Massey Basketball: First Season

1977-8 the Streaks girls’ basketball team had a pretty good season. There was not a two class system, so the Streaks won their Regional with wins over Alexis, Yorkwood, and Southern. They went onto lose the first round of the Sectional to Moline 48-36. But it didn’t end well, the Streaks had been using an ineligible player the entire second semester so they had to forfeit all those games plus give up the Regional title. So what had been a pretty good season, became a 1-19 season.

In the middle of July, I got a call from George Lundeen (Athletic Director), asking me to come in and talk with him. When I arrived at the high school, I was met by Mr. Lundeen and David Bradley (GHS Principal). I was told that they had decided a change need to be made in the coaching position for the girls’ basketball team. They explained that they had offered to someone else but they had turned the job done but they had recommended me for the job. They explained why they thought it would be a good job for me. And pointed out there would be good players. I believed them but I had only seen one girls game the year before.

I was told the job was mine if I wanted it. They told me to let them know in the next day or two. So I drove home and called back to say I would take the job.

Girls basketball season was different then. While we started practice in late October, we didn’t play any games until January. So we had a pretty long preseason. We had 20 games on our schedule, plus the IHSA tourney.

1978-9 was the first year that the girls team never practiced at Hitchcock School. Before this, the girls got to practice in Thiel one night per week, and the rest of the time at Hitchcock. During the 1978-9 season, we had no Wicall and no Field House. The usual schedule was for Boys Varsity to go 2:00-5:00 (they had athletic PE), then a 5-7 shift, and 7-9 shift. The Soph Boys and Soph/Varsity Girls would alternate in those shifts.

Mondays there were often boys JV games. If there was a JV game, the girls teams went to either Churchill or Lombard to practice from 7-9pm after the JH teams were done. Wednesday were the one day the girls got to practice after school. Otherwise all practices were in the evenings.

Game night, the north side main floor bleachers were pulled out. There was plenty of room. The only fans were parents and a few boyfriends. There was no pregame music, the PA equipment was not equipped to do that. The boys games had the GHS band to play. A couple years later when we played Richwoods, they brought a huge tape player and played pregame music- the first for GHS girls games.

There was no email, no fax, and no texting. So if you wanted to get results in the paper, you wrote them on a sheet of paper and put them in the mail slot at the Register-Mail. Then in the morning you called in results to the radio. And there was no radio stations covering games.

We opened the season with a solid win over Alexis, 60-29. But later that week, we lost in OT to Macomb. I don’t remember the call at the end of the game, but I remember trying to talk or plead with the refs as they left the floor. Not good!!

Our biggest win of the year was a win over Limestone in game #4. Limestone had most of their team back from an Elite 8 appearance. Limestone went 1-3-1 vs any zone and just stood. So we played a 1-3-1 zone and just stood with them. It was a huge win that vaulted us to 3-1. We were considered a top team at that point. And the IHSA actually did seeding that early in the season. We were seeded #1 in the one class Regional.

From the Limestone game, we went onto lose 12 straight games. We won our last two games of the regular season versus Macomb (revenge) and Yorkwood. We then won first round Regional vs. Farmington before losing the Regional Championship.