Chuck
January 12th, 2007, 05:03 PM
:attention: As always Chris Lofton is in the News once again. Here is the article from Ohio State.
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Bob Baptist
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH
On a February night in 2004, then-Ohio State basketball coach Jim O’Brien mentioned on his weekly radio call-in show what he was looking for with one of the two scholarships available for the following season.
"I really think we have to find somebody who can really shoot it," O’Brien said.
A couple of hours to the south, across the Ohio River, in Maysville, Ky., Chris Lofton was really shooting it. He was on his way to averaging more than 26 points per game and making almost half of his three-point attempts, leading his high school team to the state championship game and winning Kentucky’s Mr. Basketball Award.
Ohio State knew about him. How much the Buckeyes recruited him is uncertain.
"Not really at all," said Lofton’s high school coach, Kelly Wells.
Then again, not really anyone did.
Lofton, a 6-foot-2 guard, was offered a scholarship by one school from a major conference. A few weeks after his high school season ended, tired of waiting for an offer from his beloved Kentucky, he took what he had — an offer from Tennessee, where a scholarship became available when another player transferred.
On Saturday, Lofton will lead the 16 th-ranked Volunteers into Value City Arena for a game against No. 5 Ohio State. He ranks among the top 10 nationally in scoring and three-point production. He has scored at least 30 points five times and made at least five three-pointers six times.
"It would be hard for me to imagine a college basketball player who had a better month than Chris Lofton," said Tennessee coach Bruce Pearl, referring to a stretch of December games in which Lofton helped the Volunteers beat Memphis (34 points, six threes), Oklahoma State (20 points) and Texas (35 points, seven threes, 11 rebounds).
The 111-105 overtime win over Texas on Dec. 23 on ESPN was Lofton at his most incredible. He hit two long threes in the final 65 seconds of regulation — one a 30-footer with 6-foot-9 Kevin Durant leaping out at him — to finish a Tennessee rally from 17 points down. He smoked Durant with another three in the overtime.
"He’s unbelievable, man," Durant said.
The believers, at least among college recruiters, were few and far between during Lofton’s senior year at Mason County High School. He was the classic small-town Kentucky boy who spent the long summer days perfecting his quick-release jump shot on his hoop at home, the courts around Maysville or in a park in nearby Flemingsburg, where his mother grew up.
Recruiters saw a one-dimensional player shorter than the prototypical shooting guard, unable to take opponents off the dribble and not quick enough to guard them. He didn’t turn heads at summer camps, Wells said, because he’s a player who performs better in a system than off the cuff.
"The question that a lot of people had was: Could he put it on the floor? Was he athletic enough?" said Ohio State assistant coach John Groce, who was at Xavier when he scouted Lofton.
"Our (question) was: Did we have a lot of guys who were similar to him at the time? It wasn’t whether he was good enough to play at Xavier. We liked him. It was more just a fit issue with the other personnel we had."
Lofton said he understood the concerns. But he felt, from his experience in AAU ball, that he could play with anyone, and he held out for an offer better than those he was getting from the likes of Arkansas State.
"I fear nobody," he said.
Three years and a lot of work later, Lofton has become the one to fear.
"He’s proved everybody wrong in that he’s not exclusively a shooter. He’s a player," Groce said.
Source (http://www.columbusdispatch.com:80/osusports/osusports.php?story=dispatch/2007/01/12/20070112-B7-00.html)
----------------------------
Bob Baptist
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH
On a February night in 2004, then-Ohio State basketball coach Jim O’Brien mentioned on his weekly radio call-in show what he was looking for with one of the two scholarships available for the following season.
"I really think we have to find somebody who can really shoot it," O’Brien said.
A couple of hours to the south, across the Ohio River, in Maysville, Ky., Chris Lofton was really shooting it. He was on his way to averaging more than 26 points per game and making almost half of his three-point attempts, leading his high school team to the state championship game and winning Kentucky’s Mr. Basketball Award.
Ohio State knew about him. How much the Buckeyes recruited him is uncertain.
"Not really at all," said Lofton’s high school coach, Kelly Wells.
Then again, not really anyone did.
Lofton, a 6-foot-2 guard, was offered a scholarship by one school from a major conference. A few weeks after his high school season ended, tired of waiting for an offer from his beloved Kentucky, he took what he had — an offer from Tennessee, where a scholarship became available when another player transferred.
On Saturday, Lofton will lead the 16 th-ranked Volunteers into Value City Arena for a game against No. 5 Ohio State. He ranks among the top 10 nationally in scoring and three-point production. He has scored at least 30 points five times and made at least five three-pointers six times.
"It would be hard for me to imagine a college basketball player who had a better month than Chris Lofton," said Tennessee coach Bruce Pearl, referring to a stretch of December games in which Lofton helped the Volunteers beat Memphis (34 points, six threes), Oklahoma State (20 points) and Texas (35 points, seven threes, 11 rebounds).
The 111-105 overtime win over Texas on Dec. 23 on ESPN was Lofton at his most incredible. He hit two long threes in the final 65 seconds of regulation — one a 30-footer with 6-foot-9 Kevin Durant leaping out at him — to finish a Tennessee rally from 17 points down. He smoked Durant with another three in the overtime.
"He’s unbelievable, man," Durant said.
The believers, at least among college recruiters, were few and far between during Lofton’s senior year at Mason County High School. He was the classic small-town Kentucky boy who spent the long summer days perfecting his quick-release jump shot on his hoop at home, the courts around Maysville or in a park in nearby Flemingsburg, where his mother grew up.
Recruiters saw a one-dimensional player shorter than the prototypical shooting guard, unable to take opponents off the dribble and not quick enough to guard them. He didn’t turn heads at summer camps, Wells said, because he’s a player who performs better in a system than off the cuff.
"The question that a lot of people had was: Could he put it on the floor? Was he athletic enough?" said Ohio State assistant coach John Groce, who was at Xavier when he scouted Lofton.
"Our (question) was: Did we have a lot of guys who were similar to him at the time? It wasn’t whether he was good enough to play at Xavier. We liked him. It was more just a fit issue with the other personnel we had."
Lofton said he understood the concerns. But he felt, from his experience in AAU ball, that he could play with anyone, and he held out for an offer better than those he was getting from the likes of Arkansas State.
"I fear nobody," he said.
Three years and a lot of work later, Lofton has become the one to fear.
"He’s proved everybody wrong in that he’s not exclusively a shooter. He’s a player," Groce said.
Source (http://www.columbusdispatch.com:80/osusports/osusports.php?story=dispatch/2007/01/12/20070112-B7-00.html)