Lights-Out Loyer Leads Clarkston to Final
March 23, 2018
By Geoff Kimmerly
Second Half editor
EAST LANSING – Warm-ups don’t count, but it seemed like Foster Loyer couldn’t miss while getting ready for Friday’s first Semifinal at the Breslin Center.
The last four seasons, that’s been a good sign for Clarkston.
The Wolves’ senior point guard went on to make 12 of 17 shots from the floor and score 42 points – becoming the fifth player ever to drop at least 40 in a boys basketball Semifinal – in leading reigning champ Clarkston back to the Class A Final with a 74-49 win over Warren DeLaSalle.
Loyer scored 17 of his team’s 23 first-quarter points, on 6 for 10 shooting, as the Wolves quickly built a double-digit lead that never fell below nine points the rest of the game.
“When he gets going, there are not a lot of people who can stop him,” Clarkston senior backcourt mate CJ Robinson said. “When he gets going like that, we try to key on getting him the ball. He knocks shots down for us, and it opens things up for others, and he does a good job of finding everybody.”
Clarkston (25-1) will attempt to finish a repeat at 12:15 p.m. Saturday against Holland West Ottawa.
Loyer drained seven 3-pointers among his 12 field goals and all 11 of his free throw attempts – against a DeLaSalle defense focused on slowing down the recently-named Mr. Basketball Award winner and Michigan State recruit.
“I don’t think in 31 years of being a varsity coach that anyone has remotely scored that many points,” Pilots longtime leader Greg Esler said. “I think about when we were here in (20)07, Manny Harris had 13. But the thing about Loyer that’s so good is he’s so deceiving – he reminds you of Cassius Winston in the fact that he’s not the most athletic guy, he might not be the fastest but all of a sudden he’s shooting the 25-footer and getting to the rim and making everybody on his team better. So there’s no question, he’s a winner.”
Those comparisons, of course, are high praise – Harris, who went on to star at Michigan, had 14 for Detroit Redford in a Semifinal win over the Pilots that season, and DeLaSalle saw its share as well of Detroit U-D Jesuit’s Winston, who’s currently running the point for MSU.
Longtime Clarkston coach Dan Fife extended the praise to include Robinson, who had nine points and five assists while sharing a game-high 31 minutes on the floor.
“When you’ve got two guards who can play like this, it makes it a lot easier to coach,” said Fife, who’s in his 36th season. “My first year coaching, we had a bunch of bigs, and our guards weren’t near like this, we played Flint Central and we just got tattooed because we couldn’t handle the pressure. These guys handle the pressure.
“The two of them feel comfortable, and it makes everybody else relax a little bit.”
As a team, it was a smooth performance. The Wolves had only 10 turnovers to 11 assists and made 53 percent of their shots from the floor.
“I think as a point guard, for both of us, it’s important that we’re in control of the pace of the game, that we play how we want to play,” Loyer said. “Just to come out and throw that first punch and get an early lead is very important for us.”
Of course, Clarkston has more than great guards – senior forward Taylor Currie, headed to Wisconsin after graduation, chipped in 16 points and 12 rebounds and had the first basket of the game. As a team, the Wolves outrebounded the Pilots 36-19.
Senior forward Luke Pfromm led DeLaSalle (19-8) with 17 points, while senior forward Jordan Winowiecki had 12 and senior forward Kole Gjonaj had 10. Senior guard Justin Fisher had nine assists.
PHOTOS: (Top) Clarkston’s Foster Loyer launches a shot during Friday’s Semifinal win over Warren DeLaSalle. (Middle) DeLaSalle’s Justin Fisher had nine assists and four points for the Pilots.
Hart Teammates Reunite After 80 Years Now as WWII Vets, Great-Grandfathers
By
Tom Kendra
Special for MHSAA.com
June 7, 2023
Walter “Stretch” Hansen and Harold Tate were good friends and high school basketball and baseball teammates at Hart High School, graduating in 1943.
No one could have guessed that less than two months after graduation (on July 2, 1943), the two friends would head to Fort Custer in Battle Creek, the first stop on their way overseas to fight for their country in World War II.
No one could have imagined how many twists and turns their lives would take over the next 80 years – from the battlefields in the South Pacific, then back to West Michigan where they both were married with children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren and now Harold even has a great-great-grandchild.
And, certainly, no one would have believed that the two young boys from Hart – who forged a friendship through high school sports long before the days of computers, microwave ovens and cell phones – would still be alive at the age of 98 for an emotional reunion last month, on May 22, seeing each other for the first time in 80 years and, to cap it off, the reunion took place in their hometown of Hart.
“It was such a great day,” Hansen said about the meeting, which was set up by Muskegon-area World War II historian Richard Mullally.
“We picked right up, talking about sports and the service and everything else.”
The conversation came easy for the two old friends, who played for Hart during a “golden era” at the school – particularly in basketball, as the Pirates won 11 West Michigan Conference basketball titles between 1940 and 1954.
Perhaps the best team during that time period was Hansen and Tate’s as seniors in 1943. That team lost only once, to rival Scottville (31-25), but more than made up for it with an 80-10 trouncing of the Spartans in the final regular-season game.
Hart then crushed Scottville and Newaygo to win the District championship, only to have Michigan’s prep basketball season stopped abruptly at that point because of World War II.
That 1943 team featured four starters over 6-0, led by the duo of Hansen and Stan Kapulak (both 6-6), Joe Mack (6-2), Lyle Burmeister (6-1) and Stanley Riley (the lone starter under 6-foot at 5-11).
“The newspapers called us ‘The Hart Skyscrapers,’” said Hansen, who will be 99 on Nov. 6. “We were taller than most college teams at that time.”
Hansen and Tate’s friendship continued to blossom on the baseball field, only to have their lives turned upside down shortly after graduation 80 years ago, when all Hart senior boys who had been drafted headed to Battle Creek as a brief staging area on their way to the battlefields of Europe and the South Pacific.
Hansen served in the Army Specialized Training Program and was part of the 52nd Signal Battalion and the 4025th Signal Battalion in the Pacific Theater.
“I had an all-expense paid tour of the South Pacific,” Hansen said with a chuckle. “The Philippines, New Guinea, Okinawa, Hawaii, all over the place.”
Tate did his service in the 24th Infantry Division and the 19th Infantry Regiment, and was stationed in Japan.
During their visit last month, Harold showed off the Japanese Samurai sword and Arisaka rifle which he had sent back from Japan to Hart. The week after their visit, both took part in Memorial Day parades – Hansen in the Lakeside parade in Muskegon and Tate in his 77th Memorial Day service in Hart.
Hansen, who still has a home on a small lake in Holton and lives at a senior care facility in Muskegon, played many years of semi-pro basketball and did some coaching. He worked at GTE and has five children and 10 grandchildren.
“I have been so blessed,” Hansen said, sorting through one of his many scrapbooks. “All five of my kids are great and I have grandkids that are just amazing, everything they are doing. I don’t even know all of their names, but it’s sure been fun watching them.”
Tate returned to Hart after his military service and has been there ever since, at first working as a carpenter with his father and then becoming a rural mail carrier for the U.S. Postal Service, retiring 26 years ago at the age of 72. He has lived in the same home for 75 years and has three children, six grandchildren, seven great-grandkids and now one great-great-grandchild.
Tate laments the demise of his beloved American Legion post in Hart, a town with just over 2,000 residents, as the number of members has steadily declined.
One topic that brings a smile to both of their faces is the recent resurgence of the Hart High School athletic program, which drew media attention not too many years ago for all the wrong reasons – notably a football program which went 24 years without a winning record.
That string was snapped with a 6-3 mark and the school’s first earned playoff appearance last fall.
But that was just the start.
This winter, Hart’s boys basketball team finished the regular season 22-0, the girls basketball team made it to the Division 3 Semifinals at the Breslin Center, wrestling qualified for the Team Finals for the fourth-straight year and competitive cheer placed fourth in Division 4. This spring, the Hart girls track & field team won its second-straight Division 3 Finals team title, and the boys placed fourth.
“It’s a great place to call home, a great place to live, always has been,” said Hansen of his hometown, which got its name from its central position in the “heart” of Oceana County.
And who would have imagined that these two high school teammates could still come home again for a reunion at the age of 98?
Tom Kendra worked 23 years at The Muskegon Chronicle, including five as assistant sports editor and the final six as sports editor through 2011. E-mail him at [email protected] with story ideas for Muskegon, Oceana, Mason, Lake, Oceola, Mecosta and Newaygo counties.
PHOTOS (Top) Members of the 1943 Hart High School varsity baseball team gather together, preparing for a team photo. Among those are Harold Gayle Tate (far left) and Walter "Stretch" Hansen, at 6-6 the tallest player in the back row. (Middle) Hansen, left, and Tate reunite for the first time in 80 years on Monday, May 22, 2023, in their hometown of Hart. (Below) Hansen served from 1943 to 1946 as a Sergeant in the Pacific Theater during World War II. Tate served from 1945 to 1946 as a Platoon Sergeant in the Pacific Theater during World War II. (Top photo courtesy of Stretch Hansen. Middle and below photos courtesy of Richard Mullally.)