Sandy Wagner watched her daughter, Taylor, coach the Hartland softball team to a Michigan state softball championship this spring.

Like most mothers, she was immensely proud of her daughter.

But after a tumultuous year for both Sandy and Taylor, Sandy was also grateful for her daughter.

“She saved my life,” Sandy said.

The Hartland Eagles defeated Woodhaven, 9-1, on Saturday, June 17 to win the Michigan High School Athletic Association Division 1 state championship.

It was the first state title for the school since 1996. And it was a positive end to what Taylor, a 2013 Marshalltown High School graduate, considered “the hardest year of my life.”

Sandy was diagnosed with head and neck cancer last August.

She looked at going to Iowa City for treatments at the University of Iowa Hospitals.

As it turned out, a better option was more or less in Taylor’s backyard: Dr. Matthew E. Spector at the University of Michigan specializes in the study of head and neck cancer and was a 30 minute drive away from Hartland.

Even better, Sandy could be scheduled almost immediately for her first procedure in Ann Arbor in what Taylor said would have been a six-to-eight week wait in Iowa City.

Mother and daughter were reunited once again in Hartland — but it was only the beginning of the Wagners’ journey.

Shortly after starting radiation treatments, Sandy had a stroke at Taylor’s home. Taylor, who was home for a movie night with her mother, called 911.

“I wouldn’t have made it without her,” Sandy said.

But now, in addition to cancer treatments, Sandy needed physical therapy, needed to learn to walk again.

Through it all, Taylor was at her side, helping her mother find her footing once again.

“She never missed an appointment,” Sandy said, adding with a laugh, “Everyone thought she was my nurse.

“She’s so young to have to take care of me. But we saw other people like me that didn’t have anyone, and I just felt so blessed to have someone to take care of me.”

Taylor admitted feeling a bit of guilt in having to put aside not only her American Government and Contemporary Affairs teaching job at Hartland, but her softball coaching duties for an Eagle team that she knew had the potential to go all the way this spring.

“There were times I didn’t feel like the best coach because I was trying to be there for my family,” Taylor said. “But being here at Hartland, everyone was so supportive and understanding. My district, my principal, my athletic director all worked with me, and I truly felt like the most blessed person to feel so loved — the love my mom and I received was above and beyond what we could have deserved.”

After a grueling process, Sandy completed her treatments in January and soon received great news — her cancer was in remission and she could come home to root on the Eagles from Marshalltown.

Taylor was entering her fifth season as Hartland head coach this spring. She was previously an assistant with the Eagles when she first came to town after graduating from Eastern Michigan University in 2017, where she had a full-ride scholarship.

One of her EMU teammates made the connection to get her student teaching at Hartland and it proved to be the right fit for Taylor. She also did some assistant coaching at her alma mater in Marshalltown, graduating in 2013 as a two-time all-state selection and a state qualifier with the Bobcats in 2012.

“I just try to think of the coaches that I enjoyed playing with,” Taylor said of her coaching philosophy, “and between Marshalltown, travel ball, and EMU, I’ve been blessed to play for some amazing men and women over the years.”

Thanks to livestreaming capabilities provided through the Gamechanger service, Sandy was able to keep tabs on the Hartland softball team’s journey during the regular season, and watched Hartland capture the title on a state livestream.

“She’s always been my biggest fan,” Taylor said. “Growing up, she wasn’t always able to go to everything, but was always the first to congratulate me. She didn’t know everything about softball, which was great because it meant that she always wanted to be encouraging. … And even in the last year when she was going through treatments, it’d be a grind for me to leave the house at 5 a.m., and not get back until 10:30 p.m. between gym work, cage work, and teaching, and have her ask me, ‘How are the girls? How’s the team looking?’; she knows these girls by name now.”

Starting the season unranked, the Eagles made a splash at weekend tournaments during the regular season, including knocking off the No. 1 and No. 2 teams in the same weekend.

The MHSAA softball’s postseason works differently than Iowa’s — all Michigan teams are unseeded and instead grouped together geographically for postseason play; teams advancing out of the district round then do battle for one of four regional titles, which ensure a spot in the state semifinals held on the campus of Michigan State University, which holds softball, girls soccer and baseball finals at the same time on campus.

In the last two years, Hartland saw its seasons end early in the postseason.

But behind pitcher Kylie Swierkos, Michigan’s 2023 Softball Player of the Year, the Eagles got on a roll and couldn’t be stopped until they were hoisting the state title trophy in East Lansing.

Hartland allowed just five runs in seven postseason games.

“We had the best pitcher in the state, the best outfield in the state, there were just no holes,” Taylor said. “It was great to go to state as a Bobcat as a player, but being at state as a coach, it’s special because it’s all about the girls. And it’s been surreal to wake up every day since we won.”

Taylor does not waver from what comes next as a 28-year-old state champion softball coach, who is also preparing for the start of the girls golf season at Hartland as JV coach.

“So many want a state championship in their career, and we did it. Now we’ve got to run it back,” Taylor said. “We’ve got to keep setting the standard in Hartland as a softball program and I want to be a coach in the district that is looked upon as having good integrity. There’s always more to work towards.”

But she can acknowledge the journey her family has been through, and what that adds to this moment.

“On a selfish level, it feels more special,” Taylor said. “Knowing the valleys and the hills, the triumphs and tribulations, it’s crazy. … It was exhausting. But every single step of the way worked out in the best way possible that it could. We got through it with the grace of God.”