I don't know if anyone beside Morgan will get much from this, but here's an e-mail I sent to my editor after tonight's Provo at Springville Region 7 boys basketball game.
Background: Chris Collinsworth is a 6-f00t-9 senior at Provo High who is signed to play at BYU. He's very thin, so in college he probably translates into a small forward. Anyway, he missed two games with a concussion, and tonight was his second game back from that injury. He and all his teammates sucked it up big-time in the first half tonight, but Collinsworth was the one who took the blame. His coach, Craig Drury, benched him for most of the second quarter and beginning of the third. The e-mail talks a lot about what Collinsworth did on defense, but my story for the newspaper talked about how, "Over the final five minutes of the third quarter, Provo turned a six-point deficit into a 33-27 lead as Collinsworth scored five points and collected three steals, three rebounds and two assists." And now the e-mail to my editor:
"In any event, wanted to tell you just how absolutely dominant Collinsworth was. Collinsworth's cousin is one of my best friends, a guy I went to law school with, and so for three years now I've had to listen to the cousin talk my ear off about Collinsworth. I'd previously seen him play three or four times , but it wasn't until tonight that I was blown away by Chris Collinsworth. I wish I had 600 words for my story to give all the details about the game-changing things he did...it was so night-and-day from the first half to the second.
"Collinsworth sleep-walked his way to scoring one point in the first half. Drury benched him before they'd gotten midway through the second quarter. The Provo offense was out of sorts, scoring six points and collecting a single field goal in the second quarter. And when Collinsworth didn't come out to start the third quarter, I thought for sure he was hurt or something. Well lo and behold, he came back into the game two minutes into the third quarter.
"Provo was down 25-19 with five minutes to go in the third. From that point, here is a breakdown of Springville's next six possessions:
--missed shot; Collinsworth rebound.
--Collinsworth steal.
--Collinsworth steal.
--Collinsworth steal; Collinsworth gets assist on ensuing fast break.
--Eaton gets fouled, goes to line, makes both free throws.
--missed shot; Collinsworth rebound, Collinsworth gets assist on long outlet pass to teammate under basket for easy layup.
"And that's not even taking into account how his presence on offense gave Provo a rhythm it had been lacking while he was on the bench. They scored 15 points before halftime, and then 18 in each of the third and fourth quarters.
"Bottom line: he didn't have it until tonight, but my hypothetical vote for Utah Valley MVP would go to Chris Collinsworth.
"Note: I felt so bad for Preston Eaton tonight. I mean, the kid was just grinding the whole game, but he had so little in the way of a supporting cast. I let my mind wander, thinking about what might have been if Collinsworth had in fact attended Springville and he and Eaton had been able to play together for three years. Now that would have been fun to watch!"
"Collinsworth sleep-walked his way to scoring one point in the first half. Drury benched him before they'd gotten midway through the second quarter. The Provo offense was out of sorts, scoring six points and collecting a single field goal in the second quarter. And when Collinsworth didn't come out to start the third quarter, I thought for sure he was hurt or something. Well lo and behold, he came back into the game two minutes into the third quarter.
"Provo was down 25-19 with five minutes to go in the third. From that point, here is a breakdown of Springville's next six possessions:
--missed shot; Collinsworth rebound.
--Collinsworth steal.
--Collinsworth steal.
--Collinsworth steal; Collinsworth gets assist on ensuing fast break.
--Eaton gets fouled, goes to line, makes both free throws.
--missed shot; Collinsworth rebound, Collinsworth gets assist on long outlet pass to teammate under basket for easy layup.
"And that's not even taking into account how his presence on offense gave Provo a rhythm it had been lacking while he was on the bench. They scored 15 points before halftime, and then 18 in each of the third and fourth quarters.
"Bottom line: he didn't have it until tonight, but my hypothetical vote for Utah Valley MVP would go to Chris Collinsworth.
"Note: I felt so bad for Preston Eaton tonight. I mean, the kid was just grinding the whole game, but he had so little in the way of a supporting cast. I let my mind wander, thinking about what might have been if Collinsworth had in fact attended Springville and he and Eaton had been able to play together for three years. Now that would have been fun to watch!"
The last thing I want to add is what his coach had to say about it. I was surprised to see a coach throwing his star player under the bus like this, but in all fairness the coach's tactics worked to perfection as Collinsworth was a monster once he got back in the game.
“(Collinsworth) sat a couple of games with an injury, and we’re just trying to get him back into what his job is,” Provo coach Craig Drury said. “He was running around out there with not going where he was supposed to be going. He’s a great player and he’s a difference-maker, and that’s the problem is he wasn’t making a difference because he was lost. He was just out of sync, so we had to get him on both ends of the floor back into sync.”
If you want to read the whole story, go to the Deseret News website. I'm afraid if I put it up here that I'll get busted. But if one of you wants to put it up, well, techincally there's nothing little old me can do to stop y'all.
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