Schuckman: QU coach drums up support, supplies to help her hometown remain Dresden Strong following tornado

The text came close to midnight as Ric Bailey needed to know his daughter, Quincy University women’s basketball coach Kaci Bailey, hadn’t been in the path of the tornadoes that skirted the St. Louis area and created a path of destruction moving past Edwardsville, Ill.

“He was making sure I’m OK,” Bailey said.

At the same time, her father and the rest of the residents of her hometown of Dresden, Tenn., had yet to see the destructive nature of the tornadoes that pummeled Northwest Tennessee and ripped through Kentucky late last Friday night.

All anyone knew was the members of the Bailey family were safe.

“I’m trying to text my mom to see if she’s talked to my grandparents because they are the closest to where it hit,” Bailey said. “Everyone was fine.”

It enabled her to embrace a little bit of comfort.

By morning, when the town of 3,000 woke to see buildings crumbled and life turned upside down, reality hit Bailey that she was six hours away and unable to immediately help family and friends pick up the pieces.

“Finally, I go to sleep,” Bailey said. “Then I wake up to all of these messages and pictures. I was still in bed when I saw the pictures and I cried.”

Parts of the hometown she’s always loved were now rubble.

“It completely wiped out the downtown,” Bailey said of the Weakley County town located about an hour south of Paducah, Ky., and 15 miles south of the Tennessee-Kentucky border. “There’s maybe a handful of businesses still standing. You worry being a small town about how you rebuild.”

You start by banding together. Bailey is helping in that regard.

After the Hawks wrap up their first semester schedule with Monday’s trip to Purdue Northwest, Bailey will load up a van and a U-Haul with supplies and head for home. 

“It’s going to be really hard to see in person,” Bailey said. “A lot of old buildings that have been there for years are just gone.”

But the people who are the heart and soul of a tight-knit community remain. They are the ones who need a helping hand, the kind Bailey and her coaching colleagues want to provide.

She took to social media this week, posting on Twitter and Facebook about the need for supplies. Her phone hasn’t stopped ringing since.

“On my way to the gym, I’m on the phone with people,” Bailey said. “What do you need? How can we help? I have a platform and I want to use it.”

A coach she worked summer tournaments with just as her coaching career was beginning reached out with support. And a colleague from Houston Baptist, who Bailey has known since her days as an assistant at the University of Central Arkansas, is jumping on board.

“As soon as I posted it, she messaged me and said, ‘Hey, I saw your post and we want to help somebody. How can we help?” Bailey said. “So I’m going to get them in with a family and they can specifically help that family. That’s cool. Basketball is a small world and people stick together.”

It’s allowing her to go beyond helping her immediate family and show her Dresden family her heart is still in Tennessee.

“No one in our family lost their house,” Bailey said. “They were without electricity for a few days. They were lucky in that aspect, but there are a lot of others that aren’t as lucky. So we’re going to do as much as we can to help those who need it.

“This is my hometown and these people need it. I’ll do anything I can.”