PATERSON – At 10 years old, Essence Carson used garbage cans to create a makeshift basketball court in her Paterson neighborhood, her mother recalled.
That was about 27 years ago. Since then, Carson played on far more prestigious courts in her rise from high school stardom through a successful professional career, including a WNBA championship.
Now there’s a court in Paterson that bears Carson’s name.
Surrounded by family and friends, the hometown hero on Monday morning watched the unveiling of the Essence Carson Champions Court in Buckley Park.
The hoops star talked to Paterson Press about the importance of having a court named after a female player.
“It’s about representation,” Carson said. “A lot of young women in this city could grow up to change this world − they just need to see that they, too, can do it.”
Carson’s childhood friends convened around the court’s center logo, painted with the logo of Rosa L. Parks School of Fine and Performing Arts, where Carson studied piano in high school.
Sarissa Gaskins reminisced about playing pick-up games against boys at the asphalt courts of Paterson’s Public School No. 13.
“Initially we had to prove ourselves, but then they understood,” said Gaskins, who later played guard at Morgan State University.
Carson’s high school teammate Faquaya Rollins remembered going all the way to the state championships in high school. “She’s making her name known, our schools known, and our city known on top of all that,” Rollins said.
Edward Black, who was Carson’s coach at Eastside High School (Rosa Parks didn’t have a basketball team) said her work ethic helped separate her from her peers. Carson used to sneak over to the gymnasium during lunchtime to practice, he said.
“She used to play with girls older than her,” Black recalled. “I didn’t realize how good she was until she started playing with kids her own age.”
Although it is still somewhat rare for basketball courts to be named after women, that trend seems to be changing with dedications to players like Lynette Woodard, who played at Kansas University 40 years ago and Angel Reese, a current star at LSU. Carson’s coach at Rutgers, C. Vivian Stringer, was honored with a court naming in 2020.
In 2007, Stringer led Carson’s team to the NCAA championship game, where it lost to the University of Tennessee. However, the success of that season was overshadowed somewhat by a crude racially-charged comment made about the team by shock jock Don Imus, who was fired from his namesake show.
Sharon Smith, who was Carson’s former principal at Rosa Parks High School, remembered Carson responding to the controversy with grace under fire.
“The way she handled such a volatile situation − I’ll never forget that,” said Smith, adding that Carson’s character was forged through scholastic sports and an upbringing as a “gentle giant.” “She was beautiful under pressure.”
Carson was chosen as the seventh overall pick in the 2008 draft by the New York Liberty. In 2011, she became an All-Star and averaged 11.3 points per game in the regular season. In 2020, Carson, known as a two-way player, was inducted into the Scarlet Knights’ Hall of Fame.
