Good Soldier

Like the lyrics from an old country song, Cavalier fans like me must “try not to think about what might have been.”

That was the feeling I was left with this past week after watching Genesee Christian’s senior and soon-to-be all-state basketball player, Scott Soldan.

The 6’4’’ and 195-pound swingman is the baseball equivalent of a five-tool player. He can shoot from range, dribble and pass like a guard, and score in amongst the trees. Last season, he was special fmention all-state after averaging better than 20 points per game.

Soldan can do it all.

It’s just too bad he wasn’t doing it in Cavalier blue.

Soldan, a resident of Flint Township since birth, opted instead to enlist at Genesee Christian and dress in Soldier blue.

He started at GCS in kindergarten and decided to see it through to the end.

“I thought about going to Carman-Ainsworth during the summer before my freshman year,” Soldan said. “My parents gave me the choice to stay at Genesee Christian or to go to Carman-Ainsworth. GCS was where I had all my friends, so I decided to stay.”

In the intervening four years, Soldan has been the big man on a small campus.

Genesee Christian is a class D high school with only about 150 students. It is a member of the MHSAA and boasts arguably the top sports program of any class D school in mid-Michigan.

Soldan’s handiwork is all over the Soldiers’ program.

It’s certainly not a big stage, but great players have a way of shining through even at shoestring schools like Genesee Christian.

“Being at Genesee Christian has been a lot of fun for me,” Soldan said. “I really like Coach Chapman, he really knows basketball.”

Dan Chapman, the first year head coach of the Soldiers basketball team, may never coach a better athlete at the class D level.

When I asked the head coach of Flint International Academy ’s basketball team, Chris Matheson, what he thought about Soldan, he beamed.

“I could go on and on about Scott,” Matheson said. “I really like the way he plays the game; he is the kind of kid you wish was on your team and he is the type of player you hope other players, particularly yours, emulate. He probably comes as close to reaching his potential as any kid in the area. He plays the game the way it was meant to be played.”

But it’s not the only game he plays, coach.

Twice an all-state soccer player, Soldan led his team all the way to the regional championship soccer game before bowing out to Oakland Christian this past November.

Last year, Soldan put the finishing touches on a great basketball season with a tremendous individual performance in the playoffs. The Soldiers won a regional title and narrowly missed making it to the state championships at the Breslin Center in East Lansing for the first time in school history.

Soldan, after scoring his 1000th career point earlier in the season, scored a combined 46 points in his team’s two regional games.

This season, Soldan got another record out of the way early. He broke the school’s all-time scoring record, one that had stood for better than a decade, during a heartbreaking loss on the road at Oakland Christian.

Genesee Christian had its share of losses last season and so far this season, but it, unlike many of its class D counterparts, doesn’t shy away from locking horns with larger schools. Soldan’s Soldiers have made a habit out of playing schools like Beecher , Saginaw Buena Vista, and Northwestern in the regular season.

“It’s better that way,” Soldan said. “It’s fun being able to play a lot of good teams like Buena Vista and Northwestern.”

Beecher is next on the docket for GCS on Tuesday night, before hooking up with Perry, one of the top class B schools in the Lansing-area.

The Soldiers were no match for last season’s class C state champions, Buena Vista , Tuesday night, but the Knights had no answer for Soldan. He scored 26 points and pulled down eight rebounds in the loss.

“As a team, I think we are going to be tough by season’s end,” Soldan said. “We just have a few kinks to work out.”

Even for a Carman-Ainsworth partisan, it’s hard to have anything but high praise for student-athlete who breaks the mold of a small-school player. He is currently being recruited by several division three schools for both basketball and soccer. Were Soldan to have his druthers, he would be playing basketball for Saginaw Valley State .

Here’s hoping he gets his chance.