It's not uncommon during a Chartiers Valley basketball game for coach Tim McConnell to raise his voice to get a particular player's attention.

"Hey, Monkey," McConnell will sometimes yell.

Anthony Cersosimo quickly turns his head to listen.

The Pitt basketball team has the Oakland Zoo, and Chartiers Valley has its own zoo with one tenant -- Anthony "Monkey" Cersosimo.

"Monkey" has been Cersosimo's nickname since a friend slapped the moniker on him during a backyard football game five years ago.

"I caught a pass and he said, 'Wow, are your arms long. You should be called Monkey.' It stuck ever since," said Cersosimo, a senior starting guard for the Colts.

Monkey is an example of something that has long been part of sports lore. The individual nickname.

From Babe Ruth almost a century ago, to Magic Johnson, to Tiger Woods today, nicknames and sports have gone hand in hand. But the nicknames have also been a fiber of WPIAL and City League sports -- from yesteryear to today. Some great athletes in Western Pennsylvania history have been known by their nicknames, and maybe the high school sport where nicknames are most prevalent is basketball.

From Valley's B.B. Flenory and Schenley's Jeep Kelley in the 1970s, to Monkey Cersosimo and Admire "Pickle" Carter of Beaver Falls today, nicknames flourish in hoops circles.

One of the best nicknames ever in WPIAL or City League sports had to be "Onion," the standout point guard of Schenley's powerful PIAA championship team of 2007 that included DeJuan Blair and D.J. Kennedy. Onion is Jamaal Bryant, who got his name at a young age because a youth league coach said his head was shaped like an onion. Seemingly no one knew "Onion" as Jamaal Bryant.

"Probably everyone calls me Onion," said Bryant, who has attended two junior colleges and hopes to play next season at Slippery Rock University. "Everyone except a couple girls. They don't like the name Onion."

McConnell said of Cersosimo, "Why wouldn't I call him Monkey? I've never heard anyone call him anything but Monkey. You walk down the halls at school and you'll hear kids say to him, 'Hey, Monk.'"

Beaver Falls coach Doug Biega said of Carter, "You have to say 'Pickle' if you want him to answer."

Cersosimo said his little brother and father often call him Monk. His little brother, Nico, recently bought him a stuffed monkey.

"It doesn't bother me," Cersosimo said of the nickname. "I kind of like it. Some kids in school don't even know my real name."

John Murray is a noted author, speaker and sports psychologist in Palm Beach, Fla., who says nicknames are a vital part of sports on all levels, but maybe even moreso in high school.

"It gives someone a different identity than in regular life and gives them a sense of uniqueness," Murray said. "This isn't really sports psychology 101, but a nickname can give someone an identity and it fits into all that team and unity thing."

Biega said, "It's almost like if you have a nickname, you're accepted into the crew."

Murray remembers being called "Moose" when he was 9, just because he hit a home run over a fence in a youth league baseball game.

"I wasn't even a big kid," Murray said. "Then when I was in a college fraternity, guys started calling me 'Chip' because I looked preppy one day. It's really weird how those things can stick, too. Thirty years later and those names still stick when I'm around those guys."

There is a long list of memorable nicknames from WPIAL and City League sports. A number of former stars had nicknames that became a major part of their identity. Schenley's "Onion" is unforgettable.

Some other stars from recent years and decades ago and their nicknames were Valley's Baron "B.B." Flenory, Blackhawk's Ryan "Archie" Miller, Allderdice's Frank "Happy" Dobbs and William "Man" Herndon, Schenley's Robert "Jeep" Kelley and Nathan "Sonny" Lewis, Westinghouse wizard guard Thomas "Junebug" Howard, Fifth Avenue's David "Puffy" Kennedy, Valley's Charles "Chipper" Harris, Midland's Roosevelt "Boo" Kirby.

They all did some wonderful things in their careers and their nicknames became part of Western Pennsylvania lore.

Kelley was a City League legend, a member of the famed 1971 Schenley state championship team. His introduction to the crowd at the Civic Arena in the Dapper Dan Roundball Classic all-star game was unforgettable. "Beep-Beep ... Here comes the Jeep."

Flenory was a star at Valley in the 1970s who played at Duquesne and his backcourt mate at Valley was Ed Hughley, known to his teammates as "Jim Jim." Miller played at North Carolina State, Dobbs at Villanova and Herndon at Massachusetts. Lewis played at Pitt, Kennedy at Cincinnati, Harris at Robert Morris and Kirby at Pitt. Kirby made a buzzer-beating shot near half court to give Midland a WPIAL title in 1979.

But there have been memorable nicknames in other sports, too. Remember New Brighton running back Ronald "Po" James? He's in the WPIAL Hall of Fame. Aliquippa's Rapheal "Pudgy" Abercrombie, a 1985 graduate, was one of the first WPIAL running backs to run for 4,000 career yards. Abercrombie was 5 feet 5, short and stalky. His senior season, he had a memorable showdown with Fox Chapel running back Chris "Scooby" Thorpe.

There was quarterback Vito "Babe" Parilli, who played at Rochester High School in the 1940s and is a member of the College Football Hall of Fame.

In WPIAL wrestling two decades ago, South Side Beaver had standout wrestler Jerry "Bear" McCoy.

But the nicknames even go to the coaching ranks in district high school sports. William "Muzzy" Colosimo coached the Greensburg Central Catholic football team to its first WPIAL title this season.

Cornelius "Neenie" Campbell was a legendary basketball coach at McKeesport in the 1950s and James "Red" McNie was a championship coach at Aliquippa.

Buzz Gabos is now North Hills' basketball coach (real first name is Charles). Gabos' father is Boats and Buzz has a brother, Rock.

The origins of some of the high school nicknames are comical, and some unexplainable. Many believe Flenory was called B.B. because of his great shooting touch and his penchant for scoring (once made Sports Illustrated Faces in the Crowd for scoring 84 points in a junior high game).

"My initials aren't B.B., either," said Flenory, whose name is Baron Cortez Flenory. "It was just a name my father gave me as a kid and it evolved. I never did ask him where it was derived from."

Flenory works as a counselor at Pressley Ridge, a school on the North Side.

"I never minded the name. As a matter of fact, I still sign everything B.B.," Flenory said earlier this week. "I tried using Baron a few times and people would say, 'Are you related to B.B?'"

Archie Miller's first name is Ryan. But when he was a youngster, his older brother, Sean, told him one day that he looked like his name should be Archie. And the name stuck. Archie is an assistant basketball coach at the University of Arizona, where Sean is the head coach.

William "Man" Herndon was a menacing basketball player at Allderdice in the 1980s. Back then, when Allderdice coach Howard Bullard was asked how Herndon got his nickname, Bullard said, "What else do you call someone who has a full beard as a ninth-grader?"

Herndon's cousin, William Kinsel, also was a talented player and was nicknamed "Doodles."

Jeep Kelley got his nickname in youth baseball because he circled the bases so fast.

Greensburg Central's Colosimo got his name Muzzy from his father.

"My dad was a World War II veteran, and when I was born, he said I looked just like Mussolini. So he called me Muzzy," Colosimo said.

In 2000, Aliquippa football player Quanear Gaskins had to play quarterback after star Josh Lay was injured in the WPIAL title game at Three Rivers Stadium. Everyone called Gaskins "Peanut" and he helped Aliquippa win the championship. When asked after the game why Gaskins is called Peanut, a teammate said, "Just look at his head. It's shaped like a Peanut."

But maybe there was never a bigger collection of nicknames on one team than the 1980 Shaler baseball team. The team is considered one of the best in WPIAL history because it won WPIAL and PIAA titles and eventually had five players taken in the Major League Baseball draft.

That team had left fielder Tiger (Kevin Walsh), center fielder Cro (Matt Stennett), first baseman Mick (Ken Karcher), second baseman Rat (Tim Fieldhouse) and designated hitter Stinkie (Mike Lang).

Stennett got his nickname because teammates said he resembled Cro-Magnon in the stages of man.

But maybe the best nickname on the Shaler team belonged to reserve infielder Keith Knaus, who was used as a pinch-runner in many games. His nickname was "Vandal."

Catcher Doug Maggio was the big star of that Shaler team, taken in the third round of the 1980 draft. That year, Maggio was asked if Knaus got the "Vandal" nickname because he was adept at stealing bases.

"No," Maggio said. "He's from Millvale. What else would we call him?"

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