100 point wonder

A few days ago Jack Taylor, a junior at Grinnell College, scored 109 points in his second game of this season. This is Taylor’s second 100 plus point performance in the last year.

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Kuhlmann's Corner, Liz Kuhlmann

Clayton Custer has always been the poster child for the BVNW boys basketball program. And he’s earned it. Not many people can say they’ve started all four years of high school on a program that expects nothing but the best, and achieves even more. Everyone knew he was going places, and sure enough, last year Custer verbally committed to Division I Iowa State University. Custer averaged around 20 points a game last year, which is pretty impressive considering the league the Huskies play in. Four years ago in California, Jack Taylor, a senior in high school at the time, was also averaging 20 points at the end of his final year in high school.

Taylor, while offered a spot on the roster from a Division I and Division II school, settled on signing to a Division III University of Wisconsin-La Crosse after tearing his ACL his freshman year of college at a prep school. As a reserve on the team, he averaged around seven points a game in just over 13 minutes. After one season in Wisconsin, Taylor learned of another Division III school—Grinnell College—and became immediately interested. Grinnell’s entire offense consists of shooting as many three pointers as they can on isolation and pass and shoot plays. Taylor felt as if this style suited him, and transferred his sophomore year.

Two games into his first season at Grinnell, Taylor was not living up to what he promised to be as he fell into a slump. His three point percentages dropped considerably, and the coach even resorted to leaving him in the game for longer than usual to get him so extra reps. However, on November 20, 2012, Taylor played the best game of his life against Faith Baptist Bible College. Shooting 52 of 108 from the field, 27-21 from the three point range, and 7-10 from the free throw line allowed him to set a multitude of NCAA records after scoring 138 points. In 36 minutes.

138 points. That’s a lot of shooting. Heck, that’s a lot of scoring. You have to be pretty accurate to hit that many shots. Obviously, Taylor received quite a bit of fame from his experience and was asked to be interviewed by various famous talk show hosts and magazines. He was a trending topic on Twitter, and NBA stars like Kobe Bryant and LeBron James name dropped him in interviews of their own. Despite the fame and popularity, Taylor did not sign to another higher level college, but returned to Grinnell this season.

And what do you know? The second game of this season against Crossroads College resulted in yet another 100 plus point game for Taylor at 109. In 29 minutes. He sat out most of the fourth quarter, and still put up over 100.

I may be missing something, but that’s pretty impressive. Some haters may point out that it may have to do with him going to a DIII college and playing less competitive competition. That does not change the fact that’s an insane amount of shots taken, and insanely high field goal/three point percentage. The typical “good” player playing an “awful” team doesn’t normally put up over 100 points. I mean, correct me if I’m wrong, but he made the news for a reason. Others may complain that many points means he’s a self-absorbed ball hog. Maybe, maybe not. But answer me this, if you hit 16 three pointers in a row, would you stop to “share” the ball? Any competitive athlete who wants to improve his or her game would answer “probably not.” He wanted to see how far he could go, and in the end gave all the credit to his teammates. That doesn’t seem conceited to me.

Now, my question is, how has this guy not been picked up by a higher-level college? Admittedly, DI is a totally different atmosphere from DIII, but come on. This guy obviously has an immense amount of talent and shooting skill. Passing by him the first time he put up over 100 is maybe understandable. But now that it’s happened twice? I’ll be surprised if he doesn’t head off to another school for his senior year.

That being said, I can respect his decision if he doesn’t. Grinnell is obviously a place where he has experienced and immense amount of success. The playing style fits him, his team and coach love him, and Derby gym has become his home where he has strived for perfection. He may decide to pay his dues to the place, and stay his senior year where he feels most comfortable. It all comes down to if he wants to be a big fish in a small pond or a small fish in a big pond.

If I were in his position, I’m not sure what I’d do. But I’d be thankful to at least have the options. There is no doubt in my mind that Jack Taylor is a special player, and he will have a wide variety of interesting stories to tell his grandkids one day. After all, how many people can say they single handedly scored over 100 points in two college competitions? Not many, but Jack Taylor can.