http://www.stltoday.com/sports/colum...-guide-mizzou/
Hochman: Martin looks to his past to guide Mizzou
By Benjamin Hochman St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Cuonzo and LaPhonso.
Two of the greatest players our area has ever seen ... and from the same school? At the same time?
Winter sweltered. It was the 1987-88 season, and the hottest hoops team in the area (in the nation?) was Lincoln High School in East St. Louis. There was spunky sophomore Cuonzo Martin, now the coach at Mizzou. And senior LaPhonso Ellis, a future fifth pick in the NBA draft, “The Phonz” as cool as “The Fonz.” He hit a 3-pointer to seal the ’88 state title game, proclaiming “That 3-pointer was kind of live, wasn’t it?” to the Post-Dispatch, while slapping high-fives with whomever was in close range. “This is my senior year. That’s two (titles) in a row, and all I can say is, I’m happy as can be.”
And now, nearly three decades later, Martin is recruiting the next Ellis.
Figuratively: Recruit Jeremiah Tilmon, Class of 2017, is the best player to come out of East St. Louis in years.
And literally: Over in Indiana, senior-to-be Walter Ellis was offered a scholarship by Martin at Cal … and now LaPhonso’s son is a possibility for Mizzou.
“Cuonzo’s really good at finding those kids who maybe are late bloomers who have a chance to be really, really good players,” LaPhonso Ellis said. “And that happens to be our kid.”
Martin’s arrival at Mizzou has been more like a hoops revival. Michael Porter Jr., the No. 1 player in the land, is coming to Columbia, so you’ve heard. And Kevin Knox, the No. 7 player per ESPN.com, visited Columbia on Saturday. And then there’s Tilmon. Mizzou, for all of its abrupt aplomb, doesn’t have a stud big man. Tilmon is tall, man. Six-foot-10. And after asking out of his signing with Illinois, Tilmon could be a Tiger. Yes, there have been murmurs that Tilmon dropped-off a little as a senior. But he’s still 41st nationally on the ESPN.com list. And he probably could’ve logged some minutes for Mizzou even last year.
And so, Tilmon has Martin back in East St. Louis, recruiting a young man with talent like LaPhonso. Or himself. Or a poor-man’s Darius Miles. Martin is connecting to his past to bring the future to Mizzou — by making the future look like his prep past. Because Cuonzo and LaPhonso were so good. That 1987-88 season, Martin led the area in steals, and after Ellis graduated, he became the thumping heart of Lincoln, winning the school’s third consecutive state title in 1988-89. And LaPhonso is in the conversation for best player ever from the St. Louis area, considering his prep dominance and ascension through college — and then 12 years in the NBA. In the ’88 state title game, Ellis flirted with a creative triple-double — a game-high 26 points, 15 rebounds and nine blocked shots.
“They were a great team,” said Digger Phelps, now 75, Ellis’ college coach at Notre Dame. “When I saw him going into his junior year of high school, I said, ‘God, this guy’s a player.’”
“LaPhonso was the star, but Cuonzo was the quiet assassin, as he always was in his career,” said SLU basketball radio broadcaster Earl Austin Jr., a local hoops authority. “And Cuonzo was a monster at the top of Lincoln’s 1-2-2 zone press.”
This spring, The Chicago Tribune released an exhaustive list of the top high school players, boys and girls, in Illinois history. You can imagine how good this list is. The list had the top 50 players, featuring only one from East St. Louis: LaPhonso Ellis. In the 50-100 list, the only East St. Louis player was Miles, who went from high school straight to the pros. And then, in honorable mention, the only ESL product was, yup, Cuonzo Martin.
“When I think of him, I always think ‘steady and disciplined,’” Ellis said of Martin, who went on to star at Purdue. “One of those guys you can always count on. Even in high school on our state championship team, everyone knew how good he was, but he was always the steadying influence. Most of the shine went to, typically, a combination of myself and Vincent Jackson. Vincent Jackson was a highlight kind of guy, mega-hops, could shoot the basketball. Not very many games when Vincent wasn’t dunking the ball in transition. But you always needed that guy who was steady — skilled, but steady. And that guy was always Cuonzo.”
Ellis turns 47 in May. He does on-air work for ESPN now. Used to own a Jamba Juice franchise in South Bend, Ind., where he still lives (and Phelps lives). LaPhonso remains in touch with Martin, all these years later.
“It’s not unusual that we go even two months without either texting or a phone call,” Ellis said, “whether it be checking in on each other’s families or just talking about hoops and how he’s doing at Cal and obviously we’ll be talking quite a bit with Missouri, as well. …
“It’s nice that the whole thing has been brought back around, full circle.”
So who is LaPhonso’s kid? His name is Walter Ellis. He’s a 6-5 shooting guard for John Adams High School in Indiana. He’s “new to our sport,” LaPhonso explained: He played goalie in hockey since the age of 5 and then dabbled with football, as a wide receiver, starting at age 9. But Walter picked up his dad’s sport rather quickly, and had a huge summer on the circuit, prior to his junior year. Per LaPhonso, Walter has offers from schools including Xavier, Ole Miss, Belmont and California, where Martin coached until this March.
“Will he be re-offered by Cuonzo at Missouri?” LaPhonso asked aloud. “We don’t know. We don’t have that expectation, because you never want to compromise the integrity of friendships and relationships. So just because he was a good fit for Cuonzo at Cal doesn’t mean he’ll necessarily be one for him at Missouri. And nor are we expecting anything. I always say to young people, and as it was for us growing up in East St. Louis, we like everything to be merit-based. If Cuonzo deems that Walter can help him at Missouri, that’s great. If not? Great still. We just want the best for Cuonzo, his family and his program.”
Regardless, the reconnection of Cuonzo and LaPhonso is, if anything, just fun — two of the best our area will ever see, united again by the next generation.
As if he was on air, ESPN’s Ellis broke down Martin the coach over the phone. He did so by comparing him to the legendary Bennie Lewis, their coach at Lincoln.
“The culture of self-sacrifice, respect, being polite, that culture was established by Coach Lewis far before we ever got there,” Ellis said. “So when we got there, there was an expectation how we would be on the floor and off the floor. All of those characteristics, Cuonzo has carried with him. All of those things have influenced his success. And I think that’s part of the reason kids like to play for him. He’s a player’s coach, he’s fun and light-hearted — yet he expects so much from you. And he has an uncanny way of communicating — ‘Yes, it’s about the team, but if you have the ability to play at the next level, I’ll help you achieve your dream.’ He’s got that great balance of being authoritarian but allowing the kids to know he genuinely cares about them — and their futures.”
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk