Courtnay (Rattigan) Bryson sometimes thinks back to her magical senior season at Karns City.

It was the 1999-2000 campaign and the Gremlins weren't sure just how good they were.

It took a loss of all things against WPIAL power Oakland Catholic for them to realize they had a shot at greatness.

“Coach (Larry) Deal saw how depressed we were on the bus,” Bryson said. “When we stopped to eat he said, 'OK, we need to talk about this.' We were like, 'You're not mad at us?'”

He wasn't.

Even though the Gremlins lost, the coach saw a team that could stand up to anyone.

He just needed his team to believe it.

“We didn't even play that well and we only lost by a couple of baskets,” Bryson said.

That knowledge carried Karns City through the season.

The Gremlins rolled and routed opponents on the way to the PIAA Class AA playoffs. In the postseason they used clutch shooting, almost-impossibly good free throw shooting and the intangibles they had possessed all season to win the state title.

Twenty years later, they continue to realize just how special that run was.

Bryson lived in Texas for a year and spent two stints in the Baltimore area before moving back to the area.

“Living here again, seeing and hearing about high school basketball in WPIAL country, you understand more what it meant for us to win it,” Bryson said. “District 9 teams, let's face it, we didn't get any respect and we played WPIAL teams and we whipped them.”

Bryson said things are different now with the expansion to six classes and that makes what the Gremlins accomplished even more impressive.

“It's almost like we played a totally different game,” she said. “Almost like baseball with the bats changed.”

The memories Bryson made will never change, however.

“There's two things I will never ever ever forget about that season: losing to Oakland Catholic and winning the championship in Hershey,” she said.

Bryson, at 6-foot-3, was the glue in the middle of a talented senior group. The center, Bryson dominated in the paint.

Senior Karissa (Kusick) Dominick was a 5-10 point guard and a nightmare for opponents to contain.

Senior guard Alicia Anderson was also tall at 5-10 and was the leading rebounder and seniors Kerry Gutherie and Ronda (Vlassich) VanDyke rounded out a talented starting five.

Sophomore Kellie (Kepple) Johnston and Ashley Ritzert came off the bench.

“We had a small team; we had 13 girls, five seniors and eight sophomores,” Dominick said. “But our junior year, we felt like we could do something.”

After that Oakland Catholic loss in the second game of the season, Karns City rolled off 30 consecutive wins, culminating with a 53-39 victory over Bishop Hoban in the title game.

In the semifinals against Southern Huntingdon, the Gremlins went 30-of-31 from the free throw line to secure a trip to the state final.

“We just had something special,” Dominick said. “I think that showed, especially during our senior year. Free throw shooting helped us win the whole playoff run.”

In the 20 years since, some of the members of the team have drifted apart.

And they have gotten older. Bryson is 38, as are most of that fab Karns City five.

“I cannot believe it's been that long,” she said. “My son (Max) is closer to 18 than I am and that makes me want to vomit.”

VanDyke has moved on to coaching the game.

She led the Karns City fourth-grade girls basketball team to tournament wins at Butler Catholic and at North Allegheny.

VanDyke's daughter, Katelyn, 10, plays on the team.

“I never thought I'd be good at (coaching),” VanDyke said. “You know how to do it, but it's hard sometimes to teach it. I do enjoy it, watching the girls come together as a team and win. They're fighters. They're scrappers.”

Sort of like that 1999-2000 Karns City high school team.

“I'll always remember how close we were and how well we meshed together,” VanDyke said.

Many of the players on that team went on to the next level. Bryson had a promising career at Indiana (Pa.) University cut short by a series of knee injuries.

“I have the knees of an 80-year-old woman now,” she said. “All I can do now is shoot.”

Dominick said she thinks about that 1999-2000 Karns City team the most when she watches her children play.

She thinks back to how well they played together and what they were able to accomplish.

“A lot of us went on to play in college,” she said. “That speaks to how we played.”