Bob Seggerson
The Lima News
It’s difficult to get sports enthusiasts from my generation to agree on many arguments about local basketball trivia back in the day, but there appears to be universal agreement on two points of contention: The most historic gymnasium and the greatest game ever played in that cathedral of hoops.
The Lima Senior High gymnasium, located at the site of the old LSH on Pierce Street was, for six decades, basketball heaven for many area athletes and fans. Lima Senior High and Lima Central Catholic called the gym home and it hosted many of the most memorable postseason tournament games in that era as well. When it opened in 1955, it was a palace seating 3500 fans. Keep in mind that it replaced the old South High School gym, built in the early 1920s, that could barely squeeze 1000 spectators onto the balcony that wrapped high around the old gym floor.
For the greatest game ever played in LSH gymnasium, I give you Middletown at Lima Senior High, played on February 3, 1984. Lima Senior’s coach, Ron Niekamp, remembers the game well. “I coached over a thousand high school and college games in my career, but that game is one of my all-time favorites. I loved that old gym. When they opened those balcony doors over the east side basket it was as if fans were hanging from the rafters,” he remembered.
Any game with GMC opponent, Middletown, was treated with reverence. Niekamp got the message early. “Old timers were always coming up to me with stories about games with Middletown,” he says. “I understood quickly that those games were special.”
Lima Senior (14-1) and Middletown (14-2) were both state-ranked at the time and the only blemish on the Spartan record was an earlier loss at Middletown. There was a “payback” atmosphere in the gym that night. Adding to the drama was the presence of two of the greatest athletes to ever compete in the GMC. Middletown’s Chris Carter and LSH’s William White were elite competitors who were already committed to play football at Ohio State. Both went on to great college and NFL careers. And they could both hoop!
The level of anticipation went up a notch when, Earl Bruce, Ohio State’s head football coach, marched into the gym just before tip-off and parked himself at the scorer’s table directly at half-court. (He told fans he didn’t want to show partiality to either team)
I was a spectator at this game. It was intense from start to finish. Andre Reed, one of the most talented players to ever wear a Spartan uniform, had misgivings about the game. “We lost a great player, Anthony Thompson, who broke his wrist a few weeks earlier and I was wondering how we were going to able to get it done that night,” he remembered. “But Lee Stewart played the game of his life (22 points and 10 rebounds) and Melvin Walker took over for AT and scored 18 points.”
Like all great games, it came down to the last minute of play. The Spartans went cold from the field and squandered a five-point lead late in the game, so coach Niekamp decided to hold the ball for over a minute, calling his last time-out with just 14 seconds on the clock.
Everybody in the gym, including Middletown, knew who was going to try to take the last shot. Andre Reed, who closed his career as the leading scorer in LSH history, remembered the last huddle. “Coach Niekamp told me the defense was going to be all over me and to be ready to get the ball inside to Lee (Stewart) if I was double-teamed, but I made my mind up that I was taking that shot if five guys were guarding me.”
Andre took the inbound pass and made his move to the basket immediately hounded by two defenders. Niekamp remembered the move that Reed had perfected. “Andre had this nice little ¾ sidestep, turn around move that gave him just enough room to shoot it over even the best defenders, and let me tell you, Reed could shoot the basketball.”
Reed spoke about the move. “I got that move on the playground growing up from an older player named Curly Baker. He was this little guy who could score over everybody, and he took the time to teach me the move.” Reed demonstrated the move, with deadly precision, to Middletown that night and when he scored the winning points, the gym erupted. Long-time Spartan fans tell me it was the loudest noise to ever bounce off the walls of that hallowed ground.
Middletown’s coach, Ted Stewart, told Lima News reporter Jim Naveau after the game, “I don’t know if we could have done a better job of guarding Reed on that last shot if we had gotten inside his uniform with him.”
The game was the first one ever aired live by TV 44 and Mike Schepp’s iconic call of Reed’s game-winning shot remained the opening promo for every basketball game covered by the station for nearly two decades.
Reed has dreams about the shot. “People still come up to me and remind me about that game. I’ll never forget it,” he says.
Neither will any of us who were there to witness it.
