What began as an idea to try to extend the basketball season for a couple fourth-graders from Houlton ended up with a team consisting of players from throughout central and southern Aroostook County competing in a national tournament last month.
The Maine Athletic Club squad, consisting of three girls from Caribou (Ashlyn Bouchard, Anna Jandreau and Salena Savage), two from Southern Aroostook (Madison Russell and Madison Shields), two from Houlton (Drew Warman and Emma Swallow) and one from Presque Isle (Faith Sjoberg), returned from the Zero Gravity National Tournament held in Massachusetts June 6-7 by placing in a tie for third place in the 10-and-under division with a 3-2 record.
Clyde Warman said the team began to form following a conversation with Bryan Swallow about trying to have their daughters continue to play after the Aroostook Youth Basketball League season ended in March.
Warman said he started talking to parents from other communities to guage their interest and with Warman as the head coach and Swallow as his assistant, practices were held once a week — mainly in Houlton at Southside School but occasionally in Caribou.
“We let everyone know up front that we would keep expectations low, as we didn’t know what to expect,” Warman said.
The team ended up competing in four tournaments and performed well in all of them. At the first one in New Hampshire, the squad advanced all the way to the championship thanks to an intense fullcourt man-to-man defense. Despite losing in the finals by eight points to a team from Boston made up of fourth- and fifth-graders, Warman said his MAC squad proved to be a formidable opponent.
“I could sense something different about this team,” Warman said. “I remember thinking to myself it is the first time in my coaching career that I’ve had a group of kids that collectively competed as hard as those kids competed — and they are only fourth-graders.”
The next tournament was the Zero Gravity Maine Open Championships and after advancing to the finals the team was tested early by the Maine Firecrackers, a team from the Portland area known as the best AAU club in the state. Despite trailing 8-0, MAC battled back against the taller team behind the gritty defense.
“Every girl was diving on the floor for loose balls and was fighting for rebounds,” Warman recalled. The Aroostook County team pulled off a 30-26 victory and automatically qualified for a paid trip to the nationals.
The team faced the Maine Firecrackers in the championship of the next tourney — the Maine AAU Championships — and came away with another win, this time by a score of 22-13.
The nationals were next and Warman sensed all the team members were nervous about what was ahead.
“I did my best to ease the nervousness by talking about what we did to get this far and if we continue to play hard for each other, only good things will happen,” he said.
The results again were positive. The team won its first three games against Massachusetts-based teams before meeting up against the Worcester Sting, who were tagged as the favorite to win the title heading in.
The local team dropped a 30-17 decision against a team of taller and quicker opponents who employed a 1-3-1 zone defense which proved too difficult to solve.
Despite the loss, the team advanced to the tourney semifinals and had another meeting with the Sting. This game proved to be much more competitive as they trailed by just four at halftime. The Worcester team ended up extending the lead to 17, but MAC battled back to close to within five on two occasions before being eliminated, 27-15.
“The girls played fantastic all weekend,” Warman said. “I was hoping not to get blown out when I should have known that they had too much internal grit to let that happen.”
Warman said it was a pleasure to coach this group and was pleased with the bonds that were formed between players from different parts of The County.
“They all got to experience some basketball outside of the state and had some success along the way,” he said. “The wins were nice, but it was other things that stand out in my mind, like their laughing and playing in the hotel swimming pool with each other, going to a team supper with all the families and how faithful they were about attending practices and tournaments over the three months we were together.
“This all started because I wanted to find a way to spend some additional time with my daughter on the courts,” he added, “but what I got in return was a lot more than that.”
