Erie Mason Climbs to Championship Level
February 15, 2019
By Doug Donnelly
Special for Second Half
ERIE – When Kevin Skaggs was named the boys varsity basketball coach at Erie Mason, he immediately got on the phone and started asking questions.
After more than two decades coaching basketball, Skaggs was about to embark on something new – high school basketball.
“All of my 22 years was in college coaching,” he said. “I reached out to a lot of different high school coaches, coaches that I had known over the years. … It’s mind-boggling how you have to fit all of the pieces together to build a program.”
Whatever those coaches told Skaggs, he should box it up and sell it.
Skaggs took over an Erie Mason program that occasionally had success but was often the team on the schedule other schools wanted to face. Those days are just a memory now. In his eighth season, Skaggs has become the school’s all-time winningest coach, recently leading the team to its first-ever outright Lenawee County Athletic Association championship. His team also is in the midst of a 13-game winning streak, the longest in school history.
What’s more is the success doesn’t appear to be a blip on the screen. Mason has had five consecutive winning seasons for the first time in school history and its top scorer – the top scorer in Monroe County – is just a junior.
“I think we are starting to make (other schools) believe,” Skaggs said. “We want to be one of those opponents that when we walk into the gym, other teams say, ‘oh, no,’ instead of ‘oh, boy.’”
Those days are here. Earlier this week, Mason knocked off Petersburg-Summerfield, 64-44, in a non-league game. The Bulldogs came into Erie with a 15-0 record and a top 10 ranking in the Associated Press poll but were handled by the Eagles.
Mason followed that win with an 89-50 victory Thursday over Hudson to clinch the outright LCAA championship, the first since they joined the LCAA in 1988.
Erie Mason has a Saturday date this week with LCAA rival Dundee with a chance to improve to 15-2 on the season. Mason hasn’t won 15 games in a season since 2003-04 and has done so only three times since the school debuted in 1961-62.
All of the wins, high-powered offenses (Mason averages 67 points a game and has made 126 3-pointers as a team) can be traced back to when Skaggs first got to Mason and, on the advice of coaching friends, started a youth basketball program, the Junior Eagles. Those first-year kids eight years ago are now the ones Skaggs sees in the huddle during timeouts.
“They are from that first group of our youth program, and you can get a sense of that,” he said. “They love basketball. That was a big step for us.”
Skaggs, 63, brought together others in the community to put together the youth program for boys and girls. While Mason has had success in other sports – the football team won the Class C championship in 1987 – basketball had lagged behind. Now, he said, that culture has changed. It happened, he said, because student-athletes started loving the game of basketball.
“What you want to teach is to teach them to have fun with the game,” he said. “If you get the kids to fall in love with the sport, they will pursue it. You want to be able to keep kids interested and with a ball in their hands.”
The program aims at teaching the game, making sure kids have fun and, then, around the fifth- and sixth-grade level, increase the competitiveness. By middle school, the basketball players are able to compete with other teams on the Mason schedule. By high school, they are used to success and hungry for more.
“Our eight-grade team had a tremendous year, and our seventh-grade team was pretty good,” Skaggs said. “It’s starting to cycle through, which is wonderful to watch.”
Skaggs also said he’s noticed that athletes aren’t leaving the district to go play for other schools like was once the case.
“We’re keeping our players in our school,” he said.
Skaggs earned his master’s degree in sports administration and bachelor’s degree in social work at Western Michigan University, where he met coach Dick Shilts. He was directing Christian-based basketball camps in Michigan and Ohio before becoming an assistant coach at Kalamazoo Valley Community College under Shilts and enjoying monumental success. After six years there, he became head coach at Alma College from 1995 to 2001, going 53-98. His second Alma team went 14-12 and won a Michigan Intercollegiate Athletic Association tournament game for the first time in school history. After moving to Erie, Skaggs got an assistant coaching job at Owens Community College in northwest Ohio. He was an assistant five years with the Express, including three years as a volunteer coach, before becoming the head coach.
In 2011, he was named the head coach at Erie Mason, a school just north of the Ohio border that had just a handful of winning seasons in its history.
“Mason was a no-brainer. I was 55 and getting a little tired of getting on a bus and going three to four hours away for a game,” he said. “Plus, my son was playing and I was missing watching him.”
His family has been a major part of his run at Mason. Sons Isaac and Jacob have both either played or coached with him his entire time at Mason.
“What’s a better place to start than with your family?” he said.
He also found community members Tom Banachowski and Brad Liedel to serve as assistant coaches. He delegates what he calls “meaningful responsibility” to his assistants to help the workload and to build continuity in the program. One thing he doesn’t delegate is the Eagles’ offense.
“I’m greedy when it comes to offense,” he said. “That’s mine. There’s nothing like watching an offense that moves the ball and goes. It’s exciting and fun to watch.”
For the past couple of seasons, the Eagle most fun to watch has been Joe Liedel. The 5-foot-11 junior recently moved into second place on the school’s all-time scoring list. With 1,229 points through 16 games this season, he’s well within reach of the school’s career leader, J.P. Horne (1,455 points).
“If Joe Liedel was 6-foot-3, every Division I school would be calling on him,” Skaggs said. “He’s one of the most complete kids I’ve coached in 35 years – and I don’t say that easily.”
Liedel has been sensational this season. He’s the top scorer in the LCAA, and has had games of 41, 37, 37, 34 and 31 while shooting 51.4 percent from the floor, 86.9 percent from the free throw line and leading the team in assists and steals.
“He’s really a complete player, offense and defense,” Skaggs said. “When he thinks there is a weakness in his game, he identifies it and works on it. He’s always been good at shooting, but now he can get to the basket. It adds to his game.”
Liedel isn’t a one-man show, however. Senior Jake Trainor averages 13.6 points a game, while senior brothers Bryan Sweeney (10.6 points a game) and John Sweeney (8.3 points, 6.3 rebounds a game) have played major roles as well.
When they get to the postseason, Erie Mason will be trying to win its first District championship in 46 years. The 1972-73 team won District and Regional championships. It won’t be easy as the Division 3 District at Blissfield is loaded with talented teams, including Summerfield (15-1), perennial power Monroe St. Mary Catholic Central (11-3) and Clinton, which just knocked off 10th-ranked Quincy.
Skaggs is drawing on his college coaching days to keep his players focused on next-level goals.
“Our first goal was to win the LCAA, and we’ve done that,” he said. “Next, it’s the District. Every game we play in now is a test to get ready for the state tournament. You have to keep the focus on one game at a time. We’ve been able to do that. We’re still having fun.”
Doug Donnelly has served as a sports and news reporter and city editor over 25 years, writing for the Daily Chief-Union in Upper Sandusky, Ohio from 1992-1995, the Monroe Evening News from 1995-2012 and the Adrian Daily Telegram since 2013. He's also written a book on high school basketball in Monroe County and compiles record books for various schools in southeast Michigan. E-mail him at [email protected] with story ideas for Jackson, Washtenaw, Hillsdale, Lenawee and Monroe counties.
PHOTOS: (Top) Joe Liedel moved into second place on the Erie Mason all-time scoring list this season. (Middle) Coach Kevin Skaggs has led the Eagles to rare success including an outright league title this season. (Top photo by Vanessa Ray.)
Where's Cros-Lex? Among Hoops Best
By
Paul Costanzo
Special for MHSAA.com
February 16, 2021
Conversations about Croswell-Lexington basketball have long been common in Lance Campbell’s barbershop.
Hearing them on the opposite side of the state, though, is something new.
“It’s nice to go on Twitter and have people talking about Cros-Lex,” said Campbell, the Cros-Lex boys coach whose full-time job is running Campbell’s Cuts in Croswell. “It hasn’t been something that’s happened. It’s nice to get the statewide attention. A friend of mine went to a showcase in Grand Rapids, and said he was sitting in the stands and people were like, ‘Who the (heck) is that Croswell whatever? Where the (heck) are they?’”
To answer the question: Cros-Lex is a few miles inland from Lake Huron in the southern half of the Thumb. But the folks on the west side were talking because they had already found Cros-Lex – near the top of the Division 2 boys basketball rankings.
The Pioneers were 20-1 a year ago, spending most of the season in the top five of the polls. They were ranked No. 25 in all divisions by MLive heading into the postseason and were picked by multiple writers and followers of the sport to make the school’s first run to the Breslin Center for the MHSAA Final Four.
The online chatter never had a chance to turn into more, as the season was ended prior to the District Final because of COVID-19. But with much of the team back, led by four-year standouts Hunter Soper and Tyler Johnson, the Pioneers are looking to prove all the talk was justified.
“Last year felt perfect,” Soper said. “It’s hard to think about it, and going to bed every night with a ‘What if?’ Everything felt like it was clicking for us. We’re trying to get back to that this year. We’re hoping to make a deep run again and not end on a ‘what if,’ but a ‘we won.’”
Campbell, a Cros-Lex graduate himself, won’t say outright that he saw this coming. But he also won’t say that he didn’t.
While he’s in his fourth year as varsity coach, he’s been coaching at some level in the program since the early 2000s, when his former coach Don Roberts asked him to come aboard. He watched the players who now make up his team grow up as athletes on the basketball court, baseball diamond and football field.
“Five or six years ago, we kind of looked and thought this could be a special class, but I’ve seen that happen multiple times and you never know how it will work out,” Campbell said. “When I was in eighth grade, I think four of the five starters didn’t even play basketball by the time we were on varsity. This senior class, Joey Noll was a role player, he was the eighth or ninth kid on the eighth-grade team, now he’s a starter. Two kids who started on that eighth-grade group aren’t playing anymore. We kind of envisioned this being a special group, but again, I’ve seen where it doesn’t always work out.”
There was also a question as to whether the talented group would turn its focus to one sport over another. Many of the Campbell’s current players grew up playing baseball together on travel teams. As they reached high school, however, the multi-sport focus has only increased. Campbell said each member of main rotation is a multi-sport athlete, many of them playing three sports. That’s a source of pride for Campbell, who is also the school’s golf coach.
“When we had four-man workouts, I was like, ‘Basketball is not even on your radar right now. Focus on things football related,’” he said. “We have to collectively work together. (Football coach Mike LeGrow) did a good job this year, and hopefully that will continue. I know some of these kids are starting to throw some baseballs. We also tell them to not overdo it. We’re going six days a week right now, three days of games, three days of practices, and once in a while you have to be a kid. You have to stay home and play PlayStation or Xbox. If you have a girlfriend, you have to take her to the movies. You have to spend some time with your parents.”
The players also weren’t sure of what could come, even though Soper and Johnson were showing early signs of being special on the court, having moved up to the fifth-grade team as third graders.
“I think back then we were mostly focused on baseball,” said Johnson, who is still weighing playing baseball and basketball in college. “We were part of a really good travel baseball team. It wasn’t until our sophomore year that we thought, ‘OK, basketball could be it.’ That was our first summer playing AAU.”
Johnson said playing multiple sports together has brought the team closer together, referring to his teammates as brothers. It’s also helped to build chemistry on each field of play.
“I feel like it helps out a lot with the different roles everyone plays on the baseball diamond or football field,” Soper said. “You get to understand what guys do, and their tendencies.”
Soper and Johnson are the unquestioned stars on the basketball court. Both stand at 6-foot-5 and are dangerous from anywhere on the court. While neither has signed with a college, they both plan to play at the next level. Soper was the Blue Water Area Conference MVP a year ago, and Johnson was runner-up.
As Cros-Lex has rolled to a 3-0 start this season, Soper is averaging 17.3 points per game and Johnson 14. Soper also has set the school record for career rebounds.
But the Pioneers have shown they go much deeper than their two stars as they are winning by an average of 40.6 points per game. Juniors Saige Slanec and Jake Townsend have also contributed double-figure scoring games. Seniors Noll and Nolan Durand continue to play major roles on both ends of the floor, and sophomore point guard Trey Kolakovich has meshed nicely with his older teammates in his second varsity season.
“Collectively, we’ve got so many kids that do things that kind of get overlooked,” Campbell said. “The great thing with our team is, I had a guy send me a message after the game (Saturday against Brown City) and he said there were instances in the fourth quarter when we had some bench players on the floor and they did things well and everyone on the bench was up and cheering. I always tell them that I was all-area in high school, but no one remembers that. If we would have been good enough to put up a championship on a banner, then everyone would see it. If we do things collectively, as a team, that’s something not anybody can take away from you.”
The Pioneers have never won a Regional title, something this year’s team hopes to end. But they know it won’t be easy, and after last year, they are simply embracing the opportunity.
“I feel like every practice, every time we’re together and every time you’re on the court, we don’t take it for granted,” Soper said. “Especially for a senior, everybody talks about how fast it goes, but you don’t really know until you live through it.”
They’re also not taking the online chatter and recognition for granted, even if they’re much more interested in showing the state how good they are in person.
“It’s really cool that a little town in east Michigan in the Thumb and on the lake can get all this recognition, and that people are talking about us,” Johnson said. “We see most of it, and we talk about it, but it’s not like we freak out about it. Coach keeps us pretty under control. You can look at this stuff, but it doesn’t mean much. You just have to keep playing.”
Paul Costanzo served as a sportswriter at The Port Huron Times Herald from 2006-15, including three years as lead sportswriter, and prior to that as sports editor at the Hillsdale Daily News from 2005-06. He can be reached at [email protected] with story ideas for Genesee, Lapeer, St. Clair, Sanilac, Huron, Tuscola, Saginaw, Bay, Arenac, Midland and Gladwin counties.
PHOTOS: (Top) Croswell-Lexington’s Saige Slanec looks into the post during a game this season. (Middle) Trey Kolakovich brings the ball up the floor. (Below) Croswell-Lexington’s bench anticipates a teammate’s 3-pointer. (Photos courtesy of Mike Gallagher/Sanilac County News.)