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Staying Course Pays Off

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By CARTER GADDIS

The Tampa Tribune

Published: March 19, 2008

TAMPA - Courtney Lee just wanted to go home. His mom, his brothers, the familiarity of big-city Indianapolis, the things closest to his heart - these were what he missed when he first set foot on the Western Kentucky campus as a freshman in 2004.

Bowling Green, Ky., home of the Hilltoppers, was fine for some. And Lee was more than grateful Coach Darrin Horn thought enough of him as runner-up for Indiana's Mr. Basketball award to offer a scholarship when the home-state powers at Purdue and Indiana did not.

"When I first got here, it was a case of homesickness," Lee said. "Coming from a big city to Bowling Green, that was a big adjustment."

The phone calls, begging for his mom to jump in the car to come and get him, to let him transfer to a school closer to home, started almost from Day One.

"As you can imagine," Horn said, "that created quite an alarm for us."

Horn and the Hilltoppers need not have worried. Those phone calls were short, as was Mom's answer:

No.

Four years later, Lee will participate in his first NCAA Tournament with No. 12 seed Western Kentucky against No. 5 seed Drake in a first-round, West Region game Friday at the St. Pete Times Forum.

The 6-foot-5, 200-pound swingman will do so as the player with more career points (2,176) than anyone in the NCAA Tournament field. He'll do so as the second-leading scorer in Western Kentucky history, behind only Jim McDaniels (2,238), who led the Hilltoppers to their only Final Four appearance in 1971.

And Lee will do so knowing his 20.4 scoring average and status as the Sun Belt Conference Player of the Year will make him a marked man on the court.

"We're going to have our hands full trying to contain him," said Drake coach Keno Davis, who was struck by Lee's athleticism and skill without the basketball when he began watching Western Kentucky game film Sunday night after the tournament pairings were announced.

"It's kind of our philosophy with the best player ... you just can't take that away, but you don't want him to be the difference in the game where he's able to beat you single-handedly. So, we'll try to mold our scouting report, obviously, with an eye on where he is on the court at all times."

That's fine with Lee, whose willingness this season to embrace the role of on-court leader - the go-to guy in every situation - has elevated him to a potential first-round NBA draft pick.

"When a team's going to come out and try to stop me or contain me, that sets it up for my teammates," Lee said. "They'll do their thing, and it gives us the chance to prove their scouting wrong."

That's the senior leader talking, talking about team.

Talking like Danny Rumph might have talked to a homesick WKU freshman four years ago.

It was Rumph, a junior guard on the Hilltoppers' 2004-05 team, who took Lee under his wing and showed him how good life could be in Bowling Green. It was Rumph who became surrogate big brother when Lee's two actual big brothers were far away.

On May 9, 2005, Lee found out by cell phone his surrogate big brother had died because of an enlarged heart during a pickup basketball game back home in Philadelphia.

No. Not Danny. How could he be gone? How can life go on?

But he was gone. And that's what life does: It goes on.

"Since the time has passed, I learned to deal with it and cope with it," Lee said. "I look at him as another set of eyes watching over me."

Rumph's image and jersey No. 11 are etched in a tattoo on Lee's arm. He has dedicated his achievements to the memory of his friend, but Horn sees more than that.

"It was almost ironic that his heart is what killed Danny, because he poured his heart out every day," Horn said. "It didn't matter what we were doing, individual instruction, shooting drill, he brought it. And that was not something that Courtney did very well, in all honesty, early on.

"I think in a lot of ways, he's taken that experience and the memory of Danny and he's used it to grow and strengthen himself."

It has all led to this weekend at the Forum.

"To come to Western Kentucky as a freshman," Lee said, "not familiar with the area, just playing here for four years, developing as a person and a character, going to the tournament as a senior, I couldn't ask for anything better."

Reporter Carter Gaddis can be reached at (813) 259-8291 or igaddis@tampatrib.com.

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