The Pumas: A true tale of crime, basketball, victory, loss, family

As the state high school basketball tournament takes place, The Star revisits the story behind a charter school team that captured the hearts of many in 2011 — and finds out where the players and coaches are today.

Nick Reich stared at the black-and-white photo on the table in front of him.

The beaming smiles, the celebration, the pride. It all seemed so far away.

The former head basketball coach at Indianapolis Metropolitan High School tried to remember that moment of glory four years ago, so poignant and yet so fleeting.

He tried to remember how he had brought together a group of teens who struggled with poverty, bad grades, criminal activity, anger and frustration. How he had turned them into a family.

But a gaping loss overshadowed the good times in his memory.

"It's so stained," Reich said. "I almost have to be forced to think about that."

Slowly he did remember, starting back in 2007. Reich, a coach with no coaching experience and a troubled past of his own, approached a group of kids playing a pickup game at Washington Park on the city's Eastside.

Like other kids who would join the team, they came from neighborhoods where high school graduation wasn't a given and violence was all too common. Many of the kids at Indy Met had little to build on besides raw talent, and their own heart and fight.

It would be enough to achieve something no one thought possible. It was a partial victory, to be sure, but a major one nonetheless.

Building a team

The first time Reich laid eyes on three of his core players, he was passing out fliers at Washington Park Family Center during open gym.

In 2007, Reich was the director of student and family services at Indianapolis Metropolitan High School. The public charter school, operated by Goodwill Education Initiatives, was just three years old and needed students.

Reich touted Indy Met's unique learning environment. At that time, there were no bells or passing periods at the high school. Teens often sprawled on couches or in the hallways to do their schoolwork.

The curriculum was designed for students who hadn't been successful elsewhere, whether they had gotten in trouble or were highly intelligent and bored by traditional classes.

Reich, as a school social worker, provided additional support through parenting and anger management classes and a school-based food pantry and by connecting families to financial assistance when they faced eviction or their electricity being shut off.

Basketball was just one more tool to get teens to graduate from high school.

"There are kids that can get disconnected from education without something to keep them connected," Reich said.

At Washington Park, Reich saw talent in JerrBryon Graves, Raymond Green and Anthony Jackson.

The boys knew each other through open gym but weren't close friends. That soon changed.

Forging relationships

JerrBryon said his friendship with Anthony and Raymond developed quickly during their freshman year at Indy Met. Anthony even lived with JerrBryon and his mom at various times.

Anthony said Raymond and JerrBryon were his brothers, the two people he could be himself around.

He gave Raymond the nickname "Boosie," because Raymond's haircut resembled that of the Baton Rouge, La. rapper of the same nickname.

Raymond's mom Lakishia Green said her son would pack half a dozen sweaty, smelly teenage boys into his bedroom.

JerrBryon remembers them staying awake all night to play basketball. Raymond even attended JerrBryon's travel basketball games to support his friend.

"These two guys are my brothers," JerrBryon said. "They meant a lot to me."

They were connected by a love of the game.

Indy Met didn't have a gymnasium, so the school rented space for basketball practice at various parks around the city. It didn't have money for practice jerseys, so the boys played shirts versus skins.

Reich drove a short, 15-passenger school bus wherever the team needed to go, and he washed the players' game jerseys at his house after every game.

He became a father figure to many players.

Reich brought Raymond to the doctor and to get contact lenses. He and his wife took in players when they were having trouble at home.

When Anthony considered dropping out of school during his junior year to get a job after his girlfriend became pregnant, Reich and others persuaded him to stay. He received help through the school-based food pantry.

A year later, when Anthony celebrated his son's first birthday at Monkey Joe's in Castleton, the entire team showed up in the bus to celebrate with him. They left directly from there for a basketball game.

During the boys' senior year, the entire team spent the night at Reich's house before some of the games. Reich said it was a matter of necessity. When they slept over, he could control what they ate for dinner, when they went to bed, what they had for breakfast and when they left the house.

Everything Reich did had one purpose: to keep the kids in school. To give them a goal to strive for. To give them a fighting chance to resist the pull of street gangs that thrived in some of their neighborhoods.

It was no easy task.

Reich said he could fill a book with tales of players who spent time on Indy Met's basketball team but didn't finish. Many simply outplayed themselves in life as often as they challenged other teams on the court.

Courting trouble

The first sign of trouble came on Nov. 17, 2007, the Saturday before the first game of the 2007-2008 season.

Around 12:30 p.m., the team left the school after practice and started walking north along White River Parkway to Municipal Gardens so they could play some pickup basketball.

A man was walking along the same street. When their paths crossed, two players pinballed the man between them. One player sucker-punched the man on the side of his head, then took his coffee and threw it on him, according to records from the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department.

"Everybody was hyper, feeling like we was the man," said Anthony, who was there but did not hit the man. He said they made a stupid mistake.

Two witnesses who were driving by called police, and officers caught up with the group of 10 players. One player told police he struck the man to protect his friends. All of them were arrested.

The player who hit the man was charged with robbery, battery, criminal gang activity and disorderly conduct, according to police records. The other nine faced charges of robbery, disorderly conduct, criminal recklessness and criminal gang activity.

Reich told The Star that he and other school officials vigorously fought the criminal gang activity charges. The Star does not have access to their juvenile records, but Reich said all the charges eventually were dropped.

But the player who hit the man and Raymond, who also messed with the man, were suspended from the basketball team for the season.

The school allowed Raymond to practice with the team, but he couldn't play in a game. He showed up for every practice. Reich persuaded school officials to let Raymond play in a couple games at the end of the season as a reward.

Anthony was expelled from Indy Met midway through that same school year for an incident involving a gun at school. He came back his sophomore year but challenged authority. Anthony told The Star he was suspended 25 times during high school.

"I don't know what was wrong with me," he said. "It wasn't healthy. It wasn't right. It wasn't helping me. I was getting affiliated with the wrong things and wrong people."

Anthony said people questioned whether he might end up in jail. His academics suffered. He said he lost focus until junior year, when he started to pull himself together.

The team also struggled in those early years. The Pumas ended the 2007-2008 season with a 10-10 record.

Anthony, Raymond and JerrBryon all played sophomore year. The team finished with eight wins and 14 losses.

Then, before the start of the 2009-2010 basketball season, Raymond and JerrBryon were among five teens arrested for breaking into a home.

JerrBryon said Reich was extremely angry and yelled at him.

"It was just a dumb mistake," JerrBryon said. "I can't tell you what I was thinking back then, but it was a dumb mistake."

Again, they were suspended from the team. Reich fought to allow them to practice, but he was overruled. Both boys were banned from the team during their junior year.

Reich said officials questioned his motivation for seeking leniency for his basketball players.

Some felt Reich was motivated by self-interest, since JerrBryon and Raymond were two of the best on the court.

But the coach said his motivation was much more simple: He wanted to see his players graduate high school. Reich said his mindset was always, "What happens to them if … ."

"You balance potential and problems," he said. "By that time, I deeply cared about both of those kids."

Second chances

Reich believed the players were coming around.

He said there was nothing JerrBryon hated more than the word "tutor," but he buckled down when he needed to make decent grades in order to play basketball. And basketball kept Raymond in school and away from alcohol and trouble with gangs.

Some of that philosophy of forgiveness came from Reich's own experiences. He spoke openly to the team about his own past, which included arrests, smoking weed and dropping out of college.

"I'm not perfect," Reich told his players. "I did a lot of stuff I'm not proud of and I want to help you avoid some of those same things."

By Raymond, JerrBryon and Anthony's senior year, every player on the varsity team had gotten second or third chances.

And it seemed as if Reich's efforts were finally paying off. Anthony and JerrBryon returned to the team that year. Raymond took some convincing, but he also agreed to rejoin.

Reich said the 2010-2011 boys basketball team had talent.

Raymond was the top scorer. He went hard all the time. Once, when Raymond was sick during practice, he threw up in a trash can then ran back over to his place in line.

JerrBryon, who grew to be the leader, was the best in the state in assists and the team's go-to guy for big shots.

Anthony was extremely athletic and a great rebounder.

Other players brought plenty of the qualities Reich promoted in his players — heart and fight.

"Everyone bought into their role or job and that's what made them unique," assistant coach Richard Bishop said.

Reich thought the Pumas had a legitimate shot at winning a sectional title. Bishop said if they were shooting for success, they should shoot for the top — for a state championship.

There were a couple of things head coach Nick Reich neglected to mention when he recruited Richard Bishop to be his assistant basketball coach.

"So, where's the gym?" Bishop remembers asking after he arrived at Indianapolis Metropolitan High School before the 2010-11 season.

Oh, we don't have one, Reich replied. Later, he asked Bishop, "Do you know how to drive a bus?"

Reich said it hadn't occurred to him to mention that the charter school didn't have a gym. In the previous three years, the boys basketball team had practiced at three different city parks. Every game was a road game. It was their "normal."

Bishop, who was once an assistant coach at North Central High School, was used to having a nice gym and players who wore practice uniforms and rode in a large athletics bus.

Instead, he was handed guidelines for driving a dingy, white 15-passenger bus.

Even some of their workouts were unorthodox.

Bishop remembers watching the players run up and down the steep hill between White River Parkway and the bank of the river in 95-degree heat. A line of players stood along the edge of the water to ensure their teammates didn't slip and fall in.

"You realize other teams aren't doing this?" Bishop asked Reich.

Early in the season, Bishop wanted JerrBryon Graves and some of the other players kicked off the team. He said they cut corners, got in trouble or gave up. The assistant coach came from a "no kid is bigger than the program" philosophy.

But Reich believed every player was bigger than the team. He asked Bishop whether JerrBryon would graduate from high school if he wasn't on the team. And what about Anthony Jackson? Would he?

Reich didn't think so.

"For me, the goal was to get kids out of high school using basketball," he said. "It wasn't about building a basketball program."

So when Anthony left in the middle of a game to sit in the stands, he got another chance. When 6-foot-10 William Kennedy quit the team midway through the season because he thought he wasn't getting enough playing time, he was allowed to come back.

Indy Met's 2010-11 season started off rocky, with the Pumas losing three of their first five games.

But, slowly, they pulled together. The team rallied to a last-second win against Charles A. Tindley Accelerated School midway through the season. The Pumas also beat Guerin Catholic High School, which had a strong program.

Indy Met played an up-tempo game, and the teens were so close that they shared the basketball. They impressed people in other ways, too. Reich said people often commented to him how respectful his players had been on and off the court.

But there still were lessons to learn.

Respecting the game

It was the fourth quarter. The Pumas were dominating the Indiana School for the Deaf on Jan. 27, 2011. Indy Met's score was in the mid-90s to the Orioles' 26.

Reich's players wanted to break 100 points, which they had never done. He agreed but told them they couldn't score another point after hitting 100.

The Pumas scored 101 points and held firm.

Then, in the last seconds of the game, Jonathan Kelly stole the ball and ran up the court, because he wanted to dunk the ball. He missed, and the buzzer sounded.

Reich was livid. Jonathan's action, he said, was "intolerable." He had disrespected the game.

Reich got in Jonathan's face while he was still lying on the ground. He continued throughout the handshake line and into the locker room.

He made Jonathan go back onto the court, with spectators still in the stands, to run suicides. Without being asked, JerrBryon led the rest of the team onto the court to run with him.

They were one team, one ego, one family.

"It speaks to how close the kids came together," Reich said. "It would not have happened any other year."

From there on out, everything clicked on and off the court.

'Heart and fight'

The Pumas won five of the next six regular-season games, then took home the program's first sectional title before moving on to the regional semifinal at Martinsville High School.

Two seventh-graders at Martinsville East Middle School were assigned as ball boys during the semifinal on March 12, 2011. They excitedly cheered for Indy Met.

It didn't look good for the Pumas. At one point in the second half, they trailed Southwestern (Shelby) by 16 points. But they didn't give up. The Pumas fought back for the 47-44 win.

"Pinch me," Raymond Green said at the time. "I need to make sure it's true. From gym to gym, bus ride to bus ride, it doesn't seem real this is happening. These are my Met brothers. They are my family."

Reich had his players line up and high-five the ball boys, saying they were his good-luck charms.

It launched an unlikely friendship. Later that night, when the Pumas returned to Martinsville for the regional championship game against Shawe Memorial, the ball boys brought several friends to cheer in the stands.

The Pumas trailed by 12 points in the second half. Raymond looked across the free-throw lane at Anthony.

"This ain't over," he said.

Anthony nodded.

They fought back hard to tie it up.

With seconds left on the clock, JerrBryon tried to run up the court but was confronted by a Shawe defender well before half-court.

With a one-handed baseball throw, JerrBryon hurled the ball as the clock expired. The Shawe players all turned toward the basket and watched. The ball looked as if it might be wide to the right, but it glanced off the inside of the rim and sloshed through the net.

JerrBryon's teammates swarmed him at midcourt.

"Heart and fight!" Reich yelled. "Heart and fight! That right there was heart and fight!"

JerrBryon's shot captured national attention. ESPN named it the No. 1 play of that day. Media outlets across the country shared the video.

Suddenly, Indy Met's improbable playoff run was in the spotlight. People were fascinated by the team's success without a gym, without practice jerseys and in the face of adversity. There was a focus on the closeness of the team, including the fact that they spent the night at Reich's house before the regional games.

Players were baffled by the attention.

"Why is everyone making a big deal out of this?" Raymond asked while eating dinner at Reich's house.

The public loved an underdog.

'My best moment'

Next up was North Daviess from Elnora, on March 19, 2011. With more than 20 friends of the Martinsville ball boys cheering them on, the Pumas again started out slow. But they stuck to their game and pulled off a 61-50 victory.

Indy Met — in just its fourth varsity season — was headed to the Class A state championship game.

The Pumas would face Triton, a powerhouse that was making its third state finals appearance in four years.

"Triton was like Goliath to us," Reich recalled.

The game was played at the glittering Conseco Fieldhouse, now named Bankers Life. Going into the championship on March 26, 2011, Raymond was averaging nearly 20 points per game. The team was ready.

But nerves were running high. At one point early on, there were four back-to-back steals without a basket. Triton raced to an early lead, but with 1.1 seconds left in the first quarter, Raymond tossed the ball to JerrBryon, who knocked down another one of his half-court buzzer-beaters to tie the game.

The teams were evenly matched. Triton forward Clay Yeo, 6-5, was an inside force, and the Trojans also were draining 3-pointers. With 25 seconds left in the game, the Pumas led, 52-50, and the Trojans started fouling. Two big offensive rebounds by Anthony gave the Pumas four turns at the line, inching their lead to 57-52.

The Tritons hit a 3-pointer to come within two, but it was too late.

When that final buzzer sounded, the Pumas had won 59-55. Reich wrapped Raymond in a hug. The rest of the team latched on for a group hug. Raymond's mother tried to run onto the court but was stopped by security.

"That moment right there was my best moment," Anthony said. "Just to see all my teammates so excited. It was a time to remember."

In the locker room afterward, Reich told the players to use the feelings they had to propel themselves forward and overcome adversity in real life.

"Don't let this be the highlight," he told them. "Let this be a springboard."

The aftermath

The next two months were a whirlwind.

Goodwill Industries, which founded and operates Indy Met, paid for a trip to Washington, D.C., for the coaches and players. The team was honored at an event, visited congressional offices and sat courtside at a Wizards game.

"More important than their winning record was the way the team played and how the players conducted themselves on the court," Goodwill Education Initiatives' board of directors wrote.

They were praised by rival fans, high school sports officials, referees and members of the community. State legislators honored them, and they were invited to speaking engagements throughout the city.

Their story also inspired people to donate to Indy Met. Goodwill raised millions of dollars in a few months, Reich said, enabling the school to accelerate building a school gym.

"It was a good time for the school and city, because they doubted us," JerrBryon said. "We had a lot to prove to a lot of people."

"They treated us like we was winners," Anthony recalled. "They treated us with respect. We actually felt noticed for a time. It was the best time of my life."

Reich, who resigned at the end of the season, hoped the players' story wouldn't end there. All but one of the Pumas' eight players were seniors, and Reich wanted them to attend college.

"Until these guys set foot on a college campus, my job is not done," Reich said in 2011. "Hopefully after that, we'll be able to sit back and reflect on what we've done."

Indeed, some would go off to college.

As the school year came to a close, JerrBryon committed to Presentation College in South Dakota, Anthony committed to Purdue University North Central, and Jonathan and Reese Williams committed to Indiana University-Kokomo.

But not Raymond — not the team's leading scorer, the one who had declared, "This ain't over." When others were getting letters of acceptance, Raymond received another kind of letter.

He would not be graduating from high school, let alone going to college. He had failed his End of Course Assessment. He would have to stay in school if he wanted to graduate.

But Raymond didn't stay in school. He walked away from Indy Met. He went back to his old neighborhood, back to his old ways.

"That day that he walked out of the school, we lost the game of tug of war," Reich said. "We were winning up through the state championship game, and we were winning after that, but when he got that letter that he didn't pass the test, we lost."

When Raymond "Boosie" Green walked into the kitchen of his family's Northside apartment on Oct. 16, 2011, his mother, Lakishia Green, didn't turn around.

"Ray," she said, "go take the trash out."

"Yes, ma'am," the 19-year-old replied.

It had been six months since Raymond and seven other Indianapolis Metropolitan High School students crowned a successful basketball season with a state championship.

It had been four months since Raymond found out he hadn't passed his End of Course Assessment and wouldn't graduate with his friends and teammates.

Now, four of those teammates were settling into life on college campuses. A fifth was preparing for missionary service as part of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

And Raymond was here, in his old neighborhood, a high school dropout tangled up in a life of alcohol and violence.

Lakishia said her son still had a vision to do more. She said Raymond had signed back up for school. It would start in two days.

Raymond returned from taking out the trash, then, telling his mom he had left his hoodie outside, he disappeared out the front door. She continued mopping the floor.

Shortly afterward, just before 9 p.m., Lakishia opened the door to shake out the mop and heard voices. People were howling.

A guy she knew was crying as he walked toward her on the sidewalk.

"I'm sorry, Ms. Kishia," he said. "I'm sorry, Ms. Kishia."

She grabbed him. "Sorry for what?"

"Boosie got shot," he told her.

After calling her father and aunt, Lakishia left the apartment and moved toward the cluster of police cars.

"I didn't know if my son was dead or alive," she said.

Raymond was sprawled in the middle of 32nd Street, just west of North Keystone Avenue. She looked at her son's red shoes. His feet didn't move.

It was then that Lakishia knew.

'It's burned in your brain'

Nick Reich, the former head coach of Indy Met's championship basketball team, got a call and headed to the scene.

The young man he loved lay still in the middle of the street. Reich stood 10 or 15 feet away, staring at Raymond's body.

"I don't remember crying," he recently told The Star. "It's like a train wreck. It's something you can't take your eyes off of."

Richard Bishop, who served as assistant coach during the 2010-11 state championship season, arrived soon afterward.

"It's burned in your brain," Bishop said. "That image, to see a man with so much potential lying there. The loss isn't what gets you. You look at the potential of what could have been."

Raymond lay there uncovered for four hours, Lakishia said. A crowd gathered around the yellow caution tape. People screamed at police to cover up the body.

Reich remembered seeing little kids playing nearby.

"And you wonder why kids grow up desensitized to the value of human life," he said.

No one has been charged in Raymond's death, according to the Marion County prosecutor's office. Lakishia Green said police told her that her son was shot while trying to rob someone in a car.

"He was in the wrong," she said. "He knew better than that."

Lakishia couldn't cope with her son's death, so Reich took over. He got Raymond's funeral paid for and picked the casket and the plot in Sutherland Park Cemetery.

He also helped figure out how to get Raymond's former Indy Met teammates home from college. Two of them, JerrBryon Graves and Anthony Jackson, considered Raymond their brother.

Anthony had just seen Raymond that weekend, while home from Purdue University North Central. He said he immediately broke down when he found out his friend was dead.

JerrBryon, who was attending college in South Dakota, had just finished basketball practice when he got the call.

"I went into shock mode," JerrBryon said. "I felt like it was my fault because I was in South Dakota."

He and his other Indy Met teammates served as pallbearers.

'How do you deal with it?'

Reich said losing Raymond made him question his relationships with other players.

Several of the players relied heavily on him and expected him to bail them out. They called from college to complain because they missed home, or it was cold, or they were in trouble.

For years, they'd been a family. Now he wondered if he was a crutch.

He pulled away. He stopped returning calls or, if he answered, he told the players to figure it out themselves.

"What's the point of all this?" Reich asked. "If you still aren't capable of doing things for yourself, then I was highly unsuccessful anyway. So what's the point?"

For him, in a lot of ways, Raymond's death was where the story ended. Reich had to force himself to remember the basketball championship, the time before he saw Raymond's body lying on that street.

"Those two events are always linked, and there's just no way that they can't be," he said. "There's a start point and an end point, and all of that is together. But the end point is probably more powerful in a lot of ways than some of the other things that you remember, unfortunately."

Reich left his job at Goodwill Industries the month Raymond died to become executive director of Circles Indiana, an organization that works to alleviate poverty. He founded Social Insight LLC, a consulting firm, in 2013 and still works there today.

"I didn't really know how to deal with it," Reich said. "His championship ring is still sitting in my console of my car, so how do you deal with it, you know?"

Earlier this month, with Lakishia Green and The Star, Reich returned to the place where Raymond died. He hadn't been there in years, but the memories were as vivid as if it had happened yesterday.

A telephone pole closest to the spot where Raymond died was covered with stuffed animals, CDs, empty alcohol bottles and items with the names "Raymond" and "Boosie" on them. A tribute to Raymond was spray-painted in red on the pavement: "Truth." "Justice." "Miss you."

Memorabilia also coated a large tree toward the other end of the block. Reich walked over and stared silently at the tree.

"Coming here just pisses me off," he said.

Reich said he didn't know Boosie. He knew Raymond, the kid whose smile lit up a room, who loved basketball so much that he practiced every day, even when he knew he wouldn't be able to play in a single game.

Seeing the shrine just reminded Reich who won: the streets.

'Trying to make it every day'

When the Pumas won the state championship, Reich had told his players to use it to overcome adversity and find success in real life.

Raymond's death stung. And he wasn't the only former player to stumble badly.

Former Puma Jared Tapley is serving 45 years in prison relating to the death of his then-girlfriend's 4-month-old daughter. According to the Marion County prosecutor's office, an injury on the left side of the girl's face appeared to match the pattern of Tapley's high school basketball championship ring.

Prison officials declined The Star's request to interview Tapley.

The Star couldn't find all of the players, and some declined to talk. But others appear to be taking Reich's advice to heart.

William Kennedy, the 6-10 Puma who clogged things up defensively on the court, now is an elder in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. He is finishing his two-year missionary service in Vancouver, Canada, then plans to return to Indiana to play collegiate basketball.

"My basketball career is not yet over but, for right now, I serve others for two years," William said. "It has blessed me and my family tons, as well as others."

He said his time on the team taught him not to give up when things are difficult and to always be a light and example to others.

Anthony left college in 2013 after tearing his ACL during the off-season. He came back to Indianapolis for rehabilitation, got married and moved to Florida for a short period of time. He and his wife are no longer together.

Today, he said, he works at the Johnson & Johnson warehouse in Plainfield. He contacted Purdue University North Central and hopes to re-enroll in the fall. His son, who was born while he was in high school, is now 5 years old.

"I'm just trying to make it every day, just day by day," Anthony said. "I'm just thankful I'm alive. I want to keep doing better and going forward."

JerrBryon is a junior at Presentation College in South Dakota. Last March, he and his longtime girlfriend had a son.

He said he wants to get his degree to "let my son know that if things don't work, you can't quit."

JerrBryon, who is a business major, said he wants to open a basketball facility if his basketball career doesn't take off. He'd like to be a personal trainer and help kids learn the game.

"I got a lot to prove to the doubters and my family," he said.

'Ain't nothing changed'

Reich recently reconnected with JerrBryon and Anthony. The three men met at Raymond's grave site. JerrBryon and Anthony, who have remained close, traded jabs on which person would win a game of one-on-one. They teased each other about whose statistics were better. And they reminisced about Raymond's talent.

Four years later, they're still family. Mourning a loss. Remembering good times. Pressing forward.

"Ain't nothing changed," Anthony said.

Reich said meeting with The Star and telling the story pushed him to remember those good times. He recaptured that sense of pride they had when they won the state championship.

"Knowing the things that we overcame on a daily basis, it really amazes me," Reich said. "Those kids and the way they handled that attention and the media, it makes me extremely proud of what we were able to accomplish at the time."

But the relationships they had with each other were what made it so special for him.

"I don't think that I was a great high school basketball coach," Reich said. "I was the right coach at the right time for the right group of kids who probably all needed each other at that point in our lives. I'm not who I am and where I am without each of those kids. They're probably not who they are and where they are without each other.

"It's not basketball, it's not Xs and Os, it's nothing I did," he said. "It's nothing but heart and fight."

Star reporter Kyle Neddenriep contributed to this story. Call Star reporter Marisa Kwiatkowski at (317) 444-6135. Follow her on Twitter: @IndyMarisaK.