Columbus East’s Koryn Greiwe, right, attempts a shot while guarded by Zionsville’s Laila Hull during a basketball game at Columbus East High School in Columbus, Ind., Wednesday, Dec. 29, 2021.
The Republic file photo
For nearly 42 years, Maria Stack’s total of 1,518 points stood as the all-time girls basketball record at Columbus East.
No one came within 150 points of that record until earlier this season when senior Koryn Greiwe came barrelling down on Stack’s mark. Monday night, the record finally fell.
“I haven’t followed basketball too much really, but when Koryn was getting close to the record, people started calling me and texting me, ‘Hey, she’s about to break your record,’” Stack said. “Then when she did break the record, my phone blew up and my Facebook blew up, so I knew.”
Stacking the deck
Stack was one of the pioneers in the early days of girls high school basketball. Her mother helped start the girls basketball program when Maria was in elementary school.
Maria honed her game playing against boys, including her three older brothers and became a gym rat at East.
“That was my playground,” she said. “I spent many, many hours in that gym. I lived across the street from the school, and someone gave me a key to the gym, so I could go in and out when I wanted.”
A three-sport standout in high school, Stack won Miss Basketball honors in 1980 after leading the Olympians to the state finals, where they fell to Southport in overtime. She went on to play at three colleges, earning NAIA All-American honors while at Gonzaga.
“I’ve heard a lot about her,” Greiwe said. “Coach (Danny) Brown talks about her. I haven’t seen any film or anything, but coach Brown talks highly of her, so I’m so blessed to be among those top players.”
Stack was inducted into the Indiana Basketball Hall of Fame in 2007.
“I do believe I left a legacy there in Columbus,” she said. “With Koryn and myself, all of those records wouldn’t have happened without our teammates and our coaches and people who rebounded for us and anybody else that played with us. I’m getting ready to turn 60, so when those memories come back, I just chuckle at that.”
These days, Stack lives in Franklin and is a human resources manager at NTN Driveshaft in Columbus. She isn’t sad that her scoring record has been surpassed.
“All records are meant to be broken, and I’m glad to be able to set a standard that lasted as many years as it did,” she said. “It’s not something I dwell on. I wasn’t going after any record. I just loved to play the game. I always say that good things come to those who work hard.”
Setting the standard
Greiwe comes from an athletic family. Like Stack, she has three older brothers. Greiwe’s brothers all played football at East, and her older sister Seena was a three-sport athlete and now is a video producer and editor for Air Force Academy athletics. The Greiwes’ uncle, Duke Tobin, is director of player personnel for the Cincinnati Bengals.
Koryn, however, is the only one among her siblings to play varsity basketball. She gained immediate attention as a freshman when she scored 437 points, averaging 19.0 a game.
“When she first came in four years ago, I knew she was a special player, and I had a feeling she could break that record the way she was going,” Brown said. “She’s just a special player, and for her to break Maria Stack’s all-time record, Miss Basketball in 1980, a record that’s held for 42 years, that’s just unbelievable.”
As a sophomore, Greiwe scored 509 points, averaging 21.2 a game. Last year, the Olympians played only 20 games, and Greiwe scored 325 points, averaging 16.3.
Through 16 games this season, the 5-foot-7 point guard has 264 points, an average of 16.5. She now has 1,535 career points with four regular-season games and the postseason tournament remaining.
Fittingly, Greiwe broke Stack’s record on perhaps the best shooting night of her career. She went 8 for 8 from 3-point range, 11 for 12 overall from the field and 2 for 2 from the free-throw line in a 78-39 win against Eastern (Pekin). Needing 28 points to break the record, she scored 26 in the first half, capped by a 3-pointer from midcourt at the first-half buzzer, then hit two 3-pointers in the third quarter to finish with 32.
“I could have never have dreamed of getting the school scoring record at the beginning of my career,” Greiwe said. “The scoring record is something that is so special, and at the beginning of my career, I didn’t know if I would be able to hit it. That’s why (Monday) night was so emotional. It’s just something that’s once-in-a-lifetime, so I’m just so thankful.”
But Greiwe has been about more than just scoring. She has led the Olympians in assists all four years.
At 13-3 going into Tuesday’s matchup at Class 4A No. 1 Bedford North Lawrence, East is having its best season since it went 24-3 and reached the 4A state final in 2006-07.
“I just want to get involved in as many ways as I can to help my team win,” Greiwe said. “Just the little things like steals, assists and rebounds, I work really hard at that.”
“She’s our leader,” Brown added. “She’s an all-around player. She leads us in assists. She wants to win. We want to win, and that’s the main thing. Everybody talks about her being a big scorer, but she’s a team player. She takes care of the basketball for us. I’m just glad I got to coach her because she’s one of the all-time greats, and now she’s the greatest scorer in East history.”
The next steps
Greiwe still is undecided on where she’ll be playing next year, but she does plan on continuing to play basketball at the collegiate level. She is thankful for what she has been able to accomplish throughout her high school career so far.
“It’s truly a dream-come-true,” Greiwe said. “I’m so blessed and thankful to be a part of this program and have amazing teammates, amazing coaches and support from the community, especially my parents and my family.”
Stack said she hasn’t attended a high school game since Ali Patberg, who is the city’s all-time leading scorer with 2,026 points and currently a graduate student on the Indiana University women’s team, led Columbus North into a game at East. But Stack is hoping the Olympians can do something her 1980 squad came so agonizingly close to achieving.
“I hope they carry through and get to the state finals and bring home a championship,” Stack said. “We haven’t had one of those yet, and that would be great to see.”
