Pittsford Pair Leads Repeat Title Charge
March 18, 2017
By Geoff Kimmerly
Second Half editor
EAST LANSING – They could make left-handed layups as second graders. That just doesn’t happen. This was bound to be a special group.
Chris Hodos made that observation and prediction a decade ago, five seasons before taking over the Pittsford girls basketball program. He proved to be quite right – but never could’ve expected to say good-bye Saturday to a senior class including the most victorious pair in MHSAA girls basketball history.
The Wildcats finished a second straight Class D championship run Saturday and extended a two-season winning streak to 55 straight victories with a 71-31 title clincher over Saginaw Michigan Lutheran Seminary at the Breslin Center.
Pittsford students chanted “automatic” after Maddie Clark’s first basket of the fourth quarter, and the Wildcats nearly have been the last four seasons. Four seniors played their last game Saturday morning – Clark, Jaycie Burger, Katelyn Kafer and Katie Clement – and after tying the record in Thursday’s Semifinal, Clark and Burger ended their careers 103-2 over their four varsity seasons – and with the MHSAA girls basketball record for career victories.
“I’m just so thankful to have been able to do this with all my best friends in the whole world. I love this team so much,” Burger said. “I’m sad this is our last game ever in a Pittsford uniform, but I wouldn’t have wanted it to go any other way. A running block in the state championship is pretty special, and I’m just happy that I got to take part in that. It’s sad, but it’s happy.”
This season’s Pittsford team finished 28-0, to go with a 27-0 record in 2015-16. The Wildcats fell in overtime to St. Ignace in the Class D championship game to close 2014-15, as their only loss of 2013-14 came in a Class C District Final to Adrian Madison.
Clark was named Class C Player of the Year this winter by The Associated Press, and Burger also was selected to the all-state first team. Both started during all three trips to Breslin, and Kafer saw the floor briefly in both the 2015 and 2016 Finals before starting Saturday.
“They’re winners up and down the line,” Hodos said. “They’re all 4.0 students, or close to it. We were academic all-state as a team last year and we’ll be close again this year. They’re all active in the community; they do a lot of good things off the court. They’re not just winners on the basketball court.”
As Burger drove into the lane two minutes in, saw the defense shift toward her and dropped a pass to an open Clark under the basket for two points, it was surely familiar to anyone who has followed the final weekend of girls basketball the last few years. Clark and Burger combined to score their team’s first 11 points against the Cardinals and 14 total during the first quarter as Pittsford took a 16-6 lead into the second.
Certainly to its credit, MLS (18-10) stuck within 10 of the Wildcats past the middle of the second quarter – something many teams have not been able to accomplish the last few seasons. And it was a memorable weekend as well for a Cardinals program that played in both its first Semifinal and championship game.
MLS kept within 30-17 heading into halftime. But Pittsford came out on a 26-6 run during the third quarter and pushed the lead further in the fourth.
Junior guard Reese VanLue led MLS with 13 points and nine rebounds.
“I’m definitely proud of our team. We achieved so much,” Cardinals senior center Rylee Pankow said. “It really does actually hurt, but we let our light shine on the court. It may not have been the score we wanted it to be, but I think we’re a better team than that but we didn’t play our best today.”
“We have a great group of leaders on this team. They played for each other all season, and they kept battling and battling,” MLS coach Brian Blaine added. “Our goal was to make a tournament run, and I know it hurt for these girls because they didn’t want it to end. But definitely when they get some time to take a look at this, they’ll realize it’s been a pretty magical run.”
Clark (29) and Burger (27) scored 56 of their team’s 71 points before coming off the court together as the clock ran under 30 seconds. Clark made 11 of 15 shots from the floor and all seven of her free throws, and also grabbed 10 rebounds. Burger added three assists and three steals, and junior guards Sydni Brunette and Marissa Shaw had six and four steals, respectively. Shaw finished this winter with 175 steals, tied for sixth most in MHSAA history for one season.
“We know our roles as a team,” Clark said. “I know a couple times Sydni had a wide-open look but she passed it to Jaycie because Jaycie was feeling it. We’re very unselfish and we know what our roles are, and that’s very important. And these girls are really special. … These last two seasons we have been perfect, and that doesn’t happen very often. And I’m thankful for my team, because they make me a better player.”
To answer again a question that’s been frequently asked this weekend, Pittsford is located southeast of Hillsdale and just west of U.S. 127, about 12 miles from the Ohio border.
The high school has a few more than 200 students, and friendships go back generations – this team certainly adding to that bond.
“We’re a pretty close group. Jaycie’s dad didn’t go to Pittsford, but him and I were friends in high school – actually, we hated playing against each other, but we loved it,” Hodos said. “And Mad’s dad and I were good friends in high school.
“And a lot of the other girls too; it started in kindergarten, and they’ve grown so much.”
PHOTOS: (Top) Pittsford’s players, coaches and fans celebrate at the end of Saturday’s Class D championship game win. (Middle) The Wildcats’ Jaycie Burger maneuvers to put up a shot over Michigan Lutheran Seminary’s Rylee Pankow.
Maska/Shiels/Zajac Family Celebrating, Sharing In Each Other's Hoops Successes
By
Doug Donnelly
Special for MHSAA.com
March 6, 2024
Call them Lenawee County’s First Family of Basketball.
The Maska-Shiels-Zajac clan have dominated the Lenawee County basketball scene this season with family members breaking records and winning championships in multiple communities.
- Brad Maska has coached Onsted to its third straight Lenawee County Athletic Association championship. His Wildcats are 20-5, won a District and will play for a Division 2 boys basketball regional title Thursday.
- Kristy Zajac, Brad’s sister, is the head coach of Tecumseh’s girls basketball team, which shared the Southeastern Conference White title this season – the program’s first league title in 20 years – and surpassed 100 career wins last month.
- The season came to an end Tuesday for Britton Deerfield and head coach Darren Shiels, who is married to Brad and Kristy’s sister Kelly. But it was the best in BD history and included the program’s first District championship.
“As happy as I was for myself, I think I was happier for Darren,” Maska said, reacting to Britton Deerfield and Shiels upsetting second-ranked Adrian Lenawee Christian in the District Final last week. “I was so ecstatic for them. To lose to that team by 50 points a month ago, to get those kids to believe and come back … I couldn’t believe it.”
The family is tight. They spend summers together at the family cottage in northern Michigan, vacation together every spring break in Florida, and during basketball season it’s not uncommon to find any one of them at each other’s practices.
Over Christmas break, Shiels stopped by Zajac’s Tecumseh practice to help with a specific defense she wanted to implement, and Shiels and Maska shared some strategy at a practice in January.
“We talk basketball all of the time,” Zajac said. “It’s constantly basketball.”
All three played at Britton High School before Britton and Deerfield merged. They all played under the tutelage of Bart Bartels, who coached both the girls and boys varsity teams at Britton for years. He is an assistant coach with Zajac at Tecumseh now.
“It’s really fun to bounce ideas back and forth,” Maska said. “We talk often, probably every other day. It really spurs a lot of conversations. It’s neat to have that family base where we can bounce ideas off each other.”
Zajac has been on the phone this week talking to her brother about their matchups.
"Why reinvent the wheel when you have two great coaches in your family that you can go to for help," she said. "At Christmas this year, all three of us were drawing out plays on napkins. It's always a great resource to have."
Shiels hit the game-winning shot for Britton in its 1995 District championship game, which was the last time Britton or Deerfield won a District basketball title until last week.
He began coaching almost as soon as high school ended and took over the Britton varsity in 2005. He coached his alma mater for four seasons, then Britton and Deerfield became a cooperative program for a couple of seasons, and then the communities voted to join the districts together. He’s been head coach through it all. This season’s 18-7 Patriots were led by Darren and Kelly’s son Logan Shiels, who finished as the school’s all-time leading scorer.
BD has six seniors, including Shiels and Brayden Shiels, a nephew of the head coach, and Ryan Good, a cousin.
“I’ve coached them since they were little because they were all on my son’s team,” Shiels said after Tuesday’s Regional loss to Allen Park Inter-City Baptist. “This is tough. The finality of it all hasn’t hit me yet, but I just think I’m most proud about how the kids all care about each other so much.
“They tell each other they love each other all the time. They’ve played together so long.”
After the District title was won at Adrian College, the Britton Deerfield team held an impromptu celebration at BD. The team gathered in front of family and friends to cut down the nets and talk about the season.
“I was surprised so many people showed up,” Shiels said. “It just shows how big it was to win the District. It’s hard to win a District.”
Maska was a 1,000-point scorer at Britton who played college football at Adrian College. He is in his 17th season as head coach at Onsted. His teams have averaged 15 wins a year and have had two Mr. Basketball Award candidates despite being one of the smallest schools in Division 2.
Ayden Davis is a Mr. Basketball finalist this year and will finish his career with more than 1,800 points, 1,200 rebounds and as the No. 2 shot-blocker in state history.
“Mr. Basketball candidates don’t come around very often, and we’ve had two,” Maska said. “It’s a big deal. We’ve had a lot of success and built a pretty solid program.”
Zajac was the all-time leading scorer during her playing days at Britton and played four years at Eastern Michigan University. She has two daughters on the Tecumseh team, including junior Alli, who recently became Tecumseh’s career scoring leader.
“I told her now that she has the school record, she has to catch me,” Zajac said.
One of the biggest fans in the gym at Onsted, Britton Deerfield or Tecumseh is 92-year-old Urvin Reau.
Reau grew up on a farm a few miles from Britton. He raised six children, including Brad and Kristy’s mom Denise. He is at a game almost every night of the week supporting his grandkids – who coach – and great grandkids who play.
“I always get to the games,” said Reau, 92. “I love to watch the kids play. High school sports are great. They are playing against their rivals. That makes it fun.”
The families got together the Sunday before the boys started District week for a family dinner, and they already have spring break carved out of their schedules.
“Spring break has always been our time,” Maska said. “It’s literally when we all have time to decompress and relax. It’s when we all can get together and discuss a lot of things – good and bad – that we had during the season.”
Basketball season rolls on. Zajac’s team is in the District Semifinals tonight as it tries to repeat as District champ.
Maska said Tecumseh better.
“I already told Kristy,” he said, “that if she’s the one that doesn’t have a District championship when we head down to spring break, she is going to hear about it.”
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) From left: Cole Shiels, Darren Shiels, Kelly Shiels and Logan Shiels. Darren is the varsity boys basketball coach at Britton Deerfield, Kelly is the longtime scorekeeper and Logan and Cole have both played for their father. (Middle) The Maska family, including from left: Kristy Zajac, Brad Maska, Urvin Reau, Alli Zajac, Addi Zajac, Avery Zajac, Logan Shiels and Gretchen Maska, Brad’s wife. (Photos courtesy of the Shiels/Maska/Zajac family.)