Massacre in Smithville---Lessons on the Hardwood

I had some confidence in my shooting ability, belief in a bit of my playing skills on the basketball court.

I was 15.

I also had some confidence in the playing ability of some of my teammates. Like Doug, Scott and and Danny. They were ages 16-18, and they were grown.

Or so I thought.

Many lessons ahead of me.

Like Smithville, for example. A little neighborhood south of Bloomington, my hometown. For me it was the country. Small and rural. The sticks.

My church team was a hodgepodge of kids, and I was new and hopeful. We represented most of southern Monroe County, town and countryside.

I had cut my teeth in a couple aspects of the game at my small church court on Second Street where we practiced Saturday mornings, across the street from my old Middle School, now Bedford Elementary.

And now I was a Panther, a freshman at Bloomington High School South. I was coming up.

I had played my days in middle school against big Seth Berry, a forward on the freshman team. Mostly one on one at his house, but I had finally beat him. Once.

And now Seth was running with the big high school dudes, including co-freshman Chris Lawson, who was about 6'9" and projected to be a seven footer. There were lots of upper classmen at South who were huge: 6'7", 6'7", 6'6", '6'5. The PGs were all 6'1" or 6"2.

I watched them play my freshman year, the time I went from 5'8" to six feet, hoping for more. I had love handles on my hips and considered that "growing room". It seemed to be working!

I wasn't a great player, but I had played enough of my Boy Scout adult leaders, a couple of whom enjoyed playing, on Tuesday nights to think I could compete.

And of course, my humbling sessions with middle school star and future NBAer, Seth Berry. He had given me hours of lessons, swats and post ups over the summers. He was 6'3" and talented, a promising freshman star. Maybe he even got some JV time his frosh season, I can't remember.

So 6 foot me was ready to roll with my church homies to get some glory.

Our volunteer coach, Bob Todd, took the job with some ulterior motives. His son Jared was about 11 or 12 years old and good at shooting the rock. To be on our church team you had to be between the ages of 14-18. Bob was priming his son for later greatness. Undersized but a smooth operator.

The Todds had big dreams for Jared from the heart of Indiana.

The Hoosier dream.

Jimmy Chitwood.

Bobby Plump.

Jared Todd. The coach's boy. And the father had ambitions, as did the son.

Kind of like Coach Knight with his son at our rival high school, BHS North, Pat. My friend and fellow Scout and church teammate Jonathan Hill had played against him in middle school on the north side of town.

Later, of course, this Hoosier legend embodied Damon Bailey, who got his star noticed a year before in the bestselling book about Bob Knight by John Feinstein, A Season on the Brink.

That is where Coach Knight was famously quoted for saying there was an eighth grader in Heltonville better than anyone on his college squad, including NCAA All-American Steve Alford.

Heltonville was on the south side of Lake Monroe. Smithville, north.

The sticks.

Cue the music from Deliverance.

And me, the townie that had grown to six feet. Seth Berry beater.

Bob Todd had connections in Smithville, a place not far from his own house on the south side of town. Maybe our assistant coach, Phil Pedro, knew a few folks down that way, too.

So the ten or dozen of us went down to Smithville, a few mile drive from the town of Bloomington, one of the capitals of the basketball universe.

The actual Oscar winning film was a year from debuting, as well as the season that brought the General his third and final ring at IU. That was 1987.

But I digress from the Smithville narrative. 1986.

It was dark. Maybe a little wet. February or so.

The Smithville community basketball gym seemed old, like Gene Hackman Hoosiers 1950s old.

The roof was high and dusty and seemed to have some leaks. The hanging lights were old and faint. The floor was worn and needed an upgrade. Parts were missing and chipped. The wooden bleachers on the edges seemed a century older than the floor.

The tables and chairs of the sidelines were old country style.

Us "city" kids thought we stood a chance. Us townies had nicely painted and veneered wood floors.

We thought we had a prayer.

Not to be.

They had some big kids that I recognized from my one year at Batchelor Junior High and Bloomington South that year. Some of them were big, lanky 6'4" and 6'3". Michael Strain. A few other tall gawky kids. Maybe John +++++++++++, a big dude my friend Jake would later come call "Mortal".

But none of them were Seth Berry.

Seth read the autobiography of Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and admired George Raveling at the University of Iowa.

They had a few smaller guys, kids who lived on that court. Kids who had been cut from the high school squad but kept playing the game.

Steve Perry, maybe Joey Scifres. The latter eventually made the high school team, one of the best teams in the state of Indiana during my four years.

Despite our older vets like Doug and Scott Eads and Danny Percifield, guys with cars and maybe even jobs (I always saw Danny as Sheriff assistant at the county fair)  we got worked.

No contest.

The scoreboard showed no mercy.

The rims never relented toward us.

I don't remember how many shots I got off personally, but I do recall throwing up a 15 or so footer from the straight baseline and it hitting the the backboard on the side.

Embarrassing.

But we were already down fifty points or so, so it didn't really matter as far as the game results.

Final score?

90 something to 30 something.

A rout.

A massacre.

An embarrassment.

A lesson.

A learning experience.

A memory; a tale.

Smithville.

That might have been my first organized game of basketball ever, with impartial referees.

Gratefully, it wasn't my last.

But you have to get your start somewhere.

Smithville, USA.

Clinch