One of the first things Sam Porter did after taking over the Glen Burnie High School girls’ basketball program was remind his players that it was OK to make a mistake.
“It’s not about the mistake,” he told them. “It’s about what we do after the mistake is made.”
Once that mindset took root with the team, “[The players] don’t worry about the mistake anymore,” Porter said. “They were like, ‘What do I have to do to help my team? What do I have to do next?'”
This subtle shift in focus helped lay the foundation for one of the more dramatic turnarounds in state basketball history, as Glen Burnie rose from a winless program in 2018-19 to a state championship in 2022-23. Porter was hired in June 2020, but his first season didn’t come until 2021-22 due to the pandemic.
The Gophers rallied from a seven-point fourth-quarter deficit against Winston Churchill in the Class 4A championship game last March to claim their first state championship in girls’ basketball in the 100-year anniversary of the school’s opening.
The 43-40 victory against Churchill marked Glen Burnie’s first state title in any sport since the baseball team claimed the 4A championship in 1999. It capped a 24-2 season for the Gophers, one year after they suffered their only loss in the 4A semifinals to eventual state champion Western and finished 24-1.
“We came together and wanted to make Glen Burnie something more than what people think it is,” said McKenzie Gilbert, a junior forward on the championship team and now a senior.
The program’s transformation was set in motion by Porter and the culture of trust and accountability he quickly established upon taking the job. He worked as a health and physical education teacher at Glen Burnie for four years prior to accepting the position and he currently serves as the school’s assistant principal. So his familiarity with the school and the players gave him a good head start.
It was also boosted immensely by Porter’s daughter, Amourie, a rising talent who turned down the chance to play for numerous private schools in order to play for, at the time, a downtrodden program. Amourie led the Gophers to a 12-9 mark in 2019-20 prior to her father taking over the team.
“It was because of the challenge,” Porter said of his daughter’s decision to play at Glen Burnie. “It was, ‘OK, they are saying Glen Burnie can’t do it.’ She is a competitor. She likes to compete.”
After averaging roughly 20 points, 11 rebounds and five assists in leading the Gophers to the state title as a combo guard-small forward, Amourie is a freshman at Cal State Bakersfield.
Now, the challenge of keeping the Gophers on top will fall to players like Gilbert, one of four seniors on this season’s team, and sisters Trinity and Starr Munford. Trinity is a junior guard and Starr is a sophomore guard.
Gilbert personifies how far the Glen Burnie program has come in a short period of time on Porter’s watch.
“I feel like Coach Porter made me who I am today,” she said. “When I first came to the team, I wasn’t confident, and I wasn’t the best at basketball. But, as I have been with him, he gave me confidence and made sure I always did my best.”
At first, Gilbert felt intimidated by Porter. She felt he was very strict and demanding. But she quickly gained an appreciation for him and his coaching style.
“He puts hardness on us so that we can be better,” she said. “I was scared at first. But, at the end of the day, he is a really good coach.”
Building personal relationships is the hallmark of Porter’s coaching philosophy and a skill he is banking on to keep good players in the Glen Burnie program when they could play elsewhere.
“Coach Porter is more than basketball,” Trinity Munford said. “Players are able to connect on a different level with him.”
When Porter started coaching at Glen Burnie, he was conducting virtual workouts due to the COVID-19 pandemic. When in-person school resumed, he scoured the halls, looking for any girls interested in playing basketball.
“If you are interested in playing, that says something about you,” he said.
Before long, 50 to 60 girls were showing up at interest meetings for the team.
“That starts telling the tale right there,” he said.
Already, Porter knows that this Glen Burnie team will be much different than last season’s championship team. Six seniors graduated from that team. But that doesn’t mean his standards and expectations have changed.
“If we take care of the things we know we can take care of, if we do that, who knows what’s going to happen?” Porter said. “This is a solid squad. It’s a young squad, of course. It’s not the team from last year. But this team has its own identity. It’s awesome.”
Photo Credit: Wes Brown/CountySportsZone
Issue 284: December 2023 / January 2024
Originally published Dec. 13, 2023