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Khrystopher Lawson - He got college game
Tracy High and Tracy Outlawz point guard to run the floor on the next level...please select the title to get the link of the article.
Terrance Jones - Making the Grade
Making the grade
Chris Roberts / Tracy Press / Tuesday, 15 January 2008
Hitting the books gave West’s Jones the chance to shine on the court.
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Jones wasn’t eligible to play sports at West until this academic year, after he made up two years of high school over the summer and posted a 3.0 grade-point average in the first quarter. Press file photo.Playing basketball was always important to Terrance Jones.
But so was school — even as he teetered on the brink of flunking out of West High.
Now, after making up two years of credits in a few months of summer school, after posting a 3.0 GPA in the first quarter — making the senior academically eligible for sports for the first time — and after leading the Wolf Pack in scoring with 17.4 points per game headed into tonight’s Tri-City Athletic League opener?
Now, he’s got both.
Jones, 17, played AAU ball for the Tracy Flight (now the Outlawz) since his eighth-grade year at Monte Vista. But never for the Wolf Pack. He always said he would, but the grades were never there.
“I finally came to my senses or whatever — it was just like a switch came on. I didn’t want to be a high school dropout,” he said Tuesday, minutes after finishing practice and minutes before heading to a night class. “Freshman and sophomore year, a lot of people wanted me to make the team, I was like, ‘OK, I’ll do it, I’ll do it,’ but I never did it. I had a lot of doubters. … People were like, ‘You did it three years in a row — now you’re probably not going to do it.’”
His Saturday-school hours neared the century mark, and attendance was an issue. Not entirely his fault — in the middle of 10 children, he’d sometimes stay home from school to watch his younger brothers and sisters while his single mother worked. Still, it took a toll on his report card and on his after-school life.
Finally, he approached his AAU coaches last spring and asked for help.
“He said, ‘I want to graduate on time with my class.’ That was the main thing,” said Charles Roth, Jones’s AAU coach since that eighth-grade year. “His focus was to graduate — and with the grades to graduate, he became eligible to play basketball.”
Roth and his wife, Jane Fass, took it upon themselves to adopt Jones academically, a project which quickly required 12-hour days or longer.
From then until now, they’ve picked Jones up at his house to get to West in time for the 7 a.m. zero period, brought him home in the afternoons or driven him to practice and to night classes.
Just by physically being in school, Jones’ grades started to climb at the end of his junior year. Seeing that improvement, he was allowed to join West at Delta College’s summer league — where he got even more incentive to improve from Mustangs coach Brian Katz.
“I didn’t even think I’d ever be able to go to college because of my grades,” Jones said. “Then coach Katz said, ‘If you do good and get the grades, you can come play here.’ That motivated me a lot.”
So did the 3.0, which is the best he’s ever done in school. So did giving the Wolf Pack skill and athleticism they didn’t think they’d have. And so will walking with his class in June, coming back from the brink to graduate on time.
“You don’t see kids turn it around that much, that fast, very often,” West coach Steve Thornton said. “It just goes to show what kids can do.”
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written by Cresha , January 16, 2008
Error in article above: "...the Tracy Flight (now the Outlawz)." Tracy Flight and Tracy Outlawz has no affilation. They are two different organizations.
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written by Cresha , January 16, 2008
Congratulations Terrance on a job well done. Char
Khrys Lawson - Hard Work on the Hard Court
Hard work on the hard court
Chris Roberts / Tracy Press / Tuesday, 15 January 2008
Summer regimen springs Tracy High’s Lawson from scrub to starter.
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Lawson spent most of his first two years on the bench before a dedicated summer 2006 boosted his skills enough to earn him the starting point guard position, a role he’s held ever since. Press file photo.Not everyone can be the guy.
In sports, it’s usually fairly obvious fairly soon who’s going to be the superstar and who’s going to be the scrub. That seemed to be the case with Tracy’s Khrys Lawson, who rode the pine much of his freshman and sophomore seasons, spending most of the time watching while the Bullpups took the 2005-06 sophomore title.
“It was hard for me,” he said. “Basketball is ... my passion.
It’s what I like to do.”
But then something happened. Lawson spent the summer between his sophomore and junior seasons in the gym, playing as much basketball as he could. He went to camps. He lifted weights. He worked on his ballhandling.
He showed up to varsity tryouts in November, and there it was: As the 2006-07 Bulldogs put together an 7-3 San Joaquin Athletic Association season, Lawson was somebody he didn’t expect to be.
He was the guy, beating out the returning senior to spend his junior year out on the court.
“He was our ironman point guard,” Tracy coach Paul Demsher said during Tuesday’s practice.
“He really wanted to be the guy his junior year, and his hard work paid off.
“And, to be honest, he’s the guy we can’t do without for very long.”
Well-known on campus — he was named homecoming king in October — Lawson does it all on the court for Tracy. He’s only 5-foot-7, but he’s led the ’Dogs in rebounding many nights. And even though he’s not a pure scorer — and even though he’s been slowed by a broken wrist he suffered the day before tryouts — he’s still put up 10 or more points six times to rank second on the team behind shooting guard Nate Brown.
On top of that, he has the proverbial “it” that can’t be taught: When he leads, others follow.
“He’s one of the players you listen to,” said junior guard Preston Mattos, who first played with Lawson back at the Tracy Boys and Girls Clubs when they were grade-schoolers.
Lawson isn’t shy about speaking up, either. Before Demsher reaches the locker room at halftime, Lawson is there talking to the team. He has the ability and authority to speak to the big men as well as the guards.
“He’s a veteran — he’s consistent,” Mattos added. “He knows what he’s talking about.”
This past summer, Lawson found different ways to improve his game. He went to three weeklong camps, played AAU with the Tracy Outlawz and took his game to the parks in San Leandro, near Brown’s mother’s house.
“You play the older guys who are stronger and have more knowledge of the game, and they try to manipulate you,” he said. “They make you do the things they know you’re going to do because you’re young.”
Lawson’s probably not the team’s star — that’d be Brown — and he’ll never be the flashiest guy out on the court. But that’s OK.
“I just want to help my team get to Arco (Arena, the site of the CIF Sac-Joaquin Section Division I finals),” he said.
“I just want us to win.”
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written by fletcher , January 16, 2008
Great Article however a few corrections should be noted. Khrys did not sit on the bench during his entire Sophomore year. It was not until he began to start during the Sophmore year that the Sophomore team began to win and took 1st in their division that year.
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written by mendoza , January 16, 2008
Great Ball Player!
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