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| At top left, Alec with his mother Beth and father Troy; at right, along the sidelines in 2004; at bottom left, with Duke players Luke Kennard and Grayson Allen |
As I watched Alec Holtrey play his final home game for the Springboro basketball team tonight, I had one of those moments that often plays out in the movies — where a lifetime of images roll together to a soundtrack.
Though he is now a senior and looking forward to college, I could still see him as a kindergartner roaming the sidelines at Springboro varsity games, decked out in a uniform two sizes too big, always ready to fetch a loose ball or give Jake Ballard a cup of water. That’s the kind of opportunity a little guy gets when his dad is head coach of the varsity, as Troy Holtrey was at the time.
I could see him as a seventh grader always hanging around “The Coach,” his grandfather Ron Holtrey, the former legendary coach at Lebanon, always dribbling a basketball, always striving to be better than he was the day before. He would put a sparkle in the eye of Mr. Holtrey, who always beamed with pride when talking of Alec, “He’s going to be a good one.”
And I could see him as a dedicated sophomore two years ago in a game at Franklin, where the stands were filled way before tipoff, where the excitement was as high as any game I can remember, when the Panthers made a valiant effort to beat one of the best teams Franklin has ever had. For a spell, the quick and hard-working Alec gave Luke Kennard — now a starter at Duke — all he could muster.
Seriously, Alec, you’re already a senior? How can that be? Just yesterday your mother Beth was driving you to practice. Your dad was coaching your AAU teams. As these images pass by, I can hear Florida Georgia Line singing, “May we all grow up in a red, white and blue little town…”
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THIS SENIOR YEAR was supposed to be the season when Alec scored 20 points a game and handed out almost 10 assists, leading the Panthers to a second straight championship in the Greater Western Ohio Conference.
But this season instead gave him a monumental dose of adversity, all because of the events just after halftime in the first game of the season at Stebbins. It was as brutal to watch as it was to endure. While leading a fast break, Alec pulled up to shoot a jumper. In that regard, it looked like something he had done millions of times.
Only this time he landed at an awkward angle, and only this time — to make matters worse — one of Stebbins’ biggest players landed right on top of him.
“I knew something was really wrong right away,” Alec remembers. “I knew it wasn’t good.”
The official diagnosis was a displaced and fractured fibula in his right lower leg, the kind of injury that does not heal easily. The official prognosis right from the beginning was that Alec would not play the rest of this season, including tonight’s Senior Night finale against Lebanon.
It was a crushing blow, in more ways than one. Surgery installed a plate with five screws just above his right foot. After that, he needed more physical therapy in two months than some people ever need in an entire lifetime.
It was hard for him to sit on the bench and watch. The pain was so bad he couldn’t even travel when Springboro played in a holiday tournament in Indianapolis just after Christmas. “That was definitely the low point,” he says.
Finally, after the crutches were gone and the boot removed, the real work started. Springboro trainer Cody Lucas, who most certainly is one of God’s angels, spent hours massaging and working Alec’s foot and leg back to healing. At home, Alec utilized a machine Troy purchased that is known as “Game Ready,” which applies ice and pressure in 30-minute intervals. Amazingly, Alec used it 20 hours a day (when I was at their house the other night, I could barely stand it for five minutes).
All the while, Alec's goal was to somehow make it back for the final games of the season. Could it be done? Throughout the month of January, it didn’t look good.
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BY SUNDAY, JANUARY 29, Alec had shown enough progress that he and Troy went to the high school gym to see how well he could maneuver. When they arrived, there was optimism. But by the time the workout was over, however, the hopes had quickly dashed. Troy remembers thinking, “He’s not coming back.”
Still, Alec continued to undergo “Game Ready” therapy, and continued to work with Cody Lucas. After all, there was still time. Maybe there was still a chance. If there is one thing the Holtreys (Ron, Troy and Alec) have stood for throughout the last 50 years of local basketball, it is the power that comes through hard work and perseverance.
Though it was a longshot, the odds were still good enough for Alec to keep trying.
A week later, on Super Bowl Sunday, Alec and Troy returned to the high school gym. The workout once again was as strenuous as the one the week before. But this time, surprisingly, Alec showed profound improvement. Maybe his return to the game seemed altogether possible after all.
Four days later, his doctor gave him the go-ahead. That’s the part of the story Alec enjoys telling most of all. “I had a smile a mile wide the whole next day,” Alec told me the other night. “I’m still smiling.”
He was in the starting lineup last week at Northmont and scored six points, then started again on Saturday against a powerful Dunbar team and scored 16 points. Tonight, in an awesome game that went down to the very end, Alec had 21 points. He is back.
Sweet words, right there, aren't they?. He is back.
…
SOMEDAY, A MEMBER OF this year’s basketball team will coach a youth basketball team that will be full of rambunctious group of players who are eager to see what they can do. And somewhere during that season, a player will be injured. When that happens, he (or she) will be devastated.
The days will be dark. Hope may be hard to find.
But that’s where the coach will tell the story of Alec Holtrey and the 2016-17 basketball season. They will tell a story of hard work and dedication. And they will repeat a phrase that is often used in locker rooms, “Sports don’t build character. They reveal it.”
There is no doubt I would have loved to tell the story of Alec playing in all 22 games of Springboro’s season this winter, and perhaps highlighting a win streak that led to all kinds of local attention.
But instead I will forever tell a story of his amazing comeback, doing what most players could never do, defying all the odds against him along the way.
And you know what?
It’s a better story.