. " ... … It’s obviously one of the most mature groups I’ve ever had as far as experience. I’ve had two or three seniors that have played extensive time, but not this many."

The decision to step down came after lots of talks with the rest of Provost’s family, wife Yvonne and sons Jaxson and Trey, both of whom played for their dad. Jaxson Provost, who was the 2023 Daily Journal Co-Player of the Year and graduated that year as McNamara’s second all-time scoring leader, is a junior guard at Eureka College. With one year of college ball left, Adrian Provost knows the sand in the hour glass is getting quite empty on his son’s career.

Additionally, after defeating his 2020 diagnosis of stage one thyroid cancer, Adrian Provost simply doesn’t have the energy he once did.

“I don’t regret it, but doing this job I’ve missed a lot of my sons’ stuff growing up,” Adrian Provost said. " ... I was sick five years ago, and man, it’s just hard. Come March I just don’t have much left. I can’t do it anymore the way I want to do it. It’s not fair to (the team), it wouldn’t be fair to my juniors and sophomores to come back and not do it the way it needs to be done."

One might wonder, with both of those factors at hand, why it took so long for Adrian Provost, who’s also the deputy chief of the Bradley Police Department, to hang up the whistle. For the 1992 Bishop McNamara graduate, it’s the kids he coaches and the place he coaches for.

“I tell people all the time, if you’re a part of this place, nothing needs to be said,” he said. “If you’re not, I can’t give you a sufficient explanation.”

Adrian said he coaches his players like his own sons, and his players feel loved like his own as well.

“Whether our team likes it or not, he loves us a lot, and he has since we were kids,” Krutsinger said. “We all played together as Little Irish, and from the beginning we’ve grown together, him as a coach and us as players. He’s pushed us to become who we are today.”

In his second stint as head coach, McNamara’s boys basketball program has undergone a renaissance with Adrian Provost at the helm. After going 13-39 over a brief two seasons from 2003-05, he returned in in 2014. Since then, the Irish have gone 199-140 and won four regionals, including a third-place finish at the Class 3A State Finals in 2017. And the Class of 2026 would love nothing more than bring their head coach downstate one more time.

“Since freshman year all we’ve been talking about is getting a ring,” Darr said. “That’s stuck with us all four years, and it’s now or never. … He’s had a great run as a coach, I feel like we’ve had a great run from freshmen to senior year, so if we can both end it on a good note, that would be pretty amazing."

Whether it be as a husband, a parent, a coach, a police officer or a cancer survivor, quitting has never been in Adrian Provost’s vocabulary. It’s something he’s struggling coming to grips with, but something Yvonne has helped him with.

“I hope I’ve been worthy of holding this position,” Adrian Provost said. “My assistant (Jerry Krieg) did it for 20 years and is in the hall of fame, and to walk around this community and say you’re the basketball coach at Bishop McNamara, it’s a small group and a privilege.”