Brian Boyce
The Tribune-Star
ROBINSON, Ill. — About eight years ago, on a playground in their hometown, they were just a bunch of 10-year-olds who made a pact.
A decade later, they were the boys from Robinson no one else thought could win the Illinois 2A State Basketball Championship. Until they did it Saturday night in Peoria.
“It’s been an unbelievable ride,” coach Bob Coffman said inside the Robinson High School gymnasium Sunday afternoon. Packed with standing, cheering fans decked out in maroon and white, the community stomped its support as Robinson’s first, state championship high school boys basketball team came home. “What they’ve done, they’ve earned,” he said of the team, and in particular, its seniors.
Speaker after speaker, and even one poem, denied the term “teammates” for a class described as “brothers.”
Meyers Leonard, the 7-foot senior who carried the championship trophy into the gymnasium, said “There aren’t words to describe what the community’s done for us,” as the fans roared back their approval. And he, as the others, thanked the “brothers” at his side.
Members of the senior class met while playing youth basketball in the fourth grade, and they made a pact to do whatever it took to win the state championship for Robinson High School.
Before the tip-offs, rumors of the pact were probably a joke to top-ranked Hales Franciscan and second-ranked Peoria Manual. But by the end of a tournament won at the free throw line, it was clear what mattered to the eighth-ranked Maroons.
“I think there’s some new Maroons fans across the state,” school superintendent Josh Quick said to at the community-wide pep rally. From Chicago to the state’s southern tip, fans across Illinois gained a new respect for the 500-student school from Robinson. “This was not the result of just playing hard last night,” he said, referencing thousands of practice hours, years of summer tournaments, and a goal the seniors have held nearly half their lives. “Not friends, but brothers,” he said, reading a poem written by a Robinson High School student about the team.
Athletic Director Terry Roche promised the audience that “2010 basketball has become a benchmark in Robinson,” predicting future students will always remember the small-town underdogs who won the big title. “This is just like ‘Hoosiers’,” he said of the movie based on Milan High School’s 1954 Indiana championship team.
The last time Robinson High School made it to the state tournament was a second-place finish in 1916.
Principal Troy Hickey shouted a question heard around the state. “What is a Maroon?” he called out. “A Maroon is a winner!”
Hickey, as others, lauded the team’s loyal fans for game attendance, sportsmanship and volume. “We have the best fans in the state,” he said, noting the small school boasted the biggest crowds at many of this season’s games.
And while discussing this team with other coaches and principals, Hickey said “the word persistence kept coming up, and up and up.”
More times than not, the Maroons won games by outlasting their opponents.
“I’m proud to be a part of it,” he said. “Thanks for the memories.”
Brian Boyce can be reached at 812-231-4253 or brian.boyce@tribstar.com.
