Basketball meant more than statistics for the girl who led '78 state champs

ROYAL CITY - It's often said that participation in sports can help mold a young person. For Red Rock Elementary fifth grade teacher Maria Lefler, basketball meant the world.

Some day, Lefler will be remembered as a teacher mostly. But some people will remember her as Maria Loos, the 6-2 center who led Royal High to the 1978 class A girls state championship.

Lefler admits a fondness for those memories, but she includes plenty of humility when discussing them. She hated being tall at one time and couldn't play the game when she first tried it.

Then Lefler discovered her role, accepted it and became a collegiate hall of famer. And she got to travel the world playing her game.

"Basketball changed my life," she said recently.

Lefler, a not-so-little Dutch girl, arrived in Royal City with her family in 1973 for her eighth grade. She was 5-11 and "really skinny." And she was very uncoordinated.

"I fell down a lot. I'd trip over nothing. I couldn't catch the ball," she said.

Bill Bush, who coached the state champs, saw Lefler play for the first time as a freshman. Only her height was impressive.

"She caught a rebound because she was taller than everybody else and it came right to her," he said. "Then she fell over backward."

Lefler was shy and reserved. She didn't like being taller than the boys and didn't associate. Not even with future husband Rex Lefler, who was two grades ahead.

"I never said one word to him in high school," she said.

Rex and Maria met at a bank years later, between two of Lefler's "professional" basketball seasons.

Lefler was on the Royal junior varsity that freshman year. She scored all of six points for the entire season, all in one game.

When Lefler's sophomore coach, Barbara Strecker, told her she needed to be more aggressive, she had no idea what Strecker was saying. She looked up the word in the dictionary.

Lefler became a long distance runner, and that helped with the coordination. She put down a blistering 30 points her sophomore season.

"Then I discovered I could rebound," she said.

Lefler decided to become the best rebounder she could be. Basketball and life started to change.

Years later, when Lefler was inducted into the Eastern Washington University Hall of Fame, it was for her rebounding. She set the career record, for men or women, at 1,407.

Lefler's decision to become a rebounder and the installation of Bush as the head coach converged four days before Lefler's junior season. Lefler had attended her first basketball camp that summer, and Bush had sat in on a lecture by famed UCLA men's coach John Wooden.

Pressed for time, Bush decided to make things simple. He adopted the Wooden philosophy completely.

"He had said to get yourself a good, tall center," Bush recalled.

When Bush looked out on the court, the only candidate was Lefler. Her rebounding could trigger an offense built around speedy track girls who also played basketball.

"If I got the rebound and got the ball to them, we had an advantage," Lefler said.

Wooden had also said to press fullcourt and put an intimidating player at the point of the press. With her frame, long arms and long legs, Bush decided, Lefler would be ideal.

It became Lefler's job to pressure the inbounding player and then immediately help the guards trap the pass receiver. In the first game, a White Swan guard tried to pass the ball over Lefler, and Lefler stole it.

The Knights had a good year and high hopes as they prepared for the district tournament. Then their legs gave out, and they were bounced from district.

"It was really disappointing," Lefler said.

Bush blamed himself. He got so tied up in the success of the press that he used it 100 percent of the time. He still believes he wore his girls out that year.

But good things come to those who wait. Everything Lefler and her teammates learned over two seasons paid off in one key play near the end of the state title game in 1978.

Lynden Christian's much-talked about center broke free fullcourt for an easy lay-in with the Lyncs leading narrowly. She was going to put Royal away.

Royal guard Sheri Winder gave chase but turned in the other direction when she realized she couldn't stop the play. Lefler didn't stop. She swept in, rebounded the missed lay-in, wheeled and fired a perfect two-handed overhead pass to the sprinting Winder for a momentum changing lay-in.

Of the last 10 points in the 38-31 win, Winder scored eight and assisted on two. She went on to play at Northern Idaho, as did starter Theresa Mathis.

Starter Barb Hoing played at Walla Walla CC, and starter Robby Morton became a downhill skier for Washington State University.

Lefler came up with the only game statistics she remembers from her long career in that title game. Playing with aggression, she scored 16 points and pulled down 21 rebounds.

"Before the game, everybody talked about how good their center (another Dutch girl) was. I wanted to beat her," she said.

It was between her junior and senior seasons that Lefler thought she'd turned the corner with her sport. She was named the MVP of George Ravelling's Cougar Cage Camp.

But she had no idea she was college material until EWU contacted her midway through the senior season.

Lefler went to the EWU tryout camp, won her position and became a member of the EWU varsity as a freshman. She started to travel across the country.

That team made it to nationals. But EWU moved up a division the next year and never again made it to nationals.

The upgrade meant better competition. UCLA was on the schedule Lefler's sophomore year. On shoot-around day, Lefler got down on her knees and kissed the Pauley Pavilion floor.

"You're looking at the championship banners. You have John Wooden's chair. Wow!" she said.

The next day, Lefler ran into UCLA All-American Denise Curry.

"She schooled me," Lefler said.

As college was ending, and so was Lefler's career, the EWU coach called with an intriguing offer. There was a semi-pro (no women pros in those days) opportunity in Australia.

Lefler joined the Parametta Wildcats. She got use of a car and $500 a month for the May-September (winter down under) season. More importantly, she got to see Australia.

"Oh it was fun," she recalled.

After her second year in Australia, Lefler enrolled at the University of Washington and got her teaching certificate.

"My parents said, 'I guess this means you're going to settle down,'" Lefler said.

Not quite. Lefler went off to Germany for one more season of semi-pro basketball and more international travel.

Now, many years of maturity later, Lefler is glad she was a tall girl and that she remains tall. She still employs her advantage.

"When I see somebody at the store struggling with a high shelf, I offer to help," she said.