It wasn’t the shoes. Now we know that. On Friday, three days after LeBron James sent new shoes to each of the Lady Potters, they overwhelmed two opponents in their Thanksgiving Tournament: poor, stumbling Normal Community, 62-37. and poor, exhausted Danville Schlarman, 66-31. In the doing, the Potters needed no magical shoes. They wore their old ones, perhaps planning to bronze LeBron’s. Anyway, who needs LeBron when you’ve got Brandi, Jacey, Josi, Kassidy, and Tenley?
As part of a national Nike promotion hash-tagged #ComeOutOfNowhere, a crateful of James’s shoes arrived at Morton High School on Monday. With the shoes came a video that the coaches showed the Potters.
The video begins, “Hey, LeBron here,” LeBron says, as if there’s a basketball player anywhere who doesn’t recognize LeBron. “Congratulations to each and every one of you guys on last year’s journey, but obviously this year is a new journey . . . ”
James said he’d be following “from afar.” Then, with a smile, he suggested at times he’d “be watching very close. . . . It’s going to be an unbelievable season and best luck to each and every one of you.”
After the video, the Morton coaches plotted a surprise Tuesday afternoon. At each player’s locker, there was a T-shirt bearing the legend, “Come Out of Nowhere.” Hidden under each shirt, a box. To say the girls were thrilled on discovering the box contained a new pair of LeBron James shoes is to say LeBron can play a little. Suddenly, two days before Thanksgiving, it was Christmas.
Along with the shoes came a note signed by LeBron:
“Potters,
“You came out of nowhere last season. You lost 20+ points a game to an ACL injury. It would have been easy to take a seat. You already had a state title. Instead, the next girl stepped up. Now you have 2. What’s it going to take to win 3?
“I’ll be watching.”
Friday, LeBron would have seen the two-time defending state champion Potters playing so sensationally that their coach, Bob Becker, first said, “They played great,” and then, more loudly, “They played
GREAT.”
In both games, the Potters caused invocation of the tournament’s “mercy” rule in which the clock runs continuously once a team builds a 30-point lead. Their 15 three-pointers were divvied up among six players. On defense in someone’s face at every turn, they broke Normal Community’s spirit as prelude to leaving Danville Schlarman in despair.
The Potters are now 3-0, winners of 16 straight games reaching back to last season, winners of 25 straight in the Potterdome, winners 69 times in their last 75 games. Saturday morning, they play Champaign St. Thomas More. Saturday evening, in what shapes up as the five-team round-robin’s championship game, they play Peoria Richwoods.
Comes a moment of truth in all games. LeBron decided the NBA championship last June when he made that chase-down block on a Golden State break. No mere mortal could have done what he did, and no team led by that man was going to lose that night. The stage is smaller in girls high school basketball. But such moments are just as important, as when Tenley Dowell lit it up against Normal Community Friday morning.
First, the sophomore dropped in a 6-foot runner to give Morton a 31-18 lead with 1:29 left in the first half. At 1:07, from the right side, she made a 3-pointer. With 37 seconds left, another 3-pointer, this one from the top of the key. That gave her 20 points in the half, scored from everywhere in every way with either hand. She had given Morton a 37-18 lead. She robbed Normal Community of hope. In the middle of that run, Normal Community’s despair was made audible, if not palpable, to all. One of the Lady Iron, not all iron, tripped in the lane and landed on her hind-end with a ker-lumph that we heard and she no doubt felt.
Dowell finished with 25 points in that victory, Brandi Bisping added 10, Josi Becker and Lindsey Dullard 7 apiece, Caylie Jones 6, Jacey Wharram 3, and Claire Kraft and Megan Gold 2 each.
Danville Schlarman dressed only eight players. It required no practiced eye to see that only one much mattered. That one was a 5-foot-10 guard, Anaya Peoples, a sophomore already considered a Division-1 prospect (with an alleged 13 scholarship offers as a freshman). She did next to nothing against the Potters. Seven points. The Potters played her straight up with Kassidy Shurman, Dowell, and Bisping taking turns on defense – and that’s where this one ended for Schlarman.
It happened early. The Potters held an 11-2 lead. At point guard, handling the ball every time down, Peoples was intent on making something happen. Trouble for her was, Morton’s defense was intent on letting nothing happen. When Peoples could find no teammate moving, she just kept dribbling, looking for an opening. She found none. I counted the dribbles. She bounced the thing 24 times – that’s 24, two dozen times, eight times enough to get your hind-end ker-lumphed onto Becker’s bench – wasting an entire minute – and then, finding herself near the low block on the right side, stumbling, almost falling –you couldn’t call it a shot, Peoples just flipped the ball lamely backwards at the basket, hitting nothing but air.
Ten seconds later, taking that ball out of the air, the Potters had made two passes that led to a Josi Becker 3-pointer and a 14-2 lead at the quarter. From there they ran Schlarman silly at both ends.
Bisping led Morton’s scorers with 15, Dowell had 13, Josi Becker 9, Claire Kraft 6, Courtney Jones and Maddy Becker 5 each, Jacey Wharram and Megan Gold 4 each, Lindsey Dullard 3, and Bridget Wood 2.
**
LeBron’s note about the Potters winning last season despite losing a “20+ scorer” is cause for an update on that scorer, Chandler Ryan. Now at Florida Gulf Coast University, Ryan recently reinjured her right knee and has not played this season. She is scheduled to have exploratory surgery Dec. 9 to see if further surgery is needed to repair the ACL. In any case, she will miss this season without losing any eligibility.