Lathan Falls refused to let a season-erasing injury end a family tradition.
The Wood Memorial senior, who averaged 19 points, six rebounds and four assists the past season in keying the Trojans to a 15-9 record, Wednesday afternoon signed basketball scholarship papers and a national junior college letter-of-intent with Lincoln Trail College of Robinson,Il.
“Lathan not only scored 1,055 career points for us, he has tremendous potential at the college level. He progressed each year,” said recently resigned Wood Memorial Coach Kevin Menke.
Six-foot-four, 200-pound Lathan Falls, who helped Wood Memorial to Class A sectional titles in 2015 and 2017, when the Trojans reached the regional final, is the grandson of the late Don Falls, who at Oakland City High in the 1950s scored a then-Gibson County record 1,451 points.
“He had a great high school career and comes to us with a lot of versatility,” said Lincoln Trail assistant coach Spencer Koch, who attended the signing in the high school library because, unlike NCAA coaches, a junior college coach can attend a recruit’s signing.
“His strengths include scoring and shooting ability that will translate to the college game, where shooting is the most important.”
Dad Chris Falls played basketball at Wood Memorial and California (Pa.) College. Uncle Rick Falls played hoops at Wood Memorial and golf at Purdue.
Cousin Johnnie Bartley starred in basketball at Wood Memorial before a girls’ coaching career highlighted by the school’s 2017 Class A state championship.
Coach’s daughter Chloe Bartley, a four-year starter who capped her career with the 2017 state crown; and coach’s son Paxon Bartley, who went over 1,000 career points as a junior the past season, are also cousins.
Brother Alton Falls, a 14-year-old seventh grader, plays basketball at Wood Memorial Junior High.
This tradition appeared to be interrupted in Nov. 2015 when Lathan Falls suffered injury in a preseason exhibition game against Heritage Hills.
“I got fouled and knocked down when I was running on a fast break,” Lathan recounted. “When my right knee hit the floor, it sounded like a gunshot went off. After sitting out a while, I tried to go back in, but as soon as I got off the bench I realized, ‘No way.’
“My ACL was torn and a bone was dented. I couldn’t play at all that season.”
True grit brought a comeback.
“I knew that if I worked hard, my basketball career wouldn’t be over,” Falls said. “I rehabbed it a lot, especially in the weight room.
“As a junior and senior I realized how much the injury impacted me because I sometimes got upset and depressed.
“But it made me a harder worker, a better person, a better teammate,” he said.
“Lathan reacted very well. He rebuilt his knee and has kept making his body stronger,” Menke said. “He has a great chance to be really successful at the college level.”
Falls made an impression on Lincoln Trail head coach Luke Stuckey, formerly an assistant coach with the NBA Orlando Magic, and Koch during this year’s April 13 Spring Classic in the Statesmen gym. He scored 28 points in leading the Indiana All-Stars to a 130-65 win over their Illinois counterparts.
“I’d already made a campus visit,” Falls said. “I also had basketball offers from West Liberty, a Division II school near
Wheeling, Va.; and Delta State, a Division II school in Mississippi.”Indiana-Southeast offered. So did Wabash Valley and Kaskaskia of the Great Rivers Athletic Conference that Lincoln Trail is in.
“Soon as I visited the Robinson campus, I really liked the place. It’s really cool. The coaches are cool – they really made me feel welcome.
“The players are cool, too, including Duante Booker, who played at Evansville Harrison and was my teammate in Evansville’s Pocket City League AAU program.
“Someday I’d like to play Division II or maybe Division I basketball at the four-year level, but I think junior college will be best for me these next two years.”
Booker will return to Lincoln Trail as a sophomore.
“We had just one sophomore on our team the past season, when we finished 10-19,” Koch said. “Lathan is our fourth signee – he joins Alex Heath, a 5-9 point-guard from Cleveland, Ohio; Lamar Lillard, a 6-4 guard from Momence, Il., 50 miles south of Chicago; and Quentin Jones, 6-8 forward transferring from Division II Tiffin University near Toledo.
“We anticipate signing three or four more players.”
To graduate Friday night with a 3.1 grade-point average on Wood Memorial’s 4.0 scale, Falls plans to earn an associate degree in science at Lincoln Trail and eventually become a nurse.
“I like learning about body anatomy and helping people,” Falls added.