Stand-up coaching job by Sitter

DEKALB -- OK, so it ended here Tuesday night for the Elgin Maroons.

Or maybe it's just beginning.

Four months ago, everyone knew the talent the Elgin High boys basketball team possessed. And every Maroon fan near and far was preparing for the program's best season in a decade.

Then came the unfortunate news that Rob Brault had to be removed as head coach due to his arrest for driving under the influence.

Sophomore coach Mike Sitter was handed the team just days before the start of the season. The first 12 games were rough. The Maroons didn't have a lot of flow to their game, they weren't playing defense very well and they were 5-7.

But then a switch turned on. They started listening and they started winning. And the end result of that was a run that captured the heart of the community all the way to the NIU Convocation Center, where it ended Tuesday night in a 64-50 loss to a very talented Zion-Benton team in a Class 4A supersectional, now also known as the Elite Eight.

The East Side Pride was back.

"We just wanted to bring the school together," said senior Kenny Williams, the only one of the five starters whose chosen sport is football and not basketball. "Nobody expected us to get this far. You lose a coach four days before the season starts … it could have gone downhill from there."

But it didn't. It didn't because Sitter and his staff -- mainly longtime Elgin bench assistants Jeff Howard and Dr. Nick Bumbales -- steadied the tide. They preached defense and all of a sudden the Maroons started winning. And winning some more. Winning the regional, winning the sectional … yes, it was a ride that had Cinderella written all over it.

And Sitter was the one driving the chariot.

"We surprised a lot of people," Sitter, an EHS grad himself, said. "It's disappointing. We were one step away. Our goal was Peoria and we were one step away."

Howard has been around a lot of great coaches, all the way back to his playing days at St. Charles for Hall of Famer Ron Johnson. Howard's endorsement of the job Sitter did is as credible as any stamp of approval being given in today's political campaigns.

"Mike did a great job," said Howard. "If Rob wasn't going to be the right man, Mike was. I truly believe we're back on the right track now. I'm not at all surprised this happened. I know it's disappointing for the kids right now but I'm proud as heck. We've gone through some tough times the last five or six years."

Sitter, like Jim Wolfsmith at Bartlett, is officially no longer Elgin's coach. How odd is that -- Elgin Area School District U-46 finally gets a couple of boys basketball teams deep into March Madness and their coaches are both stuck with interim tags?

"It's been great for the district," said Howard. "I was happy to see Bartlett do what they did and in our situation, it would be crazy to not give (Sitter) the job. I hope (the posting of the job, by contract) is just a formality."

So does Sitter.

"I'll throw my hat in the ring," he said when asked if he wants the job on a permanent basis.

And the rest should be, as Howard said, just a formality.