Basketball boomed in popularity at St. Mary’s School

ALGOMA ‑ News of the recent death of Tom Poehls (pronounced “pails”), a 1957 graduate of St. Mary’s Grade School and a 1961 Algoma High School alum, recalled pleasant memories of basketball teams from seasons past.

When St. Mary’s decided to build a new school in 1951, Reverend Francis Heimann, the pastor, made certain that a modern, state-of-the art gymnasium was included in the building plans, a feature lacking in the old school. The new school opened in the autumn of 1952, in the midst of the post-World War II baby boom. Thanks to the baby boom and larger families, the enrollment swelled to more than 400 students in the early 1960s.

With its own gymnasium, the school was able to assemble a basketball team. St. Mary’s fielded its first team during the 1953-54 school year. Two members of that team — Gene Laurent and Dick Mehlin — went on to star for Algoma High School. Mehlin parlayed his deadly hook shot into all-conference honors and fourth place in the conference scoring derby during his senior year in 1957-58.

Three years later, 80% of the starting lineup — Poehls, Dick Dart, Tom Laurent and Tim Zettel — were St. Mary’s alums. That 1960-61 Algoma High School squad finished with a 12-2 conference mark, a single game behind conference champion West De Pere. Both losses were at the hands of the champions, the first on a last second basket by Ron Lindeman and the second after Algoma had led after the first three quarters.

The 6-foot, 2-inch Poehls averaged 12.3 points per game. His basket in the closing seconds of the second conference game against De Pere gave Algoma a thrilling 54-52 win. Tom finished second on the team to Zettel in total points.

One year later, Zettel won the conference scoring title and became the first Algoma High School basketball player to surpass the 1,000-point mark in school history. An excellent left-handed pitcher, Tom spent two years in professional baseball, the first in Greenville, South Carolina, in 1964.

St. Mary’s alums John Fett and Larry VanLanen played key roles on Algoma’s back-to-back conference titles during the 1963-64 and 1964-65 seasons, in which the teams posted a combined 27-1 conference mark. Bruce Romdenne and Dick Poehls, Tom’s younger brother, were starters on the school’s 1966-67 conference championship team.

Bill VanLanen, Larry’s younger brother, had the distinction of scoring the final basket at the old high school gym on Cleveland Avenue on Feb. 24, 1969. Bill’s last second basket gave Algoma a 51-50 victory over West De Pere and deprived the Phantoms of a conference title.

St. Mary’s won the 1965 Corpus Christi basketball tournament with a starting lineup of Mike Graf, Jim Reinert, Dan Laurent, Pat Benes and Mike LaCrosse. The team was coached by Ken Hoffman.

As a proud 1964 alumnus of St. Mary’s Grade School, I was heartbroken when I learned of the closing of the school in June 2020. The school had been in operation since the late 1800s.

Following his graduation from Algoma High School, Tom Poehls graduated from the University of Wisconsin and spent his career as a stockbroker in Chicago. Tom never forgot his Algoma roots, however, spending a week each summer in Algoma and Door County with a handful of his high school classmates and attending AHS alumni events. A devout Catholic, Tom and his wife took a number of religious pilgrimages and bought a summer home in Algoma late in his life. Following his funeral in Chicago, Tom was buried at St. Mary’s Cemetery.