Before the glory: The ABA, Game 7s and pickup ball

EAGLE-VAIL - Before he wore Battle Mountain black and gold, Trent Beckely was a short kid, sometimes assigned to the Minturn Middle School B-team. The then-taller Derek Rush was playing Game 7 of the NBA finals in his driveway copious times.

Connor Drumm, well, he wasn't short, but he grew up in a basketball family. His dad, Bruce, played in college, and Connor watched his siblings, Ryan and Erin, play Battle Mountain basketball. Pickup games in Minturn were the norm for T.J. Montoya, while Kyle Leffler and Josh Ruark battled it out during lunch at Berry Creek Middle School.

And the coach? Well, Philip Tronsrue cut his teeth by going to ABA games with his father, watching the memorable red, white and blue ball of that era twirl through the air.

Battle Mountain boys' basketball has finally achieved prominence this year with a league championship, a Sweet 16 appearance tonight at 7:45 against Evergreen at Mesa State College in Grand Junction, and a sparkling 21-2 mark.

But this all started a long time ago for all of the Huskies. It takes a passion to play basketball at Battle Mountain. This is not exactly Indiana - skiing and hockey runs in the blood, not hoops.

"I think the guys here love basketball as much as they love anything else," Tronsrue said. "The deal is there's a lot of diversity up here. There's a lot of interests pulling at you. There are other sports that tug at different athletes. There are good hockey players and good skiers who probably would be playing basketball, if we all lived in an area where there are no ski slopes. But that's the way it is."

And so the fire was stoked by watching and imitating basketball legends, pick-up games and a rivalry between two middle schools.



Spencer Haywood

Growing up in Aurora, Tronsrue's love of basketball started in Delmar Park and the Denver Auditorium Arena. He went out and played at Delmar Park as a kid before the big boys took the court at night.

But there were also the fledgling Denver Rockets of the American Basketball Association, the precursor to today's Nuggets. His father took him to Rockets games, including the debut of Spencer Haywood, who in 1969 made the then-unheard-of move from being a college freshman at Detroit to the pros.

"My dad took me down to the old ABA, and watched the Denver Rockets down at the Auditorium Arena," the coach said. "We went to every home game. I saw the first game of Spencer Haywood, the first underclassman to come out. I just watched some incredible basketball in the ABA."

And the ABA's signature red, white and blue ball was a regular part of young Tronsrue's life.

"I loved the red, white and blue ball. I had a brand-new one almost every year," Tronsrue said. "I loved how when you got nice rotation on it, it was nothing but white."



Game 7

Like their coach, the Huskies played ball whenever and wherever they could.

Derek Rush had a 20-by-20 foot court in his backyard.

"I had my own hoop in my back yard when I was 9 or 10," Rush said. "My mom had someone make a cement block, so it was pretty sweet. We set it at 8 feet and dunked it.

"We'd always try to re-enact Michael Jordan or I was David Robinson, whoever was hot at the time. We'd try to shoot like him or dunk like him."

As any kid does in his or her favorite sport, these Huskies always imagined being the hero. On those small courts, guys like Rush and Connor Drumm have a lot of experience in Game 7 of the NBA Finals.

"I'd just count down from five, put on a move and pull up for the jump shot," Drumm said.

Of course, when a kid misses the shot in that hypothetical situation, he was fouled, completely hacked.

"I wouldn't go in until I made it, shooting free throws until I made it," Drumm said.

"We'd have games, shoot around, all of it," said T.J. Montoya of his court in Minturn. "I'd have some friends over playing pickup games. It would get pretty late. We'd always make situations up. We tried until made it."



Growing up

It should come as no surprise - and we're sure it was a relief to Sally Beckley - that Trent did not pop out of the womb at 6-foot-6. In fact, Beckley didn't sprout until ninth grade.

"I was always waiting to grow," Beckley said. "I knew (my older brother), Beau, was tall."

So when the Minturn Middle School Patriots, essentially your 2006 Huskies with the exception of Leffler, Ruark and Clark Simmons, got together in 2002 as eighth graders, Rush was actually taller than the future Huskies center and Montoya was the same size.

"It was just weird to think that I was once the same size as him. Now, he's twice as big as me," Montoya joked.

While Beckley physically grew, Drumm grew with the game through family. The physical skills were there. He was 6-foot-2 by ninth grade. The love of the game was developed courtside.

"I started off in High Country Hoops with Trent. T.J. was on that team, a couple other guys," Drum said. "It started there. When my brother and sister were in high school, I always went to their games. I got real interested in it."

A rivalry

While most of the future Huskies were at Minturn, a trio were at Berry Creek. Leffler, who dubbed Simmons, "Clark the Shark" at the time, and Ruark hit the court at recess.

"It was fun to play outside at lunch every day with a bunch of kids," Leffler said. "We'd always be playing. It was real competitive for that age. I just remember playing with Josh. He was good. We were about equal."

What was not was when Minturn Middle and Berry Creek met on the court.

"It was fun, but it sucked because we always got beat by Minturn. I can work all of them now," Leffler said with a smile.



Sports Editor Chris Freud can be reached at 949-0555, ext. 14630 or cfreud@vaildaily.com.

Vail, Colorado