Motor City Sports

Well, I got a source to confirm it last night, and now AP has gotten another one, so we’re officially reporting that the Detroit Shock are leaving after 12 seasons, three championships and seven straight playoff appearances. As of 2010, they will play in Tulsa, be coached by Nolan Richardson and well, not be Brittany’s favorite sports team anymore.

I’ve covered the team since their first game in 1998. It was a valuable source of income, but it was also one of the most enjoyable teams I’ve ever been around. I’m not a big fan of the original coach, but you couldn’t ask for a nicer group of players – Korie Hlede, Cindy Brown and the Aussie trio of Rachael Sporn, Sandy Brondello and Carla Porter. The team had some early success, but then struggled as the original coach made some divisive decisions.

She was eventually replaced by Greg Williams, a wonderful man who had done great things for women’s basketball … and who was an utter disaster. The Shock quickly turned into the league’s worst team, and Greg was fired when they got off to a 0-10 start in 2002. He was replaced by a man that no one could have ever pictured coaching women’s basketball, Bill Laimbeer.

The Shock finished that season 9-23 and the people at Palace Sports & Entertainment were ready to fold the team, but Laimbeer talked them out of it. He thought that, with the additional of a couple more players, he could turn the team around in a hurry. He already had Deanna Nolan and Swin Cash, and he got Ruth Riley in the dispersal draft and Cheryl Ford in the college draft. Given that nucleus, he turned the Shock into the best franchise in the league. They won the 2003 title, added two more championships in 2006 and 2008, and were one jumper away from the 2007 titles as well.

By 2009, Cash and Riley were long gone and Nolan and Ford were battling injuries. Even Laimbeer left early in the season to go after an NBA job. They lost a key player, Plenette Pierson, for the season from an injury suffered in the opening moments of the opening game, but Rick Mahorn and Cheryl Reeve kept the team battling, and they came agonizingly close to a fourth straight Eastern Conference title before losing to Indiana.

But this season always had the feeling of a farewell. The economy had wrecked the crowds and the death of Bill Davidson meant that the team had lost its biggest supporter. And now that’s official – Tulsa gets our team.

On a professional level, this is going to cost me a significant chunk of money every summer, but that’s the least of my cares at the moment. I’m going to miss the people. Rick Mahorn, for all of his ferocious reputation, and Cheryl Reeve are great people who have devoted so much energy to this team, and they both deserve much better than to be cast aside for Nolan Richardson.

With one or two exceptions, the players have been the most media-friendly group of any team I’ve covered. In a locker room containing the likes of Katie Smith, Taj McWilliams, Cheryl Ford, Deanna Nolan, Alexis Hornbuckle, Plenette Pierson and Shavonte Zellous, you could also get cooperation, and intelligent quotes. That holds true throughout the history of the team, starting with the people I mentioned, and going through Astou Ndiaye-Diatta, Wendy Palmer, Jennifer Azzi, Jae Kingi, Pee Wee Johnson and many others. And of course, Ruth Riley and Swin Cash, two of the nicest people I’ve met in sports.

But there’s a very personal reason that I’ll always have a spot in my heart for the Shock – my step-daughter Brittany. When I started dating her mom in 2003, Britt was understandably wary of another person trying to replace her dad. I didn’t have a lot in common with an 8-year-old girl, but she liked basketball, and she quickly grew to love the Shock. This wasn’t just basketball, these were girls, just like her! She was in Nashville for the end of the 2003 season, so she didn’t get to experience that title, but she was in the stands at Joe Louis Arena in 2006, and she was back again at Eastern Michigan in 2008.

She was a fan of the team, but there were always three players that stood out for her – Ruth Riley, Swin Cash and Deanna Nolan. She still has copies of the pictures she got with all three at a Shock open practice – she’s very proud that her arm and shoulder are in the picture on Ruth’s Wikipedia page.

She was sad when Ruth went to San Antonio, and even sadder when Swin went to Seattle. She refused to go to the first Seattle-Detroit game after the trade, because she couldn’t stand the idea of seeing her heroines playing against each other. This season, she did go, and got a big hug from Swin before the game, which made her month.

And until the last day, she always loved Tweety. She wore her autographed #14 jersey to school on Friday – the white one, as opposed to the autographed blue #14 jersey she also has – and it was really hard for me to break the news to her last night. She’s got other interests now – boys, marching band, Homecoming dances – but she was still crushed to find out that her team was leaving.

I got the nickname “Doc Shock” from some of my colleagues, because I was the only person that covered the team every year, and because I cared about it. It was meant teasingly, but I always took some pride in it. I still want to write a book about the history of the team, and maybe I’ll do that now.

So yeah, I know the jokes, but I’ll miss the Shock. Thanks to everyone involved for a great 12-season run, and for those of you still part of the team, good luck in Tulsa.