Steve Boyce jumping center during a high school game.

(Photo: contributed)

Just before East Bremerton High School went on a three-year run that led to a state basketball second place and then two consecutive state titles, Steve Boyce was the star player who prowled the center spot for coach Les Eathorne’s black and white clad Knights.

The 6-foot-6 Boyce graduated from East in 1971, the year before the school began its tremendous splash on state high school basketball behind all-American Rick Walker. But he did get to play with Brant Gibler, 6-9 center on the 1972 East team, and Walker, a freshman in 1971.

In his senior season, Boyce was named all-state and averaged a state 2A-leading 21.4 points a game that included a 37-point explosion on Feb. 18 in an 81-55 victory over North Kitsap. That big night established a new single-game scoring record at East, eclipsing the 36 points Keith Gundelfinger put up in a losing cause (84-79) to Central Kitsap in 1967 (Walker now holds the record with the 42 he put up in a 87-85 double overtime victory against Clint Richardson and O’Dea in January 1974.

“They took me out when I had 35 points and I think Les’s wife slipped him a note to put Steve back in,” Boyce said. “I went back in and scored two points and they took me out. It was pretty cool.

“My grandfather (Hank Olsen) didn’t like the noise in the East High gym and stayed home when we played there. He recorded the game (off the KBRO Radio broadcast) and I have that on YouTube right now. I’m thankful my grandfather did that.”

Boyce also scored 30 points in a 76-73 loss to Mount Tahoma in 1971 and scored 725 points in 41 games over his junior and senior years, an average of 17.7 points a game as a starter. He was on the varsity as a sophomore but saw very limited playing time, and was only the second sophomore to make the varsity team under Eathorne; Mike Edwards was the first, Walker became the third.

Basketball was in Boyce’s genes. His uncle, Ron Olsen, starred at Bremerton High School, played four years at Washington and AAU ball, including with an Air Force all-star team.

So it was almost natural for Boyce to go to Washington and play ball. Husky coach Tex Winter offered him a scholarship and he played on a loaded freshman team in the 1971-72 season. Boyce started all the games and was the second-leading scorer and rebounder.

Then Winter left to coach the Houston Rockets, making way for the hiring of Marv Harshman in 1972 as the Washington coach. Harshman told Boyce he would not get much playing time as a sophomore, so Boyce moved on and came home to Bremerton to play at Olympic College for coach Larry Sampson.

“He was a good guy,” says Wayne Gibson, who was then assistant coach to Sampson. “He had good hands, could shoot the ball and was a good fit for us. He was laid-back, but a good teammate – just a good guy.”

Sampson, who lives in Hawaii, said, “Wayne and I would play HORSE with him many times after practice and you have to call the shot. It was like this one will be a BANK SWISH. It could not hit the rim. I do not recall winning many of those games

“Steve did not have quick feet, but could shoot the eyes out of it.”

Boyce broke off two of his front teeth before one game at OC, had emergency dental surgery and played exceedingly well the next night on Demerol.

“I scored 26 points the first half,” Boyce said.

Boyce played the next season at Central Washington with Ned Delmore and Les Wyatt, who had been the star on the Ellensburg team that beat East High in the 1972 state championship game. For his senior year, he went back to Washington, not to play basketball, but to get his degree.

Boyce, whose mother Sylvia died on Valentine ’s Day, ending a marriage just short of 70 years with his dad Richard, started playing basketball (and baseball) with the North Perry Pee Wees. It wasn’t like he was a natural. But when he grew five inches before his freshman season, things started to click and his career took off from there.

Boyce got schooled on what it would take to be a starting center for East by Terry Welling, a senior in the 1968-69 season when Boyce was a sophomore. During open gyms Welling took it upon himself to show Boyce how it was done.

“Terry Welling was roughing me up pretty well inside,” Boyce remembers. “He gave me a few extra elbows to get me going. I’m trying to light a fire under you, Boyce, he told me.”

It eventually worked and Boyce went on to have a good career at East. 

Boyce collected his business degree from Washington in 1975. The sudden death of his 25-year-old brother Dave, six weeks after he was best man at Steve’s wedding, shook the family to its core and led Boyce to attend the Lutheran Bible Institute for two years. He played and coached the school’s team while there.

“(His death) made me ask the question if I was ready to die and the answer was no,” Boyce said.”I had a born-again moment and wanted to follow that up with some intense Bible teaching.”

Boyce, 65, lives in Bellevue and is a transcript analyst for adults at Northwest University in Kirkland. In his spare time continues to bowl (a 180 average) and play golf (15 handicap), sports he started as a young boy in Bremerton.

He and wife Marianne have four children ‑ David, Alyssa, Anna-Ruth and Joshua – and seven grandchildren.

Boyce also has a rare feat to his credit, a hole-in-one on a par 4 that is estimated to be a one in nine million shot. He did it with his driver in 2011 at the Les Eathorne Golf Tournament at Gold Mountain on the Olympic Course on the 255-yard 18th hole. 

He lost sight of where the ball went and as the foursome that included Greg Albertson, Dave Hegland and Jim Trostad approached the green, Hegland went up to the cup and pulled out the ball.

The bad luck for Boyce is that if it had happened on the No. 3 at Gold Mountain, the prize would have been $20,000. Boyce was hoping for some sort of big consolation prize, but he settled for a package of new Double Noodle golf balls.

Terry Mosher is a former sports writer at the Kitsap Sun who publishes The Sports Paper at sportspaper.org. Reach him at bigmosher@msn.com.

Steve after hitting a hole in one. (Photo: Contributed)