Football, Basketball
Favorite athlete: Brian Cushing
Favorite team: North Carolina
Favorite memory competing in sports: Beating Pennsbury at the buzzer
Most embarrassing/funniest thing that has happened while competing in sports: Getting my ankles broken vs pennridge
Music on iPod: Country and Hip Hop
Future plans: Special Education and Chemistry Teacher
Words to live by: “Hard work beats talent, when talent doesn’t work hard”
One goal before turning 30: Be coaching football somewhere
One thing people don’t know about me: I’m a huge Justin Bieber fan
By Craig Ostroff
Mike Stock, Jr., was surrounded by the world of sports and introduced to exceptional student-athletes from an early age. That’s what happens when your father is a high school athletic director and basketball coach.
For Stock, one athlete in particular stood out.
“I remember growing up watching Tyrone Lewis at Truman,” Stock said of the former Tigers’ standout basketball player. “My dad coached him. I remember watching him, wanting to be like him.”
Much has changed in the 10 years since a young Stock last watched Lewis play for Truman. For one, while Stock has continued to play basketball, he has gravitated toward football and plans to play on the gridiron in college. And while Lewis was a dynamic, record-setting performer for the Tigers, Stock has become known for doing the little things that don’t appear in the scorebooks or grab the headlines.
But he’s no less important to the Council Rock South boys’ basketball team than Lewis was to the Tigers in his heyday.
“Mike is not a guy who’s consistently scoring a lot of points or getting those stats you see in the newspapers,” said Hawks’ coach John Easterly. “He does all the intangible stuff, the stuff people that don’t know basketball might not notice.
“He’s our leading rebounder this year, he gets assists, he leads and directs our defense. On the offensive end, he calms us down. He’s turned out to be a very consistent, stable, reliable player out on the floor for us. I can always count on him to guard the other team’s best big man. And if we don’t put him on the other team’s best player, he ends up helping everyone out guarding their own guys. He’s a very unselfish defensive player.”
He’s also both smart and fearless on the court. Stock came off the bench early in his sophomore season before earning his place as a starter later in the year. Nonetheless, he set a school single-season record by drawing 18 charges. As a junior, he upped that total with 19 charges. Halfway through his senior season, Stock has already equaled that mark.
Easterly points to a recent 52-41 victory over Harvest Prep in the West Chester Rustin Winter Classic to illustrate Stock’s importance to the Hawks.
“We were down 9 or 10 in the fourth quarter, and Mike was on the bench, we were giving him a rest,” Easterly said. “When he came in, he was directly responsible for I think 13 points in that fourth quarter. He scored two of them, but the rest were him getting an assist or setting the screen to free up a teammate, or he got the rebound and started the transition that led to the basket.
“Mike is very unselfish. He’s our captain, and he rallies the guys. With the young team that we have, he calms them down, shows them how to get used to the ups and downs of a game and of a season and how to handle adversity. He’s a steady influence with younger players.”
That’s just the way Stock wants it. He’s more than happy to trade headlines and spotlights for the satisfaction of a job well done.
“I’ve learned how to play my role,” he said. “I’m not that high-scoring guy, especially coming from football. I know I have to do the little things that keep me on the court. And I have trust in my teammates that they can score, I’ll take care of the defense.”
It’s a role that’s echoed on the football field, where Stock plays the unglamorous position of fullback on the offensive side of the ball, often helping to clear the path for tailbacks.
Not surprisingly, his football coach also echoes the praise the Easterly heaps on Stock.
“He is the consummate team player,” Hawks’ football coach Vince Bedesem said. “(He’s) always team first. Mike played linebacker—both inside and outside—defensive end, fullback. Wherever you asked Mike to play, he would accept the challenge and be the best he could be on the field.”
His efforts on both sides of the ball were key as South’s football team finished 6-4 overall, 5-2 in the Continental Conference.
“It was a successful season, but not to where I wanted to be my senior year,” Stock said. “I wanted to get a taste of the playoffs, but we fell a little short. It wasn’t where I wanted it to be, but we still had a winning season. We still had a successful season.”
Stock is playing his part in helping the Hawks’ basketball team make major strides. Having experienced identical 7-15 seasons the last two years, the Hawks improved to 6-6 overall (4-3 in Continental Conference play) with a win Tuesday night against Neshaminy, a game in which Stock scored a dozen points and grabbed nine rebounds.
“We have a bunch of young guys, but we have a lot of talent,” Stock said. “Being a third-year starter, I knew I had to be that leader, showing them how to play varsity. We got off to a slow start, but we’re taking steps in the right direction. We knew we could do this.”
In pointing out the kind of leader, teammate, and friend that Stock truly is, Easterly points not to a game or a practice, but to the way Stock responded to the tragic car accident that took the lives of three schoolmates, including two members of the basketball team, in the summer of 2014.
“Mike was a huge part of us getting through a very difficult time in our school and our program last year,” Easterly said. “Mike was a big part of the healing process that we all went through in the program. Seeing Mike interact with his teammates, especially the younger teammates who were sophomores last year, seeing the maturity in him and how he handled that situation, it was impressive. All the kids last year went through a very difficult time. They all came together as a team and a group, and Mike was a big part of that.”
Helping others is nothing new to Stock. He’s a member of the school’s Athletes Helping Athletes club that works with kids with special needs and introduces and teaches them sports.
“It’s a lot of fun,” Stock said. “I love helping out special needs kids. I’ve been doing things like that since elementary school. It’s been my love.
“I see myself being a special education teacher when I’m older, and being able to participate in Athletes Helping Athletes helps give me experience.”
Add coaching football to Stock’s future aspirations when his playing days are over.
“He’s going to make one helluva of coach,” Bedesem said.
Stock – an excellent student - is looking at a few in-state Division II schools, where he plans to play football while he pursues a degree in special education or secondary education.
“Wherever he ends up playing athletics in college, they’re going to get a kid who’s going to give a full-on effort every time he steps on the field,” Easterly said. “They’re going to get a kid that’s dedicated to their program, a kid that’s going to work on his academics, and be a good student as well as a good citizen.
“You want kids in your program that are good people as well as strong in the classroom and also strong on the field. Mike’s going to bring that to wherever he decides to go.”
