Long-standing team members moving on from the Sailor Center
NORTON SHORES, Mich. —聽This spring, several members of the girls鈥� basketball team will be among the proud graduates at Mona Shores High School. Some of the young women have been playing together since they started youth basketball in second grade.
鈥淪everal of the team members played together on a 鈥楬oop City鈥� team when they were in fourth grade. Many spent their summers at American Youth Basketball Tour tournaments and playing Saturday afternoon ball,鈥� stated Mike Phillips, the current MSHS varsity coach, who鈥檚 coached them over the years. 聽鈥淭hese young women have spent many years in the Sailor Center.鈥�
鈥淭his group of seniors just completed a promise made to each other years ago, to put numbers on banners and trophies in the cases in the halls at MSHS,鈥� he said.
The graduating seniors are Jenna Baker, Mia Brown, Anabeth Hylland, Olivia Kasher, Lily Miller, Olivia Sobczak and Jenna Tierman.
Over the last two seasons they compiled a 33-8 record and won back to back conference and district championships.聽 And while many of them also received individual accolades, they know the most important thing that they leave behind are the memories created with each other.
One team member attest to this, stating the following:
鈥淥ne of my favorite memories was when our whole team would go to the Sports House and play basketball there for 3-4 hours every day. The reason we got together so much in the winter was because Covid took half our season away in 2021. In the end, we all showed up and I believe built a true connection from there on out fast-forwarding to our senior year together.
Our team had just kept building聽momentum聽every year. It was so exciting to see the results we got out of putting the extra work in. Every opportunity we had that wasn’t in the gym we would spend doing team bonding. We had multiple sleepovers, team dinners, and bowling; that is where the true connections were built which led us to fantastic years of basketball.鈥�
Phillips started working with the girls in 2011, when he was coaching middle school basketball at Shores. He then took over as JV coach for four years, and he has just completed his fourth year of coaching Varsity.
鈥淪cott Sewick, the current JV coach, also helped with this team when his daughters were playing,鈥� stated Phillips.
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