One of Ryan Shaw and Justin Gilmore's pre-game traditions had nothing to do with basketball.
Shaw - head coach of the Fulton Hornets - would aid Gilmore, his assistant, in tying his tie. Gilmore could never quite get it right, something he remembers Shaw taking great pleasure in razzing him about.
"He'd always make fun of me," Gilmore said in a phone interview Sunday night. "One of my favorite things was that he always made fun of me because I didn't know how to do adult things all the time and he'd make fun of me."
The memory is a pleasant one Gilmore has of his coaching mentor in an otherwise difficult time.
The 43-year-old Shaw - who guided the Hornets for the past three seasons - shockingly died last Friday afternoon after suffering a brain aneurysm in South Carolina. He had manned the in-school suspension room at Fulton High School the last three years, but was now working with his brother while retaining his coaching duties.
Shaw was in South Carolina on business, exercising Thursday night when the attack occurred.
"He was a lot of different things to a lot of different people," Gilmore said.
To Gilmore, Shaw was something of a sensei in his foray into coaching. The pair were introduced by Dave Fox, a friend of Shaw's and Gilmore's head coach at Jefferson City High School.
After coaching stops in Warrenton, Potosi and Springfield, Shaw took the job at Fulton in 2012 - replacing Marques Baldwin - and put Gilmore on his staff.
"It was a perfect fit - like yin and yang," Gilmore said. "He'd been doing it for 10 years and it was my first (coaching position), so he had the knowledge and all of that. I was just a young guy not knowing much and he taught me a lot of stuff I didn't know, mostly stuff that wasn't basketball stuff.
"He taught me probably more about just how to be a better man than basketball stuff."
Gilmore greatly admired the relationship Shaw had with his wife, Lori, a third-grade teacher at Bartley Elementary, and his children - daughter Kenzie, a senior at Fulton, and son Jordan, a sophomore and member of the Hornets basketball team.
Shaw never said no to a kid, Gilmore noted, and never turned down a request for his time, to feed a player or give them a ride somewhere. The affection spread to his staff as well; Lori Shaw jokingly referred to Gilmore and fellow assistant coach, Ethan Massey, as her husband's "ornery sons."
After hearing the news of Shaw's death Friday, Gilmore composed himself before addressing the Hornets' senior class - he and Shaw's first crop of freshmen three years ago. After that, Gilmore brought in the rest of the team and the players talked, cried and grieved in their own way.
"Most of them - not most of them - but some of them don't have that (father) figure in their lives and they explained how he was like a father to them," Gilmore said. "He was like a father to me, too. Just stories like that about how he'd helped them, stuff I didn't even know about, how he'd come over if they needed him to tell them a story that made them laugh when they needed their spirits lifted."
Fulton girls' head coach TJ Quick - like Gilmore - was a fresh face to the coaching scene when she first encountered Shaw, who arrived the summer after Quick's first year at her alma mater. Shaw was the one who was new to town, but the wealth of knowledge he brought became invaluable.
"I was kind of relieved," Quick said Sunday night. "... Here comes this veteran boys' coach willing to give me as much information as needed - he gave me drills, plays, he drove me to (tournament) seed meetings. He was always there to help."
Those car trips provided a backdrop for some of Quick's fondest memories of Shaw.
"Let's just say we don't have a great sense of direction," Quick joked. "Ryan had coached basketball for a lot of years and had a lot of stories that I had the privilege of hearing, but a lot of those were in our seed-meeting drives because we were always going in the wrong direction. ... The two of us in a car, we're horrible with directions and were late wherever we went."
On the court, Shaw stressed the importance of in-game and in-practice adjustments to Quick. A former Missouri Basketball Coaches Association president, Shaw crafted a gateway for Quick into the organization and eventually a place on its executive board.
Away from the hardwood, Quick frequented the Shaws' patio, where the family relished the chance to entertain visitors. She recalled Shaw as a "goofball," always ribbing her about her diminutive stature and sporting a smile, which Gilmore described as "freaking huge."
"Ryan and his wife are "people people,'" Quick said. "They like to have a good time, they like to have people throughout their house. ... They're such good people to be around ... their generosity is overflowing."
In that spirit, Quick hopes she can be someone to lean on for Lori Shaw - her friend and co-worker at Bartley - as well as their children.
"There's not a whole lot you can say to a family when something like this happens," Quick said. "We'll just let Lori and her family, and Ryan's family, know that we're here to help in any way possible."
Gilmore said he spoke briefly with the Shaw siblings on Friday, reiterating that he would be there for them in anyway possible.
"Ryan was a very, very giving and caring person, and I don't know if people saw that behind-the-scenes stuff," Gilmore said. "He'd stay up late, late nights watching film and worrying about kids. ... It was never about him, not for one second. It was always about the kids."
Quick remembered Shaw as a guy that put absolutely everything into basketball, his family and any endeavor.
"If he is going to do something, he's going to do something 100 percent," Quick added. "... You don't know Ryan without passion; he was an open book and he's very passionate about everything in his life."
Gilmore doesn't know how his ties will get tied now. Maybe he'll learn on his own, but maybe the tradition can continue - this time with a different Shaw.
"Maybe Jordan can show me."
There will be a celebration of Shaw's life at 2:30 p.m. Saturday at Fulton High School's Roger D. Davis Gymnasium.