‘We stood together’
Members of Oak Lawn’s 1971 basketball team reunite to recall their ‘almost’ title
It takes a long time to turn bitter wounds of defeat into treasured memories. Saturday night, the 1971 Oak Lawn High School basketball team and its storied coach gathered to share recollections and stories of what almost was theirs.
One-half century ago, the overlooked and unranked Spartans came within two points of becoming state champions, losing 52-50 to Thornridge of Dolton in the 1971 Illinois high school championship game. It was the first time in state tournament history two schools from the south suburbs met in the final game and the last single-class championship contest.
The gathering, organized by then-team manager Mike Hayes, was nothing less than an evening in which shared love could melt an iceberg and warmth for each other could thaw a frozen heart.
They were all there: C.J. Kupec, the 6-foot-6 center who led the team in scoring, and Jim Bocinsky, the crafty guard who scored 32 of his team’s 55 points in a sectional win against St. Patrick High School; forwards Brett Arnold and Bob Carr; along with Steve Wagner, Keith Gansel, Mark Swiecicki and Ed Fitzgerald.
They gathered in the Oak Lawn VFW hall for the joyful event, and the guest of honor was their coach, 91-year-old Len Scaduto, who made the trip from his home in Hawaii. It was a moment in time which undercut the Vince Lombardi catchphrase that “winning isn’t everything; it’s the only thing.”
The only thing in the room that night was mutual honor and respect for each other by each other.
Shared memories of a joyous season could not be erased by a two-point defeat to a Thornridge team that would go unbeaten the following year, winning all but one of their 33 games by 20 or more points.
It was the Scaduto “system,” a combination of both offensive and defensive numerical efficiency, that the coach claims was the driving force in taking the team from a so-so 9-2 record to 21 consecutive wins. But numbers on a chart are only numbers. When they become part of a communal will, they can become truths.
Forward Carr recalls the sectional championship game against defending state champion Lyons Township.
“Before the game started the announcement was made that tickets for the next round would be sold
at the school on Monday,” he said. “They expected to win the game and that made me angry.”
Oak Lawn won 67-61, with Kupec soring 29 points and Bocinsky adding 13.
“They should not have said that” Carr said.
“We stood together” said Scaduto who recalled how the team rallied after losing to Wheaton North in a Christmas tournament. When he moved Tom Dubetz to point guard, the team began to jell.
Sadly, Dubetz died in a car accident shortly after graduation, but members of his family were on hand Saturday night.
“No one ever ranked us in the top 10” Scaduto recalled.
The Illinois High School Association book on the state tournament attested to this, when it listed the top 15 teams in the final AP Poll that year. Oak Lawn was missing.
After 29 years at Oak Lawn, Scaduto retired in 1991, and, while he and his wife, Lynn, were vacationing in Hawaii, Len paid a visit to the athletic director at nearby Chaminade University.
“I talked to him for two hours and came back to the beach and told my wife ‘I’ve got a job,’ ” he said.
He became an assistant coach at the school for two years.
Both Kupec and Bocinsky had distinguished college careers.
Kupec starred at Michigan and was the first player in school history to be named team captain two consecutive years. He later played for two years in the NBA with the Los Angeles Lakers as Kareem Abdul-Jabbar’s backup center and later had a notable career while playing in Europe.
Bocinsky played college basketball at DePaul, averaging more than 10 points a game over a three-year span.
Others journeyed down other paths. Carr, whose desperate putback of a Kupec miss in the final seconds of the title game against Thornridge bounced off the rim, left the game on his own terms, becoming a successful businessman in Oconomowoc, Wisconsin, after graduating from Northern Illinois University.
Arnold, who also left the game in college, attended Doane College in Nebraska, is now retired and still lives in the area.
Before Coach Scaduto spoke he was presented with a special Chicago Cubs jersey emblazoned in back with his name and the number 71 — the year Oak Lawn got to the championship game. In return, Scaduto presented individual plaques to the players and team manager, honoring them for their season and telling all what it meant to the coach of that special team.
Even a stranger could understand that.