Mooseheart, Aurora Central both enjoy best seasons ever
On Wednesday, the sun set on one of the girls basketball season’s best stories.
At its own Class 1A regional, Mooseheart lost 61-37 to Indian Creek. The defeat, however bitter initially, failed to diminish a season of success not seen in years at Mooseheart’s 1,000-acre campus.
The Lady Ramblers enjoyed an 11-game winning streak that ended with a loss in their regular-season finale, and went 17-9 overall. Coach Bryan Miller, in his fifth season, has been at Mooseheart a decade coordinating the recreation program of the 97-year-old “Child City.” He’d never seen the girls have a winning record.
“I would venture to guess it’d go beyond that,” he said before the playoff loss.
He had an inkling things might be different this year, armed with a core of seniors Katie Stryker, Santana Sanchez, Maria Dillon and Cayanna Samuelson, a forward who on Jan. 7 won Mooseheart’s annual Bridge-Breaking Contest.
“Ever since we’ve seen the girls in sixth, seventh and eighth grade we’ve always talked about their junior and senior year, playing varsity ball, it’ll all culminate. And here it’s culminating,” Miller said.
Not deep, not tall, Mooseheart nonetheless jelled with Stryker at point guard and a 2-1-2 zone defense that helped fuel a transition-based offense.
Miller could employ an all-Stryker trap. Along with Katie, sophomore twin sisters Erin and Becca Stryker played varsity. Older brother Jacob Stryker graduated from Mooseheart last year. Katie was in seventh-grade when all four entered Mooseheart from Lake Mary, Fla.
“I think this season is more about sisterhood and basically determination,” said Katie Stryker, not necessarily literally.
“I just think that our team this year has been all about togetherness,” she said. “We don’t win these games by individual talent, we win them by teamwork. I think all the credit should go toward the team, not to a certain person.”
That being said, Stryker scored more than 1,400 points by Miller’s unofficial tally. She ended her career with 14 against Indian Creek.
A team co-captain with Sanchez, Stryker is the current commanding officer of Mooseheart’s National Junior ROTC program. She hopes to attend Western Illinois University and study criminal justice with an eye toward becoming a police officer. She contemplates trying to walk on to the basketball team.
With center Arranda Stuart bothered by an ankle injury, the 5-foot-4 Stryker became the 1 in the 2-1-2 defense.
“I’m not the quickest, usually those are my sisters,” Katie said. “But I know how to push people around.”
For many seasons Mooseheart had been the pushee. This group, anchored by its veteran core, turned that around.
“It was a matter of time,” Miller said. “We were hoping for it last year but this year — record-wise and basketball-wise — it’s been proven in our record.”
Diamond in the rough
Another girls basketball success story is that of Aurora Central Catholic. Mark Fitzgerald’s Chargers’ improved to 16-9 with Monday’s 56-37 win over Indian Creek, the best mark in the program’s 36 years. ACC went 15-11 under coach John Mason in the 2000-01 season.
Fitzgerald credits a mixture of defensive-minded seniors such as Alexia Goblet, Crysta Hoffman and Natalie Steinwart, and scorers Jackie Cardona, Ashley Wilk and leading rebounder Katilyn Rosa. While Cardona has scored 753 career points by herself and has hit 38 3-pointers this season, the Chargers as a team are allowing only 40.6 points a game.
Wins over the likes of Newark and Rosary — the latter for the first time since 2000-01 — ACC earned a No. 1 seed at the Class 3A IMSA regional.
Fitzgerald is in his third year at ACC and took over a team that had won 1 game each of the prior two seasons. He came out of the St. Francis boys program, and as he contemplated moving to ACC, then-Spartans varsity boys coach Mike Harper praised ACC as a “diamond in the rough” and an excellent opportunity.
The diamond should continue to shine. Only one starter, senior point guard Katherine Chandler, will graduate. Sophomore guard Alex DeCraene will return with Rosa, Wilk and Cardona.
“I cannot thank Mike enough for his confidence in me and his wisdom,” Fitzgerald said. “ACC is a wonderful place and the students and parents are fantastic. I am proud to be an ACC Charger.”
Long, winding road
On Feb. 2 local athletes capped their collegiate decisions by participating in National Letter-of-Intent Signing Day.
It is doubtful any took as eventful a route to a full scholarship as 2009 St. Charles North graduate Mike Kastel.
A 6-foot-7 forward on the North Stars’ basketball team that won a regional title and set a program wins record with 22 in the 2008-09 season, Kastel had Division III looks from Norbert College, Wheaton and Elmhurst. He settled in for a postgraduate term at Philips Exeter Academy in New Hampshire, the same path taken by a friend, Josh Bartelstein, out of Highland Park.
While lifting in the Exeter weight room, football coach Bill Glennon spied him. Three weeks into the season Exeter lost a starting defensive end to a broken leg. Glennon recruited Kastel, who first played football as a 4-year-old, then and there.
Kastel’s first practice was on a Wednesday. He started that Saturday.
“It was natural,” he said, “like doing math.”
Kastel was a sensation. At defensive end and tight end he helped Exeter to a 9-0 record, a league championship, and earned All-New England Prep School honors.
In his first game he made 3 sacks, caught two passes... and had his wrist broken. In the emergency room, Kastel recalls Glennon telling him, “Don’t worry, you’ll be a Division I football player.”
Disobeying doctor’s orders, he cut the cast off in his dorm room so he could play in the New England Preparatory School Athletic Council championship. Kastel scored on a reception to force overtime, then on defense tipped a pass that went for the winning touchdown.
In that game, however, he got his bell run twice, and suffered another concussion early in the basketball season when he had his legs taken out from under him on a layup and smacked his head.
“And that was it,” he said.
Not even.
His football abilities attracted schools in the Ivy and Patriot Leagues, and on Feb. 3, 2010, he signed with Holy Cross.
Complications arose, though, and that fell through. Kastel returned to St. Charles, and worked for his father’s construction company, RAMSCO.
“I’m a Rams fan,” Steve Kastel said.
Mike took a course at Elgin Community College to stay current, and maintaining his desire to play Division I football, sent out highlight tapes. He received a call from Delaware defensive line coach Phil Petitte, and in November Kastel was told the Blue Hens — 12-3 in 2010, losing by a point in the Division I FCS Championship — would offer him a full scholarship.
“They want me coming off the edge quickly and bringing some speed to the defensive line,” said the 6-foot-7, 230-pounder.
He received his letter of intent Feb. 1 and, following admissions clearance, signed to Delaware on Feb. 2. Steve and Wendy Kastel drove him to Newark last weekend to begin classes on Feb. 7.
Mike took his physical Tuesday morning, and will hit the weights until spring practices start in March. He is a 20-year-old college freshman.
“If they redshirt me I will be the oldest senior on campus by the time I graduate,” he said.
So be it. Life is a journey, as Kastel has discovered.
“I was sitting in my precalculus class and it hit me — I made it,” he said. “This is where I’m supposed to be. This is my home.”