When you are an athlete that has given years of your life and total focus to helping your school win, being forgotten for that effort might be the worst feeling in the world. Mike Lanen was one of those stories that actually happened, but then almost didn't happen because the school records were never properly maintained. We find stories like Mike Lanen all the time. He played 27 years ago for what is still the current coach (and now Athletic Director) at his high school. Just this past year a current player hit 8 three pointers in a game, which the coach thought might have broken a school record. It turns out that it tied the record, but the coach thought it only tied the record from another record-breaking player (who we found had done it twice). The problem was that because the school never kept any official game, season, or career records, people had forgotten that Mike Lanen had an amazing game back in 1997 and also hit 8 three pointers. Even his coach had forgotten that night. To be fair, this particular school had always kept records of it's 1,000 point scorers, but that is where the records ended. Just think of all the players, over the course of 100 years of basketball at this high school, that might have been a great rebounder, or a play-making guard, or a great free throw shooter. There are so many ways to honor your past achievements while using those achievements to set new goals for future teams. But you have to create the story, images, and in some cases videos to speak to this generation. Most importantly, your records have to be accurate so that when a new milestone is achieved, those athletes know that they have done something special. One of the first questions I ask most coaches or AD's is this: How many Mike Lanen's might exist in your program? Would you know for certain?
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In the mid sixties, Rensselaer Central Indiana High School had quite the hot-shot hoopster playing in the height of hoosier hysteria. He was so good that newspapers reported that Bob Knight, the young, up and coming coach at Army, attended a game to watch him play. The player’s name was Don Tweedie.
Don had an outstanding senior year, averaging over 18 points per game in an era before the three point line. His career scoring average was more than 16 points per game, ranking him 4th all time on the school career points per game scoring list. After his Senior season, Don chose not to sign with Army, instead opting for Division 2 North Dakota, where another young, future hall of fame coach named Bill Fitch recruited him. Entering his Freshman year at North Dakota, he joined up with a lanky 6-8 Junior forward named Phil Jackson (yes, THE Phil Jackson) where they finished fifth in the country. Don went on to have an excellent career, coming home to score nearly 20 points against Purdue one season. It was a pretty amazing story for a kid from a small Indiana town. The problem is that since the school didn’t keep any records, this story, and his accomplishments both in High School and at North Dakota, were quickly overshadowed by the 1968 Rensselaer team. That team was led by what would become the school’s all-time single season scoring leader. Don quickly became a distant memory. We didn’t find his story, or his scoring records, until nearly 50 years later, where his name and accomplishments have now been memorialized. Stories like this exist everywhere and might even be happening at your school right now, but you need accurate historical records to verify greatness when it happens. Even if you don’t have a program that dates back 50 or 100 years, it’s never too late to build a book of records that can stand the test of time. SJ was a legend on the courts of his high school in the early '60s, hailed as the first player to break the elusive 1,000-point mark. For decades, his name shone brightly in the annals of the school's basketball history, a symbol of scoring prowess and athletic excellence.
However, when the record book recently underwent a meticulous update, a startling revelation emerged. Contrary to the long-standing belief and his name being on the high school banner for years, the newspapers from that era revealed that SJ had actually scored only 879 points during his illustrious high school career, never breaking the 1,000 point milestone. It is not clear how this happened, but what is clear is that it was first reported in the local papers as far back as the mid 1980s. How had SJ's numbers inflated to over 1050 points over time? Was it a case of statistical errors, misinterpretation, or perhaps a touch of embellishment in the storytelling of his achievements? We just don’t know. His story offers a cautionary tale, a reminder that even in the world of sports where numbers often define greatness, the truth behind the statistics always needs verification. This school now has some interesting decisions to make about SJ. Do they leave the name on the banner? If so, will it call into question all the other records that have now been validated? What should the policy be going forward? As a coach or administrator, questions like these are almost always encountered during the process. If this were to happen in your program, what would you do? |