The history of sports in Northern Kentucky goes back a long way. A very long way. Decades. Centuries.
We know you’ve seen these lists before, but this is a different and unique way of presenting our “50 sports icons in Northern Kentucky” as we’ll provide you one per day over the next 50 days.
Hall of Fames are everywhere in NKY, the Northern Kentucky Sports Hall of Fame, High School Athletic Directors Hall of Fame, NKU, Thomas More and local high schools all have something to recognize their past.
We’ll preface this series by saying this, some of you may disagree with who should or shouldn’t be in the top 50 and that’s fine. Plenty are in the Hall of Very Good, but we feel these 50 are the one’s who stuck out to us.
Sports Editor Evan Dennison spoke and conferred with several local NKY sports history buffs to get their opinions and lists of their own and who should be “locks” for the 50 sports icons. We compiled each list and came up with the 50 of our own (maybe cheated a little by putting families in as one) to present over the next 50 days.
Hope you enjoy as summer time rolls on!
The 43rd of the 50 sports icons is the Molony family, NKY’s first family of tennis.
THE MOLONY FAMILY
From the late 1990s to this season, the Molony family has been Northern Kentucky’s FFOT – First Family of Tennis.
From Notre Dame and Covington Catholic to the University of Cincinnati and the University of North Carolina-Wilmington, Kevin and Maria Molony’s three daughters – Kara, Lyndsey, and Molly – have been a fixture for decades.
Kara Molony-Hussey was the first. At Notre Dame, she and Lyndsey won the KHSAA state doubles title in 1997 and helped the Pandas to the team trophy that year. At UC, she won 106 singles and 67 doubles matches – including a school-record 37 singles matches – in 2000 and was a member of Conference USA’s All-Decade team.
Molony-Hussey later played on the WTA professional tour, and she won 11 titles in the annual Cincinnati Met tournament. She’s now the head professional at Summit Hills Country Club in Edgewood. At Notre Dame, Lyndsey and Molly Molony won the KHSAA doubles title in 1997 and were part of Notre Dame’s 1998 state team titlists.
Lyndsey Molony Maynard followed Kara to UC and won 69 singles and 67 doubles matches. She finished her 10th season as Notre Dame’s tennis coach.
Molly Molony-Greene (with Jackie Vilines) won the KHSAA doubles title in 2001. She played collegiately at UNCW.
The next generation has arrived.
Austin Hussey won the KHSAA singles title in 2013. Brady Hussey, a member of CovCath’s state team champions in 2023-24, played for Dayton this year before transferring to UNCW, Blake Hussey will be a junior at CovCath, and Taylor and Mia Maynard play for Notre Dame.
See the 50 sports icons on a day-to-day basis over the next 50 days
— Day 1: Dave Cowens
— Day 2: Shaun Alexander
— Day 3: Homer Rice
— Day 4: Dicky Beal
— Day 5: Jared Lorenzen
— Day 6: Jim Bunning
— Day 7: Tom Ellis
— Day 8: Nate Dusing
— Day 9: Jim Connor
— Day 10: Steve Cauthen
— Day 11: Irv Goode
— Day 12: Stan Steidel
— Day 13: Kenney Shields
— Day 14: David Justice
— Day 15: Morgan Hentz
— Day 16: Eddie Arcaro
— Day 17: Nancy Winstel
— Day 18: Steve Flesch
— Day 19: Donna Murphy
— Day 20: Randy Marsh
— Day 21: Mike Yeagle
— Day 22: Derrick Barnes
— Day 23: Dale Mueller
— Day 24: Dave Faust
— Day 25: Kirsten Allen
— Day 26: The Oldendick family
— Day 27: Martin “Mote” Hils
— Day 28: Nell Fookes
— Day 29: Owen Hauck
— Day 30: Becky Ruehl
— Day 31: Tom Thacker
— Day 32: Sydney Moss
— Day 33: Bob Schneider
— Day 34: The Walz family
— Day 35: John Toebben
— Day 36: Pat Scott
— Day 37: Bob Arnzen
— Day 38: Joan Mazzaro
— Day 39: Frank Jacobs
— Day 40: Adrienne Hundemer
— Day 41: The Draud family
— Day 42: Bill Krumpelbeck
— Day 43: The Molony family
— Day 44: Allen Feldhaus
— Day 45: The Maile family
— Day 46: Maureen Egan Corl
— Day 47: Bill Aker
— Day 48: Maureen Kaiser
— Day 49: John Brannen
— Day 50: Mike Bankemper