{"id":3867,"date":"2016-09-07T21:05:51","date_gmt":"2016-09-07T21:05:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.missouriwestern.edu\/magazine\/?p=1489"},"modified":"2019-06-12T10:24:02","modified_gmt":"2019-06-12T15:24:02","slug":"brett-goodwin-98-championship-coach","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.missouriwestern.edu\/magazine\/2016\/09\/07\/brett-goodwin-98-championship-coach\/","title":{"rendered":"Brett Goodwin ’98: Championship Coach"},"content":{"rendered":"

In today\u2019s world of \u201ceveryone is a winner,\u201d and everyone gets a trophy for participating, a St. Joseph high school girls\u2019 basketball team showed the state what a true winner and a real champion looks like. And a Missouri Western alumnus coached them every step of the way.\"goodwin\"<\/a><\/p>\n

In March 2016, Benton High School girls\u2019 basketball team, guided by Coach Brett Goodwin \u201998, won the Class 4 state championship and finished with an undefeated 31-0 season.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was a lot of luck, but we worked incredibly hard for it,\u201d Goodwin said. \u201cThe girls put in the time and effort it takes to have a season like that.\u201d<\/p>\n

It was about midway through the 2015-16 season that Goodwin said he began to believe the team might see a repeat of the 30-0 2006-07 season, except he knew that this team could play a total of 31 games.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is a rare thing. When we did it in 2006-07, I said there will never be another undefeated season,\u201d Goodwin said. \u201cThat just doesn\u2019t happen. But the way we were able to do it again made it that much more remarkable.\u201d<\/p>\n

The championship game against the Mary Institute and Saint Louis Country Day School was nothing short of amazing. Goodwin\u2019s #6 player, a freshman, was injured in the semi-final game, and one of the starters was injured five minutes into the championship game.<\/p>\n

The game went into double overtime before the Benton girls sealed the deal. Goodwin noted that his two seniors scored 34 of the 42 points in the championship game.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe were two kids down and we found a way.\u201d<\/p>\n

One of the first to give him a hug when the game was won was his daughter, who is a cheerleader for Benton. Goodwin said that made the moment more special.<\/p>\n

Goodwin played both baseball and basketball as a freshman at Benton High School, but focused on basketball for the next three years. In his senior year, the basketball team lost in triple overtime in the quarterfinals to miss out on a trip to state. That makes winning the championship twice and making it to state four times as a coach extra sweet, he said.<\/p>\n

Goodwin transferred to Missouri Western from Graceland in Iowa to play basketball for longtime Missouri Western Coach Tom Smith. The team played in the NCAA tournament two years and had three seasons with 21-plus wins.<\/p>\n

Goodwin said he appreciated his high school basketball coach Mike Ziesel; Graceland coach Rich Harrop; and Smith, who each brought different strengths to their coaching. He said he learned from each and applied the lessons to his own style.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy days at Missouri Western are still very dear to me. I wouldn\u2019t be where I am today without them.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In today\u2019s world of \u201ceveryone is a winner,\u201d and everyone gets a trophy for participating, a St. Joseph high school girls\u2019 basketball team showed the state what a true winner and a real champion looks like. And a Missouri Western alumnus coached them every step of the way. In March […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[23,48],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.missouriwestern.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3867"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.missouriwestern.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.missouriwestern.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.missouriwestern.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.missouriwestern.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3867"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.missouriwestern.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3867\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4423,"href":"https:\/\/www.missouriwestern.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3867\/revisions\/4423"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.missouriwestern.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3867"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.missouriwestern.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3867"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.missouriwestern.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3867"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}