Sports

Top Alaska sports stories of the decade: The countdown begins

Editor’s note: We picked the top 11 Alaska sports stories of the decade. Read about Nos. 4-6 here, and Nos. 1-3 here.

No. 11: Marko Cheseto survives, then thrives

Marko Cheseto was an All-American runner for UAA who in November 2011, depressed over the suicide of a cousin and teammate, took an overdose of prescription pills and disappeared outdoors on a cold, snowy night.

More than 48 hours later, after a massive, nearly citywide search, he woke up in the woods near campus and managed to walk to safety on severely frostbitten feet. Doctors had to amputate both feet above the ankle, and the story about the gifted runner who lost his feet became global news.

He returned to international headlines this year when he set a world marathon record for double amputees.

Racing on carbon-fiber running blades, Cheseto completed this year’s Boston Marathon in a time of 2 hours, 42 minutes, 24 seconds, surpassing by 28 seconds the previous fastest time by a double amputee. In a field of more than 30,000 runners, he placed 483rd overall.

In October, he lowered the record to 2:37:23 at the Chicago Marathon.

Cheseto left Anchorage in 2018 for Florida, where he works for a company that specializes in prosthetics and continues to train.

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No. 10: Lucky 13 for Alissa Pili

Alissa Pili is currently making a name for herself as a high-scoring freshman for the USC women’s basketball team, but Alaskans already know all about her.

Pili owns the state record for most career points by a girls basketball player with 2,614, and during four years at Dimond she won 13 state championships.

She was a four-time volleyball champion, a four-time shot put champion, a two-time basketball champion, a two-time discus champion and a one-time wrestling champion.

She is the only Alaskan to win the MaxPreps national athlete of the year award, an honor she received in 2018 and 2019. The only other girl to win that award twice was Colorado’s Missy Franklin, an Olympic champion swimmer.

No. 9: The streaking Soldotna Stars

When it comes to the Soldotna Stars football team, the numbers don’t lie. They amaze.

The numbers speak for themselves: Alaska’s football team of the decade, Soldotna has won eight straight Division II state football championships and went six straight years without losing a game.

Soldotna’s 59-game winning streak lasted from August 2012 to August 2018. It ended in Soldotna against the Division I West Eagles, who scored a touchdown on the final play of the game to take an 18-13 victory.

Many of Soldotna’s wins over the years have been blowouts. During an undefeated 2019 season, the Stars outscored opponents 519-118.

At the center of the coach Galen Brantley Jr.’s successful program is a run-heavy wing-T offense that creates confusion for opponents, who struggle to figure out which player has the ball. Most of the Stars have been playing together since grade school, and they know the system well.

Soldotna hasn’t lost since West beat them two seasons ago, and will take an 18-game winning streak into next season.

No. 8: The late, great Shootout

By the time the Great Alaska Shootout ended a 40-year run in 2017, the men’s basketball tournament had lost a lot of its greatness.

It was a Thanksgiving week staple for decades, drawing tens of thousands to Sullivan Arena every year and drawing millions of viewers to ESPN over the years.

For Alaska basketball fans, the Shootout was nirvana. It brought some of the game’s greatest teams, players and coaches to town.

The tournament started in 1978 at Buckner Fieldhouse and was called the Sea Wolf Classic. It was the brainchild of UAA coach Bob Rachal, who discovered an NCAA rule that allowed teams to play games in Alaska without having to count them against their season limit. The same rule allowed games to be held in Alaska before the official start of the season.

Those advantages allowed the Shootout to reign supreme as one of the premier early season tournaments. When the NCAA relaxed its rules, there was a proliferation of Thanksgiving week tournaments and the Shootout lost some of its cachet.

By the start of the decade, mid-major teams had replaced marquee teams, ESPN had ended its coverage and fans were disappearing. Spoiled by seeing teams like Kentucky, UCLA and North Carolina for the tournament’s first 25 years, fans weren’t interested in watching Sam Houston State, UC Santa Barbara and Southern Mississippi. No one was really surprised when UAA pulled the plug in 2017.

No. 7: Mario Chalmers, times two

The Big 3 got most of the attention when the Miami Heat won back-to-back NBA championships in 2012 and 2013, but it was Anchorage’s Mario Chalmers who helped run the show.

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Chalmers was the starting point guard on the Miami teams dominated by LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh. He averaged about 3.5 assists and 9 points per game during those two seasons, and furnished some clutch play during both NBA Finals.

In 2012, he poured in 25 points in a Game 4 win over Oklahoma City and then furnished 10 points and seven assists in a Game 5 win that clinched the NBA title for the Heat.

In the 2013 Finals against San Antonio, Chalmers scored a game-high 19 points in Game 2 and 20 points in Game 6.

Chalmers spent the first seven years of his NBA career with the Heat. He played two seasons with the Memphis Grizzlies, the last in 2017-18. He is one of a handful of men’s basketball players who have won championships in high school, college and the NBA.

He led the Golden Bears to back-to-back Alaska titles in 2002 and 2003 as a freshman and sophomore, and in 2008 he led Kansas to an NCAA championship. He made the cover of Sports Illustrated — “Mario’s Miracle” — for drilling a game-tying 3-pointer with 2.1 seconds left in regulation to force overtime in the Jayhawks’ championship game win over Memphis.

This story has been corrected to reflect that the Soldotna football team’s winning streak ended in Soldotna, not Anchorage.

Beth Bragg

Beth Bragg wrote about sports and other topics for the ADN for more than 35 years, much of it as sports editor. She retired in October 2021. She's contributing coverage of Alaskans involved in the 2022 Winter Olympics.

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