Toyota of Danville Classic: A Tradition that Adapts to the Times
By FRED KRONER
fred@mahometnews.com
There was a time in the late 1980s that St. Joseph-Ogden had a leg up on the competition and it had nothing to do with the quality of the boys’ basketball program.
The advantage was the timing for the school’s annual holiday tournament. It came after the multitude of events that marked Thanksgiving week and it preceded the plethora of tournaments that take place immediately after Christmas.
The Leader Classic was a community staple in mid-December, starting and finishing before the Christmas holidays.
The entry list was a literal list of Who’s Who in Central Illinois basketball.
Chrisman, which has more than 1,600 wins in its history, was a participant. So were storied programs such as Monticello, Tuscola and Cissna Park, each of which have at least 1,400 wins. State-ranked teams from Paxton-Buckley-Loda, Unity and Armstrong-Potomac had their turns in the event that made its debut in 1989.
And don’t forget the SJ-O Spartans, who have more tournament titles (17) than all opposing schools combined in the first 30 years of the extravaganza.
“It exploded,” said Randy Wolken, who was the school’s boys’ basketball coach when the tournament began.
“The best teams in the area wanted to be in.
“The first year, we had five teams and right away after that, we had eight. We had our pick of the litter. No one else was doing it.
“You wanted to attract the best schools because you wanted great competition.”
Several schools that wanted to compete couldn’t break existing contracts when the Leader Classic began and had to wait a year to join.
Wolken and long-time SJ-O athletic director Dale Doehring were instrumental in getting the tournament established.
It wasn’t difficult to sell school administrators on the idea.
“They pretty well went for it,” Wolken said, “and I liked it from the aspect that I got four more home games.”
At the outset, there was a secondary advantage for Wolken and his teams.
“We could sit back and relax at Christmas-time,” he said.
The time of holiday leisure was short-lived.
“After a few years, we couldn’t get another tourney (in January), so we got in at Monticello (the week after Christmas),” Wolken said.
SJ-O superintendent Brian Brooks – who coached basketball at the school for 15 years – is not surprised at the tournament’s longevity.
“It was a tradition that our community wrapped their arms around,” Brooks said. “A big part (of the success) is that people at the school, and The Leader (newspaper) committed to it.
“The Leader played a big part with its support.”
As the years passed, more than the basketball schedules were changing. A growing number of schools were arranging their academic calendars to complete first-semester final exams before the Christmas break.
A week-long basketball tournament that coincided with final exams was not a good combination.
Since 2016, the SJ-O event was reduced from eight to six teams with each school playing all of the others in a round-robin format.
In 2018, The Leader newspaper closed its doors and the title sponsor changed to Toyota of Danville.
This year, another change was introduced. The tournament dates were moved up two weeks. First-round games will take place on Dec. 3.
The final day, Saturday, Dec. 7, will be an opportunity for each school to be showcased twice.
Defending tournament champion Cissna Park returns, but there are three newcomers in the field: Georgetown-Ridge Farm, Notre Dame La Salette and Watseka.
Brooks is optimistic that more expansion will take place.
“The last few years, it was more difficult to get teams because there was so much going on,” he said. “It’s not that they were not interested in coming, but the timing of it.
“We’ve gotten good feedback and may be back to eight in the near future.”
This year’s list of tournament entries features schools all within a 75-mile radius of St. Joseph.
In recent years, the tournament included schools traveling from Chicago Longwood and Stanford Olympia. Longwood bowed out after last year’s event.
While some coaches enjoyed seeing schools and styles of play they might not otherwise see in the regular season, there was a flip side to the long-distance commuter teams.
“The one negative from that far away is that you don’t get many fans, and the bottom line is that you need people in the stands to support paying the officials and the scorekeepers,” Wolken said.
“If it can’t break even, it can’t go too many years.”
Three-plus decades into the tournament’s existence, the staying power has been confirmed.
Though SJ-O twice had streaks of at least five tournament championships in a row, Wolken insisted it wasn’t because of scheduling.
“We didn’t just get teams we could beat,” Wolken said. “We had the best we could get in the area.
“You don’t want one good team and five or six poor ones. You want competitive teams and competitive games.
It can be tough to get everything to fall into place.”
Spartan administrators are hopeful that by reinventing itself with a new name and a new time slot, the tournament will remain viable for years to come.
The Toyota of Danville Classic will be held at St. Joseph-Ogden High School from Dec. 3 to Dec. 7. Home teams are listed first.
Tues., Dec. 3 @ 5p.m. Cissna Park vs. Notre Dame La Salette
Tues., Dec. 3 @ 6:30 p.m. SJO vs. Georgetown Ridge-Farm
Tues., Dec. 3 @ 8 p.m. Danville Schlarman vs. Watseka
Wed., Dec. 4 @ 5 p.m. Cissna Park vs. Watseka
Wed., Dec. 4 @ 6:30 p.m. Danville Schlarman vs. Georgetown Ridge-Farm
Wed., Dec. 4 @ 8 p.m. SJO vs. Notre Dame La Salette
Fri. Dec. 6 @ 5 p.m. Notre Dame La Salette vs. Danville Schlarman
Fri. Dec. 6 @ 6:30 p.m.Georgetown Ridge-Farm vs. Watseka
Fri. Dec. 6 @ 8 p.m. SJO vs. Cissna Park
Sat. Dec. 7 @ 10 a.m. Cissna Park vs. Georgetown Ridge-Farm
Sat. Dec. 7 @ 11:30 a.m. SJO vs. Danville Schlarman
Sat. Dec. 7 @ 1 p.m. Notre Dame La Salette vs. Watseka
Sat. Dec. 7 @ 4 p.m. Danville Schlarman vs. Cissna Park
Sat. Dec 7 @ 5:30 p.m. Georgetown Ridge-Farm vs. Notre Dame La Salettesjo
Sat. Dec. 7 @ 7 p.m. Watseka vs. SJO
