Ethan Davis did the heavy lifting on Wednesday night, shocking Rantoul and maybe himself a bit by scoring 42 points in Olympia High School’s 73-59 basketball victory at Stanford.
Then the legwork began.
Olympia coach Tom Garriott, Davis’ father, Doug, and others spent a chunk of Thursday making phone calls to former players/coaches and scouring archives in search of anyone in Olympia history to score more points in a game.
They found none. So Thursday afternoon at practice, Garriott made it as official as it’s going to get.
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“I gave him the dang ball,” Garriott said.
The game ball that is, from a night Davis made 21 of 24 free throws, 5 of 8 shots from 3-point range and tripled his previous season high of 14 points.
“That’s probably the first time I’ve ever felt like that on the court,” said Davis, a 5-foot-10, 165-pound senior. “I felt like I could make anything.”
His teammates sensed it, too, and did what good teammates do. They sent the ball Davis’ way every chance they got.
The result was a lifetime memory for Davis and a confidence-boosting win for Garriott’s first Olympia team. The Spartans were 0-6 before “it all just kind of clicked” on Wednesday, Garriott said.
“It (Davis’ performance) was a team thing,” Garriott said. “Justin Siebert was driving and kicking and finding him. So was Hunter Berges.
“One time (Rantoul) called a timeout and I said, ‘Ethan, the ball has to be in your hands.’ He was like, ‘Coach, I can’t score every time.’ I’m like, ‘You just have to keep doing what you’re doing.’ They couldn’t stop him.”
The research effort on Thursday revealed a number of Olympia stars who had games in the upper 30s, including Eric Gale, John O’Donnell, Jim Williamson, Matt Frahm, Charles Payton and others.
No one could find or recall a game with 42 points or more, including a retired sports editor whose basement is home to an Olympia diploma. The school will turn 50 next year, so what Davis did is big stuff.
“I’ll definitely remember this for a long time,” he said. “They (his teammates) were working really hard to get me the ball when I was getting hot and feeling it.
“I was attacking (the basket) as much as I could. They (Rantoul) were playing in the passing lanes, so it was pretty much beat your man and get to the rim. They had a couple of technical fouls as well that helped me get to the line a few more times than I probably should have.”
At one point Davis attempted six straight free throws following Rantoul technicals and made five.
Loving it all was a raucous group of about 30 students in attendance. Due to COVID-19 restrictions, Olympia’s varsity players are allotted limited tickets each for home games. On Tuesday, they voted to give tickets for Wednesday’s game to fellow students instead of their parents.
“Having them (students) there gave us some energy,” Davis said. “They were cheering us on and made us play a little harder than we normally would with just the parents in the stands.”
The down side?
Davis’ parents, Doug and Wendy, did not see his big night in person.
“They watched the live stream,” Davis said. “They weren’t very happy about not being able to be there, but they were happy with how the game went.”
Garriott was thrilled, too, in part because of the person Davis is. A three-sport athlete, he is a team captain and a leader, his coach said.
“At timeouts and stuff, he’ll say to the guys, ‘Don’t give up. Don’t give up,’” Garriott said. “And he means it. They follow him.”
Everyone in Olympia history follows Davis now, too. That’s what the legwork revealed.
“I knew he was making free throws, but I thought maybe he had 20, 25 points,” Garriott said. “Then I looked and I said, ‘Holy smokes, he had that many?’”
Holy smokes indeed.
Randy Kindred's top five games
Former Pantagraph Sports Editor Randy Kindred's top five games
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