Steve Stoller was one of the most successful boys basketball coaches in Suburban Lakes League history.

Stoller guided Eastwood to seven SLL titles and five runner-up finishes in 22 seasons at the helm, from 1983-84 through 2005-06.

His first championship team, the 1986-87 squad, won the league title behind the nucleus of Todd Henline, Jon Meyer, Vince Keiser, Dale Coffield and Jamey Bowser.

“That team won 19 games,” Stoller said, “and they were a team that epitomized the word 'team.' Nobody was the star, but everybody could play. We played so many games that were three- or five-point games. They were just a solid group that stayed focused and stayed together. It was a fun year.”

Henline is now in his fourth season as Eastwood's head coach and has guided the Eagles to back-to-back SLL titles. He was a second-team All-SLL point guard as a senior and has the same recollection about the 1987 championship team as Stoller.

“That whole summer before our senior year, we played ball a lot together and we put a lot of time into playing, and it showed that year,” Henline said. “It didn't matter who scored, as long as we were winning. The wins took care of themselves.”

Henline also remembered Lake, then a member of the Northern Lakes League, ending Eastwood's season in the district semifinals.

“Oak Harbor was the really good team in the area and that's who we would have played in the district finals,” Henline said. “We were looking ahead a little bit and Lake sneaked up and got us.”

Eastwood was a program on the rise entering the 1986-87 season, after having finished second in the SLL behind Lakota the previous year. Coach Paul Gnepper's Raiders also won the league title in 1985 and took second in '87.

“When I first went to Eastwood, Lakota was the dominant team,” Stoller said. “They had a nice little run previous – they were in the regionals prior to me at Eastwood. I always enjoyed the rivalries with (SLL) teams. The kids played hard but there was respect for each other. Keith Diebler at Gibsonburg, we had great contests and great competition. There's been some great players in the league who could play at any level.”

The SLL is dissolving at the end of this school year, with six of the league's seven current members helping to form the Northern Buckeye Conference beginning in 2011-12. The NBC will consist of Eastwood, Elmwood, Genoa, Lake, Otsego, Woodmore, Fostoria and Rossford. Gibsonburg is joining the Toledo Area Athletic Conference.

“It's sad to see the league disband, as far as the rivalries and the teams,” Stoller said. “One of the nice things about the SLL, with the economy as it is, our travel was always close. As you see leagues disband, fortunately for the new league (NBC) you're going to have that proximity. The SLL was great in the proximity aspect. Eastwood was family and being involved in your childrens' life, and I think the Suburban Lakes League exemplifies that.”

Gardner has seen it all
Mike Gardner was in his first year as a teacher at Eastwood in 1972, the same year the school jumped from the NLL to the newly-formed SLL.

Gardner, who has been the Eagles' boys golf coach for 39 years, coached junior high football his first two years at Eastwood and also coached the Eagles' boys basketball team for three years in the early 1980s.

Gardner said the purpose of forming the SLL was to get a league comprised of schools that were close geographically and enrollment-wise. Elmwood and Genoa left the NLL for the SLL, which also brought in Gibsonburg, Lakota and Oak Harbor from the Sandusky Bay Conference and Otsego and Woodmore from the Lakeshore Conference.

“Perrysburg was getting so big, and Anthony Wayne was starting to grow,” Gardner said of Eastwood's former NLL brethren. “Today, they're much bigger. What's been neat about the SLL is we've all been approximately the same size throughout most of the history of the league. Every school has enjoyed success in numerous sports in different eras.

“Many schools have been successful, as you look at all the different league champs. All of the school districts are contiguous with the others, and all of the districts are similar in the type of people in the district. They're all pretty much rural districts and small towns. It's been good, healthy competition for 39 years.”

The SLL went from eight member schools to seven after Lakota left for the Midland Athletic League following the 2008-09 school year.

“Lakota was ultra successful in several sports and overall for many, many years,” Gardner said. “When they left, they were second in the all-sports cumulative points behind Eastwood. A lot of people don't realize that. They were successful in wrestling, cross country, track, and they had their moments in other sports, too.”

Welling as player and coach
Jim Welling, in his third year as the head boys basketball coach at Central Catholic, led the Irish to a City League title and a berth in the district finals last season.

Many people, however, may not realize that Welling, a 1977 Eastwood graduate, was also a starting point guard for coach Terry Nigh's Eagles as a junior and senior.

“Our rivalry was normally Eastwood and Elmwood back in the 1970s,” Welling said, “but Genoa was quite a rival as well, just from the standpoint they had good talent and had a lot of good players coming through.”

Before taking the coaching position at Central, Welling was the boys coach at Lake for one season, in 2007-08. He said the level of play in the SLL was “about the same” as when he was a player at Eastwood.

“There were a lot of good players back in the 1970s that came through the SLL,” Welling said. “I felt there were a lot of good SLL players when I coached at Lake. The SLL has solid schools and solid communities, and you always have your rivals.”

Welling said it will be sad to see the SLL dissolve at the end of this school year.

“It's hard everywhere,” he said. “It's sad because a lot of history and a lot of great names came out of the SLL, not just in basketball but in all sports. It's just a part of the times we live in now. Times are hard and enrollment is different than it used to be. It's a sad state of where we sit, but these kids deserve to be involved in sports.”

Genoa ends long title drought
Dan Dippman coached Genoa's boys basketball team for 11 years, from 1989-90 through 1999-2000, and his teams won or shared two SLL titles and took second on three other occasions. The Comets' 1989-90 team, which ended Genoa's 15-year championship drought, included all-district seniors Dennis Goodman and Chad Hanely.

“That was one of our goals,” Dippman said of winning the league title. “We felt we could contend. We had a lot of gym rats who'd had some success – they were runners-up the year before (under coach Greg Elchert) - and we felt it was a good time. Brad Witt was our point guard and he refused to lose. It was a unified effort.”

Dippman, who was on Elchert's staff in the 1980s and is now an athletic director at Genoa, said the SLL was a very deep and well-coached league in the 1990s.

“Lakota, Eastwood, Jude Meyer's teams at Woodmore - every time you played them it was a full house,” Dippman said. “Most of the teams in the SLL didn't have down years in those years, but especially those teams. There were different styles of play you had to prepare for, and good talent. Through the 1990s, every year, Eastwood and Woodmore were battles that we had.”

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