The Lakeland University women's basketball program has had a great deal of success for most of its 46-year history, yet one stretch of time still stands above others.

In the midst of an already prolonged period of prosperity that stretched over three decades, for a five-season span from 1997-2002 Lakeland was nothing less than one of the most successful programs in NCAA Division III. The Muskies' record in that time was an incredible 118-17, and they would never win less than 22 games or lose more than four in any of those campaigns.

Those five years included five Lake Michigan Conference regular season titles in a row, four LMC tourney crowns and three Division III Tournament trips. They were part of a string of 18 straight winning seasons from 1992 to 2010 that extended through three coaches from Jane Bouche, through April Arvan and into the first three years of the tenure of Teri Johnson.

Arvan served as head coach and led the program from 1994-2007, posting a 266-84 record over 13 seasons. Bouche was an assistant on those teams, switching chairs with Arvan after giving up the head coaching job in 1994 to focus on her athletic director and head softball coaching duties. And Johnson was a four-year starter at point guard from 1996-2000, playing on three straight championship teams, including the Muskies' first-ever 20-win season in 1997-98.

Not coincidentally, all three of those Muskies had a role in or leading up to the 2001-02 season that in many ways still stands above the rest, a success story that started many years earlier according to the head coach.

"Throughout the entire run, dating back to 1994 even (her first season as head coach), we focused a great deal on chemistry," said Arvan, now an associate professor of sport management and leadership at Lakeland as well as its director of athletics. "We focused a great deal on winning. We focused a great deal on just feeling like at all times we were the best team and program in the nation.

"We had that focus and we had that vision. So that run and that 2001-02 season…really was a product of the team members of 1994 buying into that philosophy. And as we started to gain momentum in the win/loss column, that all bled back to '94."

Arvan coached the offense while Bouche handled the defense, effectively coordinators for each side of the court years before it became en vogue in basketball circles.

"That was April's decision how to break up the coaching," said Bouche, Lakeland's athletic director for 18 years and now an admissions advisor and director of the Kellett School. "April was solely offense, I was solely defense. But then I also coached the post players, and April took the point guards.

"It wasn't just all offense or all defense. Joe Steffensmeier coached posts as a student (assistant coach). It was really a different way to break up coaching (and) our teams had such fun because we were always rotating with coaches. We were so interactive with players."

Bouche also learned defensive techniques working at camps for and watching Dick Bennett, the Wisconsin coaching legend who coached at UW-Stevens Point, UW-Green Bay and eventually UW-Madison. Lakeland was one of premier defensive teams in the country and led Division III in scoring defense in 1997-98 and again in 2000-01, including allowing a measly 44.8 points per game in 1997-98 and again two years later.

Under Arvan, Bouche and others, a string of terrific players and teams developed. The Lakeland women's basketball record book to this day is littered with players from the 90s and early 2000s. Names like Johnson, Hulya Erden, Stephanie Sprenger, Stacey Warnke and Meredith Wilmet show up regularly.

Arvan's record in her first six years as coach was an incredible 127-30. Even then, the 2001-02 team was able to raise the bar higher yet.

The Muskies that year won a school-record 26 games, and the team's .897 winning percentage from that 26-3 mark also was and still is a program best. Lakeland also tied a school record with a 17-game winning streak, and in a testament to the program's staying power it did all this despite having to replace four starters from the year before.

Lakeland defeated teams by an average of 17.3 points per game in its 26 wins, and was even more dominant against conference foes, defeating LMC opponents by average of 21.2 points. The Muskies held opponents to 51.4 points per game, 15th-best nationally in Division III, and fifteen opponents scored less than 50 points.

The Muskies were only a few points from an undefeated regular season record; their only two regular season losses came by a combined total of seven points, including a two-point loss at Edgewood in conference.

The team included a talented cast led by one headliner. One of the greatest players in program history, Jill Dewane is the Muskies' all-time leading scorer and the only member of the 2,000-point club. The native of Denmark, Wis., was a three-time Lake Michigan Conference Player of the Year and a four-time first team all-conference performer. She also holds the school record for steals and still ranks fourth in blocks and seventh in rebounds and three-pointers made.

That season, Dewane averaged 23 points per game, third-best in Division III, and her 667 points scored are a Lakeland single-season record. She received some of the nation's highest honors as she was a consensus first team All-American and a finalist for the Jostens Trophy as D-III's national player of the year.

Beyond Dewane, though, the Muskies also had four other all-LMC honorable mention selections with forwards Jenny Clements and Amy Coduti and guards Kristi Thill and Casey Thousand. If they were overshadowed somewhat to those outside the team, their importance was not unnoticed by their coach or Dewane.

"It was a team-driven philosophy that not one person ever stood out, from day one," Banowetz said in an interview in 2012 before her induction into the Lakeland Athletics Hall of Fame. "I just think that we won a lot of games and a lot of conference championships because of that philosophy: respect for teammates, respect for coaches, and we knew just how important that was that we play as a team. Not one person stood out from other, and I think that was lot of reason for the success we had."

"(It) was a very close team," said Thousand, who has gone on to a coaching career and is now the head coach at NCAA Division II Illinois-Springfield. "We had a ton of different personalities, but when we stepped on that court we competed. We had two seniors on the team, Amy (Coduti) along with Jill (Dewane). Jill didn't say a whole lot (but) once she got on the court, she was going to do whatever it takes to win.
 
"The team got along great on and off the court. It didn't matter what happened we had each other's back. (And) not only each other within our program, but we supported all athletic teams on campus. We were all one big athletic family."

Those players were responsible for the Muskies' third-ever NCAA Division III Tournament appearance in 2002, and third in four years. The Muskies also made it to the national tourney the year before in 2001 as well as for the first time in 1999, bowing out in the first round both times.

Lakeland was unceremoniously bounced from the tourney the year before by UW-Eau Claire in a 71-43 defeat, but this time would be different. The Muskies were able to host a first round game in the 2002 Division III tourney and would post their first NCAA Tournament win, defeating Millikin (Ill.) 61-54.

Lakeland trailed only twice for brief periods in the game, but the win was far from easy against the tourney-tested Big Blue, a frequent qualifier for the NCAA tourney in those years. Millikin rallied from a 10-point second half deficit to take a 54-53 lead with less than three minutes left. Dewane scored 26 points, though, Clements added 14 and the Muskies finished strong with the game's final eight points for a breakthrough win in front of a raucous crowd in the Wehr Center fieldhouse.

"It was nice to have that one at home," said Arvan. "To host Millikin, a storied women's basketball program, to be able to host was a testimony to the fact that we had a hard schedule. We always scheduled as tough as we could in the region, so that we could have the opportunity since our eye on the prize was getting to the Final Four, we really needed to host some hard games. And of course the atmosphere was unbelievable."

"We hosted the game, and we rallied around the fans and how loud it was in there, we just knew we did not want to lose that game," said Dewane. "It was a close game, was neck-and-neck the entire game, but we just never had a doubt that we were going to win. I give a lot of credit to the fan support and total Lakeland community for rallying around us for that game."

"That was probably the biggest highlight of my career. It wasn't so much an individual accomplishment. That was one of our team goals, to not just get to the NCAA Tournament but to win, and that was icing on cake for the team and my career."

"The gym was packed," said Thousand. "The football team, baseball team, volleyball and softball along with everyone else on campus came out to cheer us on while dressed in blue and yellow. (The team) climbed up the ladder after the game was over to cut down the net. Everyone got a piece to take home as a memory. No one left the gym-all of our fans stayed and cheered."

Lakeland's season would end one game later with a 48-33 loss to Webster (Mo.), a school in the midst of a banner season of its own. The Gorloks won a school-record 25 games but would bow out of the NCAA tourney in the next round against UW-Stevens Point, which would go on to win the national championship.

The Muskies returned to the NCAA Tournament under Arvan in 2004 and 2006 and made it back again in 2010 in Johnson's third year as head coach. In all, Lakeland has appeared in the NCAA tourney seven times, but the 2001-02 team still stands out as the only in program history to advance at the national tourney.

"We had a whole team that people had to stop, and we had a great set of support players to add to the court," said Thousand. "It was never about one or two players in our program, it was always about everyone-our staff, team, athletic trainers, bus driver, managers, practice squad of guys, and anyone else who contributed to our program. It was about the tradition."