K.C. Johnson is a sportswriter for the Chicago Tribune and currently covers the Chicago Bulls, and their rising star, Derrick Rose. Rose is something of a hometown hero, where he led his high school, Simeon from the Chicago Public League, to a state championship. After a year at Memphis, the Bulls made him the number one pick in the NBA draft. Coincidentally, he wears #1 on his jersey for the Bulls. In high school, he wore #25, a number his high school will assign only as a tribute to their best players.

25 years ago this week, K.C. Johnson was a high school senior in Evanston, Illinois. He played basketball at Evanston and his team was practicing for a tournament in Rockford where they would tip-off the season against defending state champs Simeon high school. That game would be a rematch of the state finals played earlier in the year in which Simeon had ended Evanston's quest for a perfect season and a state championship. Simeon entered the new season as the state's top ranked basketball program, with the top player in the country, Ben Wilson, who wore jersey #25.

I was in the grocery store last Sunday morning and picked-up a Chicago Tribune looking for the sports section. When I peeled back the first couple of sections and got to the sports, my heart skipped a beat. I saw the picture above the fold and I knew that face and that smile immediately. It was a picture of young Ben Wilson and a story by K.C. Johnson.

You can read his story here.

It was a Tuesday afternoon, November 20, 1984 and I was back at my apartment after my college classes when I heard a news report on the radio about a shooting near a Chicago high school. The facts and confirmations began to roll in, backing up the "reports" that the victim was high school basketball star Ben Wilson. He lingered for 18 hours after the shooting before passing early the next morning.

I never met Ben Wilson. I saw him play ball. More than once. Beginning his freshman year and for the two years after that. If you asked for the five best high school basketball players I ever saw in the state of Illinois, he'd be at or near the top of the list. That's pretty good company considering Quinn Buckner, Doug Collins, Mark Aguire, Eddie Johnson, Isaiah Thomas, Tim Hardaway, and Ben's teammate at Simeon, Nick Anderson are all pretty good candidates for that list. And that only takes you through the 1970's and part of the '80's. He was unreal. 6-8 and slender, but he could dribble the ball and play facing the basket. He had a smooth, sound shooting stroke and could play outside. He had a nose for the ball and wasn't afraid to play the low post. He hustled from one end of the floor to the other. And that's what I remember from his JUNIOR year. He never got his senior year.

It's not his unrealized potential as a basketball player that troubles me. Well, it did when I was younger and more selfish. Damn, I wanted to see him play in college. It's been 25 years since his death and his basketball days would be well behind him by now. He deserved to have his life unfold like everyone else...as does anyone who fell victim to a shooting, especially at that age.

Comcast Sportsnet Chicago produced a special program about Ben Wilson which they'll air this Friday night.

This is one of those "innocence lost" moments in my life. I love high school and college basketball. The promise of a new season. The excitement of a tournament at the end of the year. And every year at this time, when the colleges get underway and high schools announce the pairings for their Thanksgiving tournaments, I remember hearing the news about Ben Wilson.

tony b.