Bob has sent me his new article. 69 should be putting it up shortly.
another Bobber classic. He is the best of the best
This is currently in an unreadable state.
Edit: thanks for the fix!
If you're gonna reply to me in the forums, please quote what I wrote that you're replying to so I have a clue...thanks! 😀
Awesome story !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
MY BROTHERS KEEPER
February 14, 2015. Valentines night in Downers Grove. The thermometer read three degrees. But the temperature was rising inside the old gym that night. The Mullins boys were back in town, and it was just like the good old days.
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Those good old days began in a backyard, where their father Mike poured a concrete slab and hung a net. After homework was done, the Mullins boys headed for the slab like clockwork. One on one, hour after hour, day after day, in the heat and in the cold, in the rain and in the snow. Mike Mullins realized quickly that older brother Brendan could shoot. Bryan was the opposite. He could handle the ball and defend. It made for quite a backyard battle.
"Oh my," Brendan said when I brought up the slab. "I don't recall those games ever ending."
"They ended all right," laughed Bryan. "They ended with us screaming and yelling at each other."
Jay Baum was the sophomore basketball coach at Downers. He had heard the stories about the father and the sons on that concrete slab. "I once asked Mike about what that was like, and he said 'I learned to just stay away. It was always last man standing. Only one of them was going to survive the day.' The other had to live with it until tomorrow."
The legend of the Mullins brothers began at O'Neil middle school, where Jim Festle was the basketball coach. He remembers when Brendan rolled into school. "Great kid. He could score like crazy. But, he could also act a little crazy. One time, Brendan was goofing off a little too much, so I benched him. I'm probably the only coach dumb enough to bench a Mullins. You want to know what that kid was made of? I put him back in, and he scores 15 points in the next two minutes. There's a time out, and I look at him. He just smiles and nods. He knew. Never had to bench him again."
Brendan smiled at that story. "I wasn't sitting out no more," he laughed.
Two years later, Bryan showed up. "Here's all you need to know about him," Festle said. "Whenever we would scrimmage, no matter how we split up the players, Bryan's team would win. Didn't matter if you put the next four best players against him. So I would let the teams play three quarters, and Bryan's team would always be 10-15 points ahead. And then in the fourth quarter, I would make Bryan switch and go on the losing team. And every time, the losing team wound up winning."
By the time the brothers hit high school, their personalities were on display.
"Brendan was confident and outgoing," said Paul Runyon, their high school coach. "Bryan was quiet and reserved."
Jon Stapleton was Runyon's assistant coach. "They were opposite personalities with one common thread: they were fierce competitors. And I mean fierce. We always put them on opposite teams when we scrimmaged. It was amazing how when got down to the end, and the game was on the line, they always wound up guarding each other. The scorer against the defender. Whoever won that match up won the scrimmage. And whatever Mullins won it on Monday, you knew the other one was coming back for revenge on Tuesday."
Runyon just laughed when I asked him about those practice sessions. "Brendan's senior year, we used to have guys go one on one after practice. The team kept begging me to put Brendan and Bryan against each other. I really didn't want to. Brendan was our star, and could score on anybody. But geez, Bryan, he just wasn't letting that happen. So one day I gave in, and let them go at each other. That was something else. It was war."
"I remember that one," said Bryan. "Everybody was hollering. Neither of us would give in. Finally, coach Runyon blew the whistle and just stopped it. Probably a good thing."
"I never did that again," laughed Runyon. "We might have lost both players for the season."
Stapleton and Baum had a running joke about Bryan. Stapleton taught him how to pass, Baum taught him how to defend. Every time Bryan made a great pass, Stapleton would ask Baum for a high five. Every time Bryan made a steal, Baum would return the favor. As the game went on, the slaps got harder. As the slaps got harder, their hands began to hurt. "Loved that pain," Stapleton said. "Of course, Bryan wasn't the shooter that Brendan was, so the running joke became 'who taught Bryan how to shoot?' Everyone decided that must have been coach Runyon, because he couldn't shoot."
"Brendan wanted to score," Runyon said. "I never thought Bryan wanted to score. It was never on his mind. We used to practice jump ball plays. Bryan would wave me off and say 'coach, let them win the tip. I'll steal the ball. I know what they're going to do.' He was amazing."
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The Valentines night event was the 2015 Downers Grove South Hall of Fame Induction. Brendan and Bryan were being inducted as returning heroes. The proceedings were going along just fine, so fine that someone suggested the brothers each take a shot from half court. You know, see which one still had it. Brendan and Bryan looked at each other, and the memories came back. The concrete slab in the back yard with dad. The one on one match ups in practice. The scorer and the defender. The confident one and the quiet one. As the crowd roared at the request, the brothers nodded. Game on. Bryan grabbed the ball first, walked to half court, took a dribble, and let it fly.
Five seconds later, the crowd erupted. Little bother looked at his big brother and winked.
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For Brendan, it was always basketball. The family went on vacation once to San Diego, and prepared to head to the beach. Brendan wasn't interested in the beach. He wanted to play basketball, and went looking for a pickup game on a city playground. He found a game, watched, and waited for an open slot. Finally, they waved the kid in. He hit the blacktop and started draining threes. Then he started driving the lane. Nobody could stop him. His team won every game. For Brendan, the beach could wait.
Of course, Brendan still had the creative side. Jim Mizener was one of his teachers, and he very clearly remembered one of Brendan's most creative moments. "Well," Mizener said, "our seniors have a tradition of toilet papering the entire school at some point. Brendan's senior year, about 500 of them gather one night right before basketball season. The kids are all running from the scene of the crime when Brendan falls down and breaks his ankle. I can only imagine how that went down with Mr. Mullins."
Well, how did it go down?
"Not well," laughed Brendan. "Not well at all."
The smile on Bryan's face showed he was very interested in hearing more about Brendan's torture. "I want to hear this one."
Brendan knew his hand was in the cookie jar. "Well, I limp home, and I try sneaking up to my room, you know, real quiet and all. That didn't fool my dad. Next thing I know, he's in my room watching me try to wrap it. He doesn't say a word. He doesn't have to. He just gives me that Mike Mullins, and I know."
The doctor said six weeks. But when basketball practice began, Brendan Mullins was back on the floor.
And before you think Brendan was the ringleader, and quiet little Bryan was just along for the ride, coach Runyan would disagree. "Oh no, Bryan could hold his own. The year we went to the state tournament in Peoria, we are staying at a hotel along the river. There's a video arcade place way down the street. We gave the kids a curfew to be back in their rooms. Sure enough, five minutes before curfew, here they all come running full speed up the street into the hotel. They must have sprinted for miles. Bryan Mullins leading the pack."
Baum believes everything began in that backyard, on that concrete slab, with the bond between the father and the sons. Bryan's sophomore team went 24-1. In a game against Hinsdale Central, the Mustangs were short on coaches, so Baum asked Mike Mullins to volunteer to help him on the bench. With Mullins watching quietly, the Mustangs struggled, and barely lead at half. In the locker room, Baum calmly gave the team some tips. Finally, as the team was about to go back on the floor, Baum asked Mullins if he had anything to add. The quiet father looked at his son and let it rip. "That's the worst display of basketball I have ever seen! If this doesn't turn around immediately, I'm out of here! Bryan remembered that scene very well. "Let's just say my dad could express himself in certain ways. And I understood them." The one night volunteer did not have to resign. In the third quarter, the Mustangs didn't just outscore Hinsdale 20-0. Hinsdale never got off a shot. Bryan Mullins kept stealing the ball.
The pinnacle for the brothers came in the 2003 sectional against the state's top ranked team, West Aurora, a powerhouse squad with five Division 1 prospects. West Aurora had blitzed teams throughout the year with a devastating full court press. "We had one shot in that game," said Runyon. "Bryan had to handle that press, and then get the ball to Brendan who had to score. There was no other way." On cue, Bryan handled the ball the entire game, and with three minutes left, a stunned crowd saw Downers grab the lead. The packed gym was on its feet roaring.
And then.........."Well," Runyon said, "let's just say Bryan took a ball where no young man should. He went down and was in real pain. I told coach Stapleton to take him out and go get him checked out. I gathered the players in the huddle, and I figured we were toast. We could not handle their press without Bryan. No way." And then......."Well, we break the huddle I look back on the court and we've got six players out there. Bryan wouldn't come out." And then....... "Well, I will never forget the rest. The place was screaming, the clock was running, the season was on the line. You knew it was a once in a lifetime moment. And Bryan kept beating the double teams and finding Brendan. And Brendan kept burying them."
The brothers looked at each other and smiled when I relayed Runyon's account of the game. "We knew exactly what we were waking into," said Brendan. "Nobody could handle their press all year. But we had Bryan. Bryan must have broke it 100 times. And when he broke it, he broke them."
"I remember the locker room at halftime," Bryan said. "Nobody gave us a chance, but we were handling the press. I remember looking around at the coaches and players and saying ' We've got them. We can do this.'"
The box score from that game shows Downers went on a 10-0 run in those final minutes, all scored by a Mullins. Incredibly, Brendan poured in 16 points in the fourth quarter. Downers had pulled off the upset of the year.
I asked Runyon what he will always remember about the pair. "Brendan? He looks like this skinny kid, but he did it all. He could beat you so many ways. He would always find one of them." And Bryan? "Oh man. You did not want to play against him. No way. Bryan was always going to be the last guy standing."
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Following his little brother was uncharted territory to Brendan. And after watching Bryan's half court shot bank in, there was pressure. This wasn't in the backyard or in front of players and coaches. They were out in the open now, in front of hundreds of fans, and this one would be talked about at the Mullins thanksgiving table for years to come. The crowd was roaring now. Bryan, the quiet one, now had the look of a cheshire cat. Brendon took the ball, took a few dribbles, and eyed the 42 feet between him and history.
And five seconds later, the place went absolutely up for grabs.
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The brothers will lead the Salukis into battle now, Bryan at the helm, Brendan at his side. They will do it not just as brothers, but as best friends, ready for the journey of their lives. They will do it together, as one, joined at the hip as they have been since Mike Mullins poured that concrete slab. Now, they compete as one, taking over a reclamation project picked to finish in the basement of the Missouri Valley Conference. Tell them that, and watch their eyes light up.
It was time to leave. It was good to see peace in the family.
"Bob wait," Brendan said. "Did you know we hand a ping pong table in our basement. Guess how that went down?"
I stared at them and could only imagine.
"I had an awesome serve. A complete power game. I could score at will, except......."
"Except you couldn't score on me! You know I had the defense to shut your game down......"
We all laughed and shook hands. I knew what was next. The brothers would soon be looking for a ping pong table.
Wonderful article, thanks Bob. I remember reading about that game. Now I know the "rest of the story".
glad everyone is enjoying the story. please let me know if you find any dangling participles. just wanted to let everybody know that southern was extremely welcoming. bryan and brendon could not have been better. when jay baum, their sophomore coach, heard that i was digging around, he called me from his vacation in budapest to help. this is a new day. let's embrace it. go dawgs!
