By: Joey McDermott
“We want Crane, we want Crane, We want Crane!” the crowd chanted. The St. Ignatius fans set their sights on Crane prior to our 2003 state playoff game. Two days later they packed their gym, standing the entire game and chanted, “Overrated, clap, clap! clap, clap; clap!” followed by, “ACT! ACT! ACT!” The Wolfpack's den was reminiscent of Duke University’s Cameron Crazies and it rattled the Crane kids.
The final buzzer went off, and my team came up short - a two point loss. I sat stunned in the crowded bleachers, paralyzed as I watched the gym clear out. The heart of our team, Florentino Valencia, laid spread eagle with his cheeks pressed against the hardwood floor. He balled his eyes out, knowing his high school career ended abruptly.
St. Ignatius didn’t understand what this meant to us, as they chanted over-rated, over-rated, over-rated. They could never understand our pain. To coach Anthony Longstreet the loss was a stain on one of his greatest teams ever. But Longstreet didn't lose because of game strategy, there were larger forces that defeated us. There’s no way Crane should have lost this game!
March marks the boys state basketball finals and Chicago was represented by two teams, Simeon and St. Ignatius. Representing Chicago’s Catholic League was recent upstart St Ignatius. It represented a rarity in state basketball, when a city Public League and Catholic League team met downstate. This was first done in 1990 when Gordon Tech played King for the state championship. See Tom Kleinschmidt and Jamie Brandon for that epic battle.
Seeing St Ignatius in the finals triggered my emotions. As a Crane teacher I lived and died with the 2003 basketball team. That game hurt me for weeks, honestly, it still hurts. I resent Ignatius for being successful and upwardly mobile. I resent them for using public housing land to build college level athletic fields. I resent them because my former school, Crane Tech, was closed and no longer exists as it once did.
When I say there’s no way Crane should have lost, it’s not just sour grapes. We lost because they exploited fears of our black fans crowding into “their” gym. We lost because they changed the start time on game day and our working parents couldn’t arrive two hours earlier. We lost because Ignatius packed the gym, denied our fans entry and our players didn’t see their family and friends to start the game.
There’s no way Crane should have lost because we were the better team. We went undefeated and won a city title. We rolled over every team that year. Our five senior starters (Lorenzo Thompson, Florentino Valencia, Carl Marshall, Tremel Gilot and Jamel Tidwell) played together for four years. In retrospect, Coach Longtsreet says, “Chemistry wise, that was my best team.” Freshman Sherron Collins came off the bench, a future McDoanld’s All American, a national champion at Kansas and one of the 100 greatest players in state history. Coach called Sherron, “The straw that stirred the drink.”
The team lived the life of rock stars - on magazine covers, TV spots, newspaper articles, shoe deals, sold out gyms, inter-state travel, overnights in hotels, tournaments in Vegas. All the lifestyle you might see in a movie. I made my first Vegas trip in the summer of 2002 and stayed at the Luxor. You can imagine my surprise when I bumped into three players outside the resort.
There’s no way Crane should have lost because I knew the heart of our players. Two in particular, Florentino “Tino” Valencia and Lorenzo “Big Zo” Thompson, were “A” students in my class, true gentlemen and school leaders. Tino graduated from Toledo and played professionally for years. Zo graduated from DePaul and today works with young people in our public schools. I’m proud of the men they’ve become more than what they accomplished on the hardwood.
I caught up with Tino this week, who is a basketball coach at my new school - Prosser. Going into that game he says, “We underestimated them. I didn’t know any of their players by name….I mean, we the number one team. We thought we were going to beat them by 50. They’re the 4th team in their league and we from the red west....”
The change in game time, as well as the “Catholic League” atmosphere, caught the Cougars off guard, “My mama didn’t even get into the game. They didn’t allow them. Not all our fans got in. We weren’t used to that environment.”
Perhaps Crane’s blowouts that season meant Crane wasn’t prepared for a high stress game. “Nah, we played Sean Dockery (Julian HS) in that (legendary) triple overtime game.” Tino says referring to the semi-final game he played in as a sophomore. After that game, “The wall was sweating at Corliss (neutral site). Dripping wet! I mean I looked at the walls and there was water all over! After that game, we could handle any kind of pressure.”
Big Zo noticed the Catholic League home crowd as well. “None of our fans got in. All we focused on was basketball, so we didn’t know the politics of it all. I didn’t find out about all that until years later…Some of the students, Ignatius, didn't even let them go home. It reminded you of how Duke was. It was crazy, we had never played Catholic Schools. It was a suburban feel. The whole front row had their shirts off, they had letters on their chest that spelled out I-G-N-A-T-I-U-S. It was like, wow!”
For Lorenzo Thompson the 2003 team represented a pride he still feels. “Crane was everything, to this day we are still friends with people from the projects (Rockwell, Horner, the Village). People we don’t know still remember us from Crane. A lot of people are doing much better than when they were living in the projects, people like “KP” (Deandre Jackson) he’s a personal chef for the celebrities. Actors, NBA players. He was from “450” (Rockwell building at 2450 W Jackson) right behind Moon’s (sandwich shop). Many are doing more than what society thought 20 years ago. It’s amazing.”
We lost because we played at St. Ignatius High School. State playoffs are played at neutral sites, but the school that educated Chicago’s political power brokers hosted a home game that night. Ignatius had every advantage in life compared to the kids I taught at Crane.
We lost because Ignatius pulled a fast one on game day. They claimed that “due to security concerns” the game was moved from 7:15 pm to 5:15 pm. They dismissed their students at 3:30 and directed them straight into the gym. Our fans didn’t know the game time changed, until after the game started. Parents of players showed up an hour late and weren't allowed in the gym.
I caught up with Coach Longstreet at a Prosser game last month and we recalled that day, “It was late afternoon. I got the call from (Principal) Scott, ‘there’s been a change of plans,’ Those (Ignatius) kids don’t live close, this was done so they could attend.” Street also acknowledged the impact of their crowd. “They had this superfan. He would run a full sprint from half court and belly flop into the wall…each time he did that their crowd went wild. We never saw that before.”
We lost because of an unscrupulous home field advantage, along with every other advantage society gave St. Ignatius. When they chanted “Overrated” at the end, it added salt to a wound. The “ACT” chant was my favorite, a reference to their higher standardized test scores for college admissions. While they attend Notre Dame and Georgetown, our kids went to city colleges, state colleges and HBCU’s. In their mind, they were superior academically, economically and socially - and they rubbed it in.
We lost because Crane never settled into a groove. We were rattled from the start and never recovered. The heartbreak of Tino crying on the gym floor - too distraught to speak to anyone - stays with me to this day. The elites had every advantage in life and they had to have basketball too. As much as I love the Jesuits, I will never forget what St. Ignatius did that day.
We should have won because the 2003 Crane senior class was its largest since the late 1960’s. Crane fought off charter expansion, the demolition of public housing, academic probation, threats of closing - and we still thrived! Our principal, Melver Scott, put together a community of educators. His greatest gift was allowing the greyhounds to run free and not harness or stifle us. He inspired us with his mantra, “Nobody is going to help us, but us!”
We should have won because I was a senior division teacher that year, my favorite group of seniors. I bonded with the same kids everyday for four years, many still reach out to this day. Last month my daughter's high school basketball team matched up against Jamel Tidwell's daughter and we reminisced (see picture). The 2003 teams’ success played a role in our schools’ academic success. The team brought pride and unity to the school. The students were excited to attend a school with this great team, we shared the success collectively.
We should have won because the class of 2003 exemplified a school community. I cried when our team lost the basketball game, I cried when my division students graduated and I cried years later when I heard news of a former student’s death. The tears were a sign of the deep personal and emotional connection we all felt towards Crane. It wasn’t just me though, the rest of the staff shared that same emotion and the kids felt it back. We were all emotionally invested into the wellness of the school.
We should have won, but we didn’t. The spirit of the team and Crane lives with all of us always. Even with the heartbreak, it was still one of the greatest years of my life.
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