Shelby County League - Dave’s Midwestern Ohio Memories

A Series of Guest Blogs by an out-of-state Fish Report reader originally from this area about fond memories of growing up in Midwestern Ohio during the 50’s & 60’s.

Shelby County League

Continuing my series on high school basketball, 50 years ago when I played, the Shelby County League included the same seven schools, Anna, Botkins, Jackson Center, Fairlawn, Ft. Loramie, Houston and Russia. There were actually 9 teams at one time, with McCartyville integrated into Anna in 1949, while Pemberton and Plattsvile were consolidated to create Fairlawn in 1951. The SCL was as competitive then as it is now, with a blueprint in place 50 years ago that still seems to exist today; namely a group of elementary school classmates begin playing together at a very young age and by the time they become seniors, the team excels and does well in the league. Russia was a great example last year. But then they all graduate and the school goes into rebuilding mode for a year or so which allows another team in the county to rise to the top. So in any given year, it’s always a crap shoot on which team is going to win, but it’s usually the senior-laden team that becomes SCL champion and also does well in the tournament.

Back when I played, Russia had another strong team with a bunch of outstanding seniors, while we were in rebuilding mode following a league championship the year before. There were no seniors on the team and I was the only junior starter, the rest were sophomores! But we were competitive and pulled a few upsets that year, primarily by using the stall technique to keep the score close. There were no three point shots back then and most of the gyms were quite small; in fact the center circle and foul circles intersected on several, so speed and conditioning were not as important as today. Instead defensive toughness, rebounding and avoiding turnovers were the keys to success. Couple those traits with a stall, and the scores would be quite low. We always tried to keep the opposing team in single digits each quarter. Our best offensive play was to suck the defense out during a stall and then lob the ball over the defense to a forward (me) cutting to the basket for an easy layup. At first I could only make the play from the right side since I hadn’t mastered the left handed layup, but fortunately we had a left handed forward who would do the same thing from the other side!

Using these tactics, we had a few upsets and enjoyed a fun season. However, my first varsity game as a starter was a disaster. On the day of the game, my mother had surprised me with a new pair of black hightop Chuck Taylor Converse All-Star shoes. But they obviously hadn’t been broken in, so blisters quickly formed on my heals and they had very poor traction on the newly polished gym floor to start the season. Further exacerbating the situation was my nervousness about starting my first game, so I scored no points, only had 3 rebounds and fouled out in a losing effort to Minster, where two of my cousins played. This poor play did not bode well for my basketball future or bragging rights with my cousins! But by the next game, the shoes were fine, my nerves were gone and we won! Look for more high school basketball memories next week.