Even astronauts loved them: Pekin celebrates talent-filled 2001-02 basketball team

PEKIN — The 2001-02 Pekin boys basketball team soared to great heights.

The Dragons won Mid-State 6 Conference and Class AA regional and sectional championships. They were ranked No. 7 in Class AA at the end of the season.

They had a fan who literally soared to great heights. It was NASA astronaut Scott Altman, a 1977 Pekin grad and former Pekin boys basketball player.

"Go Pekin!" Altman said to the Dragons in an email from the Space Shuttle the week of sectionals.

This story and others were told Friday when several members of the 2001-02 Pekin team gathered in Hawkins Gym for a 20th anniversary reunion and halftime celebration at the East Peoria-Pekin boys basketball game.

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The reunion included watching highlights from the 2001-02 season on a VHS tape in the classroom of current Pekin assistant boys basketball coach Cole Stoner, who organized the night's event.

"It blew my mind when I first realized it had been 20 years since that season," said Joe Brownfield, 37, who was Pekin's starting point guard in the 2001-02 season.

"I have three kids. The oldest is 14 and an eighth-grader at Morton Junior High School. She was born only six years after I graduated from high school. That's surreal to think about," Brownfield said.

Eleven players from the 2001-02 Pekin team went on to play college sports.

Nine played basketball in college, including five at the Division-I level: Jeremy Crouch and Kevin Jones (Bradley), Todd Peterson (Northern Illinois), Matt Hagen (Rice) and Brownfield (Western Illinois).

Crouch, who is in his first season as the Pekin boys basketball coach, remains the most proficient 3-point shooter in Bradley history.

Peterson owned the same record at Northern Illinois for many years. It was Peterson's father who put together the VHS tape of season highlights that was viewed Friday.

Brandon Dietrich made 19 consecutive shots for the Dragons at one point during the 2001-02 season. The streak ended on an in-and-out 3-pointer.

Dietrich went on to play basketball at Knox College.

Two of the 2001-02 Dragons were stars in sports outside of basketball.

Derek Rademaker played football at Western Illinois after making 217 career catches as a wide receiver for the Pekin football team. That was the IHSA state record for career receptions at one time. Rademaker's total is now No. 6 on the list. Rademaker had 94 catches for 1,357 yards and 15 touchdowns as a Pekin senior in 2002.

Matt Rineberg played tennis at Illinois Wesleyan and Saint Louis after a senior season at Pekin in 2003 that saw him win Mid-State 6 and sectional titles at No. 1 singles. He was 25-8 in singles and 24-8 in doubles during the 2003-04 season at Illinois Wesleyan.

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"It wasn't just the guys who later played sports in college that made us a good basketball team," Brownfield said. "There were the guys who pushed us in practice to make each of us better every day.

"We all had one goal: win."

It was tough to beat the Dragons, who finished 8-2 in the talent-rich Mid-State 6 and 24-7 overall, losing only to state-ranked teams.

Hawkins Gym rocked every time Pekin played. The Fire Pit student section was loud from start to finish. That season, the Chicago Tribune listed Hawkins Gym as one of the five most difficult high school gyms for a road team to win.

Pekin played just one road game in the Class AA state series.

After beating Normal West (61-52) and Limestone (56-44) to win regional and sectional titles at home, Pekin lost 58-53 in the supersectionals to Springfield Lanphier at Illinois State University's Redbird Arena in Normal.

Lanphier was led by future NBA champion Andre Iguodala and 2005 Illinois Final Four team member Richard McBride.

Chicago Westinghouse beat Lanphier in the state championship game after Lanphier had beaten Westinghouse in the championship game of the 2001 Pekin Insurance Holiday Tournament.

An earlier Dragons loss was to Proviso East in the River City Shootout at Carver Arena. Proviso East had future college stars and pros Dee Brown (Illinois) and Shannon Brown (Michigan State) on its roster.

Joe Stoner was the coach of the 2001-02 Dragons.

"In addition to all the talented players on our team that year, we had a cohesive coaching staff," he said. "We'd been together for five or six years."

Cole Stoner, son of Joe Stoner, was in eighth grade during the 2001-02 season.

"I was a big fan of that team," he said.

After organizing a Pekin boys basketball alumni game two years ago, Cole said, he decided this past fall to work on putting together a 20th annual reunion for the 2001-02 team.

"It's always great to get guys back in Hawkins Gym, create a buzz, and have them reconnect and connect with fans," he said.

Brownfield is a familiar face in area gyms. He's in his 11th season as a basketball official, currently working high school boys basketball and men's junior college games.

"I love the game of basketball. I want to stay involved," he said. "Coaching basketball is my ultimate goal, but with three kids, I don't have the time to devote to that right now."

Brownfield said being a former basketball player helps him officiate because he often can anticipate where the ball is heading.

"But playing the game doesn't mean you know how to interpret the rules," he said. "There's a learning curve to do that."

Brownfield, Crouch, Dietrich, Jones, Rademaker, Rineberg and Jon Closen were the 2001-02 Pekin players at the game Friday. Rineberg traveled from Oklahoma for the reunion.

Joe Stoner, assistant coach Pat Taphorn, and equipment manager Bob Samms and his sons, Chris and Sean Samms, who helped him with those duties and were water boys, also were there.

Other players on the 2001-02 Pekin roster were Justin Bolen, Ben Hagen, Matt McGlasson, Tyler Moretto, Kyle Myers and Brody Utley.

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Also on the coaching staff were assistant coaches Larry Crouch, Tom Woodmancy and Jeff Walraven.

Future Pekin and Northwestern star Nathan Taphorn was the team's ball boy and Eddie Pierman was the statistician.

Brownfield, whose day job is parts manager at Altorfer in Bartonville, said he keeps in touch with his 2001-02 Pekin teammates through social media and fantasy football.

"But it was nice to see the guys in person (Friday)," he said.

"I've kept in touch through the years with a lot of the guys on the 2001-02 team," said Joe Stoner, who was a basketball teammate in high school with Altman (the Dragons' coach then was Marshall Stoner, Joe's father), and also graduated from Pekin in 1977.

Steve Stein can be reached at (248) 224-2616 or stevestein21@yahoo.com. Follow him on Twitter @SpartanSteve.

This article originally appeared on Pekin Daily Times: Pekin boys basketball celebrates 2001-02 team with celebration