Turned Around: A Season That Ended Mid Sentence

The 2018–19 Westwood Patriots girls basketball team had a house money year.

It’s not that expectations didn’t exist — it’s that nothing felt fragile.

In one of the rarest situations in high school sports, this was a group capable of something real, without a single senior on the team.

Young. Hungry. And never overwhelmed by the moment.

Though the program had pushed past districts before, this group hadn’t done it together yet. That changed with a run all the way to the state quarterfinals, ending in a narrow 50–46 loss to Lake City and an impressive 24–2 mark to close the year.

Ask any coach, and you’ll hear the same thing: one of the hardest parts of the job is managing seniors — holding “next year” in one hand while offering closure in the other. Coaches return. Programs move forward. Underclassmen get more chances. Seniors don’t.

For Coach Kurt Corcoran, there were no endings to manage — only a chance to keep building.

Instead, a rare opportunity presented itself: to stand in front of a young team and reaffirm that their story would continue. No goodbyes — only optimism that the lessons from 2019 would make them stronger by March of 2020. A state quarterfinal loss stings, of course, but only when it is truly the end of the road.

Everyone from part one would still be there for part two.

The work — and the belief — belonged to all of them: Madi Koski, Tessa Leece, Karlie Patron, Megan Johnson, Ellie Miller, Emily Nelson, Natalie Prophet, Mallory Leece, Jillian Koski, Savanah Sevegney, and Emma Kargela — returning together.

Alongside them were assistant coaches Rachel Marta and Irv Dieterle, the latter a legendary presence in Westwood basketball and a 2000 inductee into the Michigan High School Basketball Coaches Association Hall of Fame.

It was like finding out your favorite show was getting another season — and no one was leaving the cast.

A middle school teacher and the head coach of the girls basketball team, Corcoran had known these girls since elementary school. By the time they reached varsity, he’d spent more time with them than with his own wife and children.

If last year was house money, this year it had matured into a bankable belief — a team ready to win a state title.

The talk was easy. The work was not. The previous season’s run without a senior hadn’t been accidental. It was earned through habits few teams are willing to keep.

Weekend sleepovers still meant early mornings in the gym — peewee basketball camp on Saturdays, film on Sundays.

Summer meant early workouts while peers were elsewhere.

Practices on the day after Christmas, New Year’s Eve, and New Year’s Day.

The kind of sacrifice that accumulates slowly — and then all at once.

Looking ahead to the 2019–20 run, Corcoran didn’t sugarcoat what awaited them.

“The U.P. was loaded with talent on the girls’ side that year,” he said. “Menominee, Negaunee, Ishpeming, Bark River, Gwinn, Calumet. Just getting out of our own district was like running through a buzzsaw.”

A buzzsaw of competition is one thing.

Westwood also took a detour.

Despite entering the playoffs at 18–2, the path to a district title ran straight through road games at Ishpeming — and eventually Negaunee — both teams Westwood owned better records than during the season. A seeding system that might have spared them the road wouldn’t arrive until years later.

On a rival’s floor, the group celebrated its first shared milestone — a district title against Negaunee, in Negaunee — a receipt, perhaps, for the road trip they never should have had to make.

From there, momentum followed.

“We rolled through Calumet and were playing our best basketball of the year,” Corcoran said.

Waiting next was a familiar opponent — Charlevoix — in a rematch of the regional final from the season before. As juniors, Westwood had steamrolled the Rayders behind a healthy Elise Stuck, a 2,000-point scorer by the end of her junior year and a future Michigan Wolverine. But Stuck tore her ACL that season and missed her entire senior year.

This time, the circumstances were different.

“You still have to play the game,” Corcoran said. “But we were heavily favored.”

The game was scheduled for Thursday, March 12, in Sault Ste. Marie.

Westwood’s fans had been relentless all season — showing up early, staying late, turning any game into a true home court advantage. It was the kind of presence you didn’t just hear, you felt it in your bones.

Wednesday, March 11, 2020 — less than a day after beating Calumet — the national sports scene began to unravel.

NBA commissioner Adam Silver was preparing to address the league’s future when news broke that Rudy Gobert had tested positive. Within hours, the season was suspended indefinitely.

By Wednesday night, the MHSAA announced that fans would no longer be allowed to attend the regional game between Westwood and Charlevoix. Each team would be limited to 50 spectators.

“That was such a punch to the gut,” Corcoran said. “Our fans were such an integral part of our success. We were heartbroken — but at least the game wasn’t cancelled.”

Thursday, March 12, 2020, was gameday.

Despite cancellations seemingly popping up by the hour, Westwood’s game was still on.

The farewell parade through the elementary, middle, and high school went out without disruption — the final sendoff before a deep playoff run.

Afterward, the bus rolled south along U.S. 41 and M-28. In each town, they were met with signs, fatheads, and honking horns — a rite of passage for any U.P. team still playing in March.

“There was zero chance we weren’t coming back to Marquette County without a state championship trophy,” Corcoran said.

They packed for a week, carrying the confidence of a team that believed it could become the second in school history to win a state championship.

“The plan was to have a shootaround and lunch in Newberry on the way to Sault Ste. Marie,” Corcoran said. “It’s almost a 200-mile drive. You get off the bus, stretch, eat, and prepare mentally. Shake out the cobwebs.”

Throughout the day, more suspensions rolled in. Major League Baseball canceled spring training. The NCAA canceled its remaining winter and spring championships.

In Newberry, the routine held. A shootaround. Lunch at Subway. Media interviews. Aside from the absence of fans, it felt like preparation for any deep postseason run.

As the team prepared to board the bus for the final hour-long drive to the Soo, Corcoran stepped into an empty hallway to put on his coaching attire.

That’s when his phone rang.

It was Principal Cliff Fossitt, still new to the school. The two had known each other for barely a month.

“Have you heard yet?” Fossitt asked.

“No,” Corcoran said. “What do you mean?”

“The MHSAA just cancelled the tournament. You have to turn the bus around and come home.”

To this day, Corcoran doesn’t remember what he said next — only the weight of what followed.

He sat alone in an unfamiliar school, knowing he was about to deliver devastating news to a dozen teenage girls — news that, for some, would be the hardest they had ever received.

He didn’t rush to the bus.

He didn’t raise his voice.

He didn’t make it about himself.

Instead, he waited.

“I just sat on it for a little while,” Corcoran said. “I let them enjoy the moment they were living for a little bit longer.”

He had never been the kind of coach to rush moments that didn’t belong to him.

This one belonged to the girls.

It was the best — and only — play he would get to call that night.

“My assistant coaches got all the girls on the bus,” Corcoran said. “As I boarded, the tears welled up. You could see it on my face. I think Tessa noticed it first — and suddenly, the whole bus was looking at me. I just said, ‘Girls, they cancelled the tournament. We’re not playing tonight.’”

Coach was right. Tessa did notice it first.

“I don’t know why,” she said, “but I had a gut feeling. I kind of knew what he was going to tell us.”

Karlie Patron knew too.

“When we boarded the bus after our shootaround in Newberry and saw Coach Corcoran’s face, we knew,” she said. “No words were necessary.”

Girls fell to their knees.

Kurt’s wife and children cried.

Even Irv Dieterle — who had seen nearly every scenario high school basketball could offer — wept.

It became a shared moment on a bus, across ages and roles, all absorbing the same news in real time.

Once off the bus, Madi Koski called the MHSAA, pleading for reconsideration — the kind of leadership and urgency you’d expect from a four-year starter and 1,000-point scorer.

It was chaos.

“It was on par with the death of a family member,” Corcoran said.

“I’m a guy of logic and reason. I tried to make sense of it. No one had died. Everyone was healthy — and yet, something was gone.”

For the first time, basketball couldn’t keep its promise — the promise that if you show up, work hard, and make sacrifices, you’ll be rewarded. Not always with trophies, but with the chance to have it decided on the hardwood — not by a committee or a world event beyond anyone’s control.

Days turned into weeks. Any lingering hope of “what if” slowly became “what could have been” as the MHSAA never restarted the tournament.

For Kurt, the fire was gone.

“That day changed me at my core,” he said. “I only coached one more year. I didn’t have it in me anymore. For all that work to be cut short — it affected my competitive nature.”

For Karlie, the loss lingered.

“I’ve carried that grief with me ever since,” she said. “I was mourning a part of my childhood that was taken from us. I was fortunate enough to play softball in college, but it never erased the loss. Something inside me changed that day.”

For Tessa, the grief extended beyond herself.

“I worked my entire life for this,” she said. “Hours upon hours. My parents devoted years of their lives to witness my goals. I’ve seen my dad cry twice in my life. This was the second.”

Kurt still coaches eighth-grade basketball and assists at the varsity level. After giving so much to his community, that energy now belongs to his family.

This is not a story of redemption or overcoming the odds.

It’s a story about a sport that broke their hearts — hearts that never fully healed, and maybe that’s okay.

There was no ceremony for how it ended — just a quiet carrying forward of what was lost.

Because life will throw wrenches into plans you prepared for and plans you believed in. And when they’re turned around again — in whatever form that takes — they’ll be ready to face anything.