MONROE – In this world, there is nothing certain but death, taxes and a member of the Hammerquist family playing for Monroe boys basketball every 20-30 years.
Since Stan Hammerquist played for the 1953 state champion Bearcats, every following generation had at least one man play for the team, going down to Tate Hammerquist, a junior who just helped Monroe win the District 1 3A Championship on Saturday and is gearing up for the state tournament. The 5-foot-10 guard wears No. 4 to represent the fact that he’s a fourth-generation Bearcat.
To say basketball runs in the family would be an understatement.
“I feel like we’re a super competitive family, so at a young age, I was always trying to be the best at everything I do,” Tate said. “Basketball was kind of an outlet for that. So it was easy for me to play basketball with my family, and just try to get better competing with my cousins and my dad and whatever it may be, with one-on-ones in the backyard or dunking on a mini hoop with my cousins. It’s just non-stop playing.”
Before Tate, his father Trevor was on the team from the 1992-93 season to 1995-96. Trevor’s three brothers – Kris, Mark and Eric – all played for the program as well. Their father and Tate’s grandfather, Martin, played from 1972 to 1973, just 20 years after Stan.
That it? No. Tate has five more younger boy cousins on track to play once they reach high school. On top of that, his cousin, Mikah Hammerquist, played for North Creek until last season. She’s now a freshman guard at South Dakota Mines.
The sport of basketball and the Monroe community has changed drastically since Stan won the 1953 state championship, but the Hammerquist family’s presence remained constant. Back when Martin was a child, the town had around 1,500 people (compared to nearly 20,000 today), and the Bearcats were the team.
“That (state championship) team was kind of the town heroes (in the 1960s),” Martin said. “Just vicariously, because of that, everybody knew that I was my dad’s kid. So everywhere I went, it was really kind of surreal. I mean, I thought it was normal, but I’m pretty sure it wasn’t.”
According to Martin, Stan never played basketball until his freshman year at Monroe, which is a far cry from how things are today. In the 1960s and ‘70s, Martin and his friends had access to tennis courts and played on their own. Youth basketball became a bigger part of the picture for Trevor’s generation, and it has only snowballed from there, with AAU basketball and prep schools often putting public schools in the back seat.
That evolution of the game sparked an evolution of talent. With three out of four generations of Hammerquist basketball players sitting next to each other, it didn’t take long for one to answer when asked who they believed was the best player out of the four:
“Me,” Tate said emphatically, drawing laughs from the rest of his family.
“I’d have to agree,” Martin said. “I think my dad was tall, and they had an unusually tall team. He was talented, but he basically relied on the rebounding. And then the skill level, I would say, with our boys, they all played a little different, but Trevor was really good. I couldn’t have made their team.”
Trevor chimed in, chuckling: “I could outshoot Tate, but everything else I think he could beat me in.”
As confident as Tate is, he agreed with his dad on that one. And the truth is Tate would not be the player he is today without the generations before him lifting him up. Trevor coaches the Monroe middle school boys – including back when Tate and four other members of the 2024-25 Bearcats were that age – and often served as a mentor for Tate growing up.
Tate recalls countless conversations with his father in the car after youth games, building up confidence after losses and instilling a mindset that Tate carries to this day.
“My biggest mentality on the court is just about whatever I can do next,” Tate said. “Don’t focus on the mistakes, try and move on. And so I feel that’s a huge, huge help for growing up with my game and my dad. It’s just super cool.”
The Hammerquist basketball ties to Monroe run thicker than blood; it’s grown to those who married into the family. When Trevor married his wife and Tate’s mom, Monica, the rest of his brothers were still in school, and their passion around the game was a bit of a culture shock for her – Martin and Trevor recalled her calling the family ‘crazy’ at one point.
“She came around,” Trevor said. “She’s highly involved now.”
Today, Monica is the treasurer for the Monroe boys basketball booster club. It’s a similar story for Martin’s wife, Colleen. The two met in the Army in 1976, and despite Colleen moving to Monroe while she was in high school, sports were never big for her. Flash forward, she became the mother of four varsity basketball players and is now the grandmother to several more on the way.
She has even learned how to yell at the referees during games, according to Martin, but Colleen claims she tries not to, opting to stay positive. When figuring out what about the Hammerquist family makes basketball so easy to invest in as an outsider coming in, Colleen didn’t have to think hard.
“I think that’s just family,” Colleen said. “It’s just the draw of family and what they love and what they’re involved in. We love to come along side of them and watch them. So it’s really been fun.”
Colleen, Martin and the rest of the family were in the stands last Saturday at Marysville Pilchuck High School when Tate and the Bearcats won the District 1 3A Championship. Martin was also with seven of his high school teammates. They call themselves ‘The Silver Sneakers,’ and they have always stayed involved with the program, blending past and present eras.
When it came time for Tate to cut down the nets after Monroe’s 61-56 win against Edmonds-Woodway to clinch the title, it marked another Hammerquist putting his stamp on the program.
“I’m super proud of all of them,” said Trevor, thinking not only of Tate but all the players he coached in middle school. “There’s a lot of history there, so it’s fun. It’s emotional for me to watch these guys play at that high level so well.”
The Hammerquist family will have at least one more chance to see Tate and the Bearcats play this season, when the No. 10-seed Monroe faces No. 15-seed Gig Harbor in the opening round of the 3A Boys Basketball State Tournament at Arlington High School on Friday, with the winner earning a trip to the Tacoma Dome.
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