A message from Joe Otis on behalf of the 1997 LaPorte Slicers Final Four basketball team:
Joe Otis as he entered the Slicer Hubner Hall of Fame in 2015. (WNLP photo)
On Saturday, Jan. 7, the LaPorte Slicers boys basketball team will host Goshen. The Junior Varsity game will begin at 3 p.m. and at around 4 p.m., prior to the start of the Varsity game, members of the 1997 Final Four team will be introduced. Immediately following the game, there will be a reception open to the public at the Silver Palace.
The 1997 IHSAA state basketball tournament was memorable because it was the last single-class tournament in Indiana history. The Slicers suffered a heartbreaking 57-56 loss to Delta in front of 29,000 fans, the fourth-largest crowd in Indiana tournament history. There were an estimated 5,000 Slicer fans dressed in Slicer Orange in attendance. A steady diet of Slicer baseball state championships certainly played a role in making our community hungry for a basketball state championship.
Games don’t always end the way we want them to. Basketball is like that. However, being a part of the last chapter of a tournament that inspired the movie “Hoosiers” is something that our players, coaches, trainer, managers, statisticians, and a large army of Slicer faithful who followed us through the tournament will treasure forever. It’s probably safe to say that no high school team or its fans anywhere on this planet will ever watch a game again in front of a crowd that large.
LaPorte was there in all its fanatical fan glory on the last day of single-class Indiana High School Basketball, and we remain enormously proud of the young men who took us there. Please come out Saturday and honor those players who made it all possible.
Sincerely,
Joe Otis and the 1997 Slicer Basketball Team
EDITOR’S NOTE: Admission tickets to the reception may be purchased ahead of time at the LPHS Athletic Office. Hors d’oeuvres and soft drinks will be provided and a cash bar will be available.