The
road through Columbia |
| By Howard
Garland and Neil Hopwood contributing writer and editor Last week’s article was about the lead up to the playoffs for the 1983 St. John’s High School basketball team, which won the state title 25 years ago this month. Click here to read part one. The first playoff game was at St. John’s against the Dreher Blue Devils, a team that featured All-State center and future National Football League star Gerald Perry. “I scouted all three Columbia teams (Dreher, AC Flora, Columbia) and we had Dreher first. Fortunately for us at our place we handled Dreher as our big guys wore Perry out. I thin k he fouled out of the game.” Neilson said. Next up for St. John’s was a quarter-final game against AC Flora at the Smith College Center on the campus of Francis Marion College. “They had a great team as they had won the AAA state title in 1982. I will never forget I went up and introduced myself to the AC Flora coach. He said, “who are you”? I said, “I am the coach for St. John’s. After we won I would not shake his hand, and I said, ‘I bet you know who I am now,’” Neilson said. The AC Flora contest was typical of all the playoff games, close half-court games that came down to either outside shooting or free throws. “One of our players was suspended from the AC Flora game for doing something he shouldn’t have at school. We were down one of our top inside players and Mike Kinley came off the bench and had a huge game. We also had good guard play against Flora as David Brown came out real strong and made some big shots.” Neilson said. The lower state championship game was played at Francis Marion also, against the Columbia Capitals. “They (Columbia) had a very good team, an All-State player and a good coach. We played our steadiest game against Columbia as we beat them on the boards and shut down their top guard. I don’t know of any team that has ever beat Dreher, Flora, and Columbia in a row in the playoffs,” Neilson said. St. John’s had more than 3,000 fans on campus at Francis Marion for the two playoff games. “We had outstanding fan support all season as fans from both Darlington and Society Hill came out in the hundreds to watch our games,” he said. Players recall the road to the championship Ellison Scott, who still lives in Society Hill and works at a Cheraw cannery, was also surprised to hear it had been 25 years since the championship. He recalled the team during long nights on the bus singing Michael Jackson songs (Jackson's best selling album of all time, “Thriller”, came out in 1982). He also recalled getting a season of free meals from McDonalds (it's all about the perks). The community support at games was incredible, too—even Tuesday night home games were packed affairs. “It really brought the whole Darlington community together,” Scott said. Instead of crumbling under the pressures of the merger, the players rallied, bound by one goal--winning. “We never wanted to lose,” Scott said. “Losing was like the worst thing that could ever happen. It didn't matter who started, who played. It was all about winning, a team effort.” Scott came from Rosenwald, as did Robert “Smoke” Rogers, the lone Caucasian player, who remembered like Scott did the Society Hill guys playing ball together from the time they were little boys. The 1982 season for Rosenwald had ended in disappointment in a semi-final round, after much of the team, including Coach Harrell, came down with a debilitating flu bug. The team sought redemption the next year. Rosenwald Elementary School had a basketball hoop, so they played all day. Merged with St. John's best players, basketball practices turned into heated affairs, with an “A” team taking on the “B” team or the “C” team. The “C” team celebrated like they had already won the championship if they beat the “A” team. Coach Harrell and Coach Neilson each brought their own trademark styles to practices, with Harrell emphasizing discipline and fitness, and Neilson plotting Xs and Os while surprising the guys with fresh drills. “The two coaches were great together,” Rogers recalled. “Having two coaches like that you were destined to have a good team.” Kenneth “Kip” Singleton said that Harrell was brilliant at coming up with stifling defenses, while Neilson was an “unreal cat” at strategizing. “With them together we had the players and the coaches—we couldn't be beat,” Singleton said. Scott remembered the second string guys playing as tough as the first stringers. Needless to say, they had a deep bench. St. John's player Johnny Wilson, who was a back-up center for the 1983 squad, moved from Darlington after high school, and now lives in Philadelphia, PA, where he works for a pharmaceutical company. He believes the merger worked to the team's benefit, because it forced the team to focus intensely during practices to weed out their strengths and weaknesses. A large number of players had tried out for the new team. They had no idea how good they would be, but they quickly realized they had a sensational mix of tall inside men and speedy outside shooters. Rogers recalled that a secret weapon for the team was a jumping drill they did before ball games. The team possessed a stunning group of high jumpers, many of whom could touch above the square on the backboard. The crowd would get into it, cheering as each player showed off their airtimes. “By the time you were done warming up, you could almost beat some teams without hitting the court,” Rogers said. “We could jump out of the gym.” Scott also recalled the jumping exhibition psyching out other teams. “We were natural country boys who could jump,” he said. He recalled the coach for Bennettsville having to admonish his players for becoming transfixed by the St. John's jumping exercise. “Everybody was dunking,” Scott said. “They knew it was going to be a long night.” The tall Singleton, one of the few seniors from the squad, said that the team wasn't intimidated by anyone, regardless of whom they played. “We knew that as long as we played together as a team and trusted each other nobody could beat us,” he said. “That was the attitude we approached each game with. Other teams were bigger and had more of a winning tradition but we knew deep inside we could beat them. There was something we had to prove.” As the season progressed, and a 5-0 record turned into 10-0, then 15-0, first local attention grew, then statewide attention, and finally the team was ranked in the top 10 nationally. “Nobody expected it,” Rogers said. “We were playing against really tough players.” What resonated most for Rogers was Coach Harrell continually hinting about a “light at the end of the tunnel”, the eventual end result for all the hard work. As the team walked into the coliseum in Columbia for the first time to compete for the state title, Coach Harrell put the period on his point. “The whole coliseum was dark expect for the basketball floor,” Rogers said. “He pointed at the floor and said, 'That's the light at the end of the tunnel.'” For many of the players, just going to Columbia was a huge deal. Who made the winning shot? Who cares? The 1983 AAA boys’ state championship game was played at Carolina Coliseum in Columbia. St. John’s opponent was the Byrnes (Duncan) Rebels. “I scouted every team we played that season but Byrnes and I called some coaches I knew in the upstate from my time at Seneca and they gave me some good scouting reports,” Neilson said. “What they did not tell me was that Byrnes’ top player had a unique hitch in his shot that caused us some problems. I think he scored 30 points and we had to make some adjustments at the half.” The Blue Devils were 26-0 and one win away from the state championship. When the team arrived in Columbia a moment for all time occurred as the team was getting off the bus. “A bird came by and made a deposit on Coach Harrell’s head. This really broke the team up with laughter and I think relieved much of the pressure we felt,” Neilson said. St. John’s played another half court battle with Byrnes as most teams were afraid to run with the Blue Devils because of their depth and quickness. The Rebels used some hot shooting to take a six-point lead late in the fourth quarter. “We got back in the game with a pair of foul shots and a steal and lay-up,” Neilson said. “Everything hinged on how we played under pressure and we played well under pressure.” Down 55-54 with only seconds remaining, St. John’s called time out and set a designed play to get Jerry “Bo Peep” Singletary the basketball. “This was the same play we used and that Bo Peep made from 30 feet that beat the Green Gremlins in Bennettsville.” Play resumed and Singletary got the basketball but the Rebels did a good job of forcing Singletary out away from the basket. “He put up the shot and he missed it to the right. Then one of our players tipped in the miss,” Neilson said. “We were not sure who did it, but after watching film we saw that Stanley Burns made the tip-in.” Burns did not take credit after the game, but he was recognized at the State House later as the player who saved the season for St. John’s. Wilson was involved in the famous disputed tip-in, and still isn't sure who deserves credit. “I tipped the ball, Stanley tipped the ball—nobody could agree,” he said. “We didn't care; it went in.” But what if it hadn't gone in at all, and the undefeated season and state championship would've disappeared? “If we had lost it still would've been a great ride,” Wilson said. “That was a great experience. But yes, I'm thoroughly happy we did win. We accomplished something not many schools are able to accomplish. I wouldn't change it for the world.” Many teams win state championships and a few may go undefeated for a season, but the way St. John’s won has to be taken into account. Two schools combined to make one team that buried personalities and put the team first. The 1982-83 St. John’s Blue Devils finished 27-0 and were the “Remember the Titans” of high school basketball. Perhaps the lingering thrill of victory could best be summed up by Kip Singletary, whose son K.J. (a Lamar High School basketball player) had heard his father’s stories about the championship, but didn’t truly understand its importance until he saw the first part of the “News and Press” story this past week. “Daddy, you really did that?” K.J. asked his father. Yes, your father, and a still proud group of men, really did that. The coaches wanted to extend thanks also to Ken Howle, who served as junior varsity coach in 1982-83, and Paul Brunson, who served as statistician that season. |