FBBC on losing end of NCAA scoring record: Jack Taylor was given the green light to shoot his way out of a slump

My father would have said of Taylor, “He didn’t shoot the ball unless he had it.” :) The old record was held by Bevo Francis of Rio Grande College, Ohio, who in 1954 scored 113 points against Hillsdale College. Bevo, of course, did not have the advantage of the three point shot. I’d say that Jack Taylor’s slump is over.

It´s crazy that a player from Faith had 70, and that was still about half the point total of the game’s top scorer.

“It felt like anything I tossed up was going in,” Taylor told The Associated Press.

Dude, you missed 56 shots in one game. That’s a bad game for a college basketball team, much less a single player.

This is why you don’t live by your feelings.

The quietest 70 points in college basketball history

The player from a winless college in Ankeny, Iowa, was about to conduct a two-hour, personal layup clinic to break his school’s record in the 179-104 loss. For Larson, it was cardiovascular boot camp — in high-top sneakers. Layups sound easy, right? Well, they are … until you try to score 33 of them. “You get really tired,” Larson said of facing Grinnell, which uses a record-setting system that switches player lineups in shifts like an NHL line change. “That’s a lot of running.” Do you try that many layups during pregame warm-ups? “No.” Do you run that many in practice? “No.” Larson said he ran more short-court sprints at the basket Tuesday night than all the sprinting during an entire practice. … The 70 points were built on 34 of 44 shooting, with 66 of those points on layups. He added two free throws and one jump shot — “baseline, about 10 to 15 feet, I guess” — to round out a school record night for both teams. Then, showcasing one more bit of hustle, he ran from the spotlight. “He’s a shy kid. He would never want the publicity,” said Faith Baptist coach and athletics director Brian Fincham, who said Larson turned down other interview requests before agreeing to one from The Des Moines Register. “He’s a great kid. Hard worker. We love having him around.” When the telephone call neared its end, Larson was asked if the morning after a record-setting game made him feel sore, tired or simply ready to head home to Owatonna, Minn., for Thanksgiving. “All of the above,” he said. … Almost all wanted to talk about Taylor and his mind-numbing 138 points. Grinnell’s scoring machine appeared on the Today show and Good Morning America as NBA megastar Kobe Bryant weighed in via ESPN. Meanwhile, someone scored 70 points — almost, it seemed, in a whisper. “It was kind of shocking, especially at the beginning,” Larson said. “You gotta experience it, I guess. “It still kind of feels surreal being in the middle of it.”

138 Points, 108 Shots and a Debate About a Record

The national conversation was more deeply layered, with many questioning why an individual would attempt so many shots in a game that was clearly not a contest, and whether Grinnell’s style of play makes the record dubious. Since 1993, the Pioneers have employed a frantic, all-out scoring system that employs a 40-minute full-court press, hockey-like line shifts and rapid shooting, with the intention of scoring as much and as quickly as possible.

Owatonna native scores 70 over-shadowed points

Several writers around the country have postulated that Larson actually out-played Taylor, but Taylor was the one who received all the headlines. In an ESPN online poll, 51 percent of voters said Taylor’s performance was actually bad for basketball, the reasoning being that chucking 3-pointers when your team is leading by 70 points isn’t usually considered good sportsmanship.

138 points in a game: Where’s the embarrassment?

I grew up in the Middle West playing basketball at a prep school that often competed against tiny rural high schools to get ready for our games in an interstate league. When it came to running up the score, there was a code our coaches enforced.
With a big lead, we slowed the game down. We stopped taking long shots that would get our supporters cheering, and with the game in hand, we brought in the second team, and after them, anyone still on the bench.
When we left the gym, we wanted the other team to feel good about having played us. We didn’t want their players hanging their heads in embarrassment, especially if we had a game scheduled with them for the following year.
We knew these unspoken rules by 16. How could college players not know as much as we did as teenagers? Maybe it’s the times. But I wish that the Grinnell players had had my old coach, who doubled as my math teacher. Coach would have made their ears burn for showing up an opponent as they did.