Sharpshooter

It is rare to find someone untouched by the cynicism that plagues Harvard, a place that can be as cold in May as it is in December. And if you happen to find someone who’s not jaded, it is just as rare to discover that this same person can shoot deer and three-pointers with equal dexterity.

At 5’2”, she is not the most imposing presence. But Beverly C. Moore somehow manages to take charge—be it as the floor general on the basketball court or as the first student arriving in the classroom. She is quietly dynamic, a person toward whom everyone seems to gravitate.

“Beverly can command the attention of an entire table in the dining hall,” says Roger Porter, IBM professor of government and business and Dunster House master. “One evening, eight members of the basketball team were dining in Dunster House after practice. I walked over to wish them well and ended up standing behind Beverly for nearly 30 seconds, waiting for a break in the conversation. Beverly obviously could not see me, but the others did, and almost broke into laughter as she kept talking in a very animated way.”

Carolyn A. Daly ’05–’06, one of Moore’s roommates, admits, “She is charismatic to the point that so many people want to talk to her at any moment that it could get frustrating.”

Hailing from the hamlet of Monroe, La., the Crimson’s point guard fits the Southern stereotype to a certain extent—she is anti-abortion (although, according to her friends, she respectfully won’t get into arguments about her politics), participates in Harvard’s Christian Bible study group and even hunts deer in her spare time (no, not in Cambridge). Moore has lived in Monroe all her life, and during her junior year of high school accepted a basketball scholarship to powerhouse Louisiana Tech. However, after two years of attending the school just 20 minutes down the road from her home, Moore decided it was time for a change. “I wasn’t really happy with the academics,” Moore says. “They were not very challenging, and I was starting to think about what I was going to do after college.” And basketball-wise, she says, “I wasn’t playing as much as I wanted to.”

Moore then put together a list of schools—Yale, University of North Carolina, Wake Forest, Duke and Harvard. She made her final decision based in part on Harvard’s location. “What made me really like it here was I had never had the opportunity to live in a city before,” Moore says. She matriculated in 2001, and spent her first year getting acclimated to school off the court (all Division 1 transfers have to sit out a year from basketball at their new school) and in the classroom.

Leaving the one place she had known her whole life for Harvard was a “pretty big change,” Moore says. “As far as study habits, I had not been used to putting in this amount of time.” There was also the anticipated culture shock. “Monroe’s a pretty conservative place, so I didn’t see a lot of diversity. There are so many different types of people here—it’s very liberal, very open-minded,” Moore says.

On the court, Moore’s just as dynamic as in person. This year, she’s averaging 6.2 points per game, making her the fourth-best member of the team. She also boasts the team’s most accurate three-point shot. “Most people look at me and don’t think I’m a basketball player,” Moore says. “I’m not the most athletically endowed person. I’m someone who leads by example, who relies on work ethic. I’m energetic and I bring a lot of enthusiasm.”

After three years, the economics concentrator is preparing for life after basketball—and Harvard. The bayou girl will hit the big city to spend the next two years as a legal analyst for Goldman Sachs’ Manhattan office, where she’ll be trading in deer for bears and bulls.