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SF David Lighty (Most Career Buckeye Wins, ASVEL Lyon-Villeurbanne Basket - France)

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12/8/05

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[FONT=arial,sans-serif]Monday, December 05, 2005[/FONT]

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[FONT=arial,sans-serif]Who are the Torch Bearers?
Well, now that helmets and shoulder pads are locked away for the winter, it's time to move from the frozen tundra of area gridirons to inside to where it's warm, loud, and fast-paced. The basketball season is upon us and this past weekend we got an early glimpse at some of the top teams and players in Northeast Ohio.

While the area has and will always be considered a football hotbed, the local hardwood has seen some superb players over the years. Looking back, Northeast Ohio has produced such future collegiate and pro stars such as Earl Boykins (Cleveland Central Catholic), Melvin Levett (Euclid), Damon Stringer (Cleveland Heights), Sam Clancy & Steve Logan (St. Edward) and of course, LeBron James (Akron St. Vincent-St. Mary). The list could go on. But enough of the past. Who is going to carry the torch and become the next great player to hail from the area?

Well, the list is extensive. There is a plethora of talent on the courts this season and several names have been mentioned when talking about the state's best. But this season, being among the best in the state just isn't good enough. We have players that are among the best in the country.

I would be remiss if I didn't start with Solon's dominating big man, Dallas Lauderdale. The 6'9" center/power forward has been a force since freshman year and has become one of the top recruits in the country. According to several recruiting sites, Lauderdale is among the top 25 players in the country for the class of 2007. That's right, he's is only a junior. Lauderdale has a great frame (235 lbs.) that he utilizes very well. With a superb combination of height, bulk and natural athleticism, it easy to see why Lauderdale has caught the attention of most of the major collegiate basketball programs in the country. He has reportedly already been offered by Ohio State and Syracuse.

Next, but certainly not least, is Villa Angela-St. Joseph senior star David Lighty. A 6'5" swingman, Lighty has already announced his intention to become a member of the "Thad Five" at Ohio State. Lighty, the #2 ranked prospect in Ohio and 21st ranked prospect in the country for the class of 2006, will join the top-ranked prospect in the country Greg Oden and top-ranked prospect in Ohio, Daequan Cook, in forming the likely #1 recruiting class in the country. Lighty is a player that can do a bit of everything. He is an accomplished scorer, but is fully capable of running the point or even banging with the big boys down low. He is the reigning Plain Dealer Player of the Year and should be considered a favorite to repeat the honor.
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12/27/05

Injury doesn't derail Lighty's rise
Ohio St.-bound guard returns to tournament

David Lighty is set to make his STOP-DWI Holiday Classic curtain call with one highly visible addition to his on-court arsenal.


Ohio State University-bound Lighty and mates from Villa Angela-St. Joseph in Cleveland will take on Friendly High of Fort Washington, Md., in an attractive opening-round matchup at 7:30 Tuesday night.

When Broome County spectators last had a look at Lighty, he was dicing Binghamton defenders for 27 points in the third-place game of the 2004 STOP-DWI Holiday Classic.

In that contest, Villa Angela-St. Joseph rolled to an 83-53 victory after following the early lead of 6-foot-5 Lighty, who rang up 17 first-quarter points including a dunk in transition that made for a 21-2 Vikings lead. He added 14 rebounds and six assists against the Patriots.

This time around, Lighty will take the floor with a bulky brace extending from thigh to shin on his right leg, protecting his knee in the wake of an anterior cruciate ligament tear that cut short his junior season during last season's playoffs.

He sustained the injury midway through the third quarter of a district playoff game, though went on to finish the game.

"No one knew it. He had a heck of a ballgame, woke up the next day and the knee was about the size of a watermelon," said Vikings coach Dave Wojciechowski.

He underwent surgery March 28 and following the lengthy rehabilitation process was released in mid-October to go full-speed. As for his present condition, Wojciechowski said: "We'll take him.

"It's been a month-and-a-half after nine months off, but I think he'll be fine. I think you''ll see the real David Lighty again when he gets to Buckeye Land.
"He's there in spurts, just not as consistently. He still gets up, still has that explosiveness — he's still pretty darn good."

Through four games, Lighty has averaged about 20 points per game for Villa Angela-St. Joseph, which won its first three before dropping a four-point game Friday night to St. Vincent-St. Mary in a game pitting two of the most highly regarded teams in Northeast Ohio.

Lighty scored 20 to go with seven rebounds in that game, but his team was an icy 12-for-26 from the free throw line.

Lighty tested the reconstructed knee for the first time in earnest on Dec. 9, when the Vikings played host to neighboring rival Euclid before about 2,000 spectators shoehorned into Villa Angela-St. Joseph's gymnasium — an attendance figure that reminded locals of the days when Clark Kellogg wore a Vikings uniform.

In the role of point guard, Lighty closed with 19 points, 10 assists, five rebounds and three steals while playing every minute of a 76-73 overtime victory. Villa-Angela-St. Joseph had a 15-point first-half lead, but neither side led by more than five after halftime.

Lighty is part of an Ohio State recruiting class that is being compared to Michigan's "Fab Five" of 1991 — Chris Webber, Juwan Howard, Jalen Rose, Jimmy King and Ray Jackson.

Also heading to Columbus, Ohio, for the 2006-07 school year will be Greg Oden, a 7-foot center from Indianapolis considered the No. 1 player in the nation; Mike Conley, Oden's point guard at Lawrence North High; Dayton Dunbar's Daequan Cook, a 6-4 guard; and Othello Hunter, a 6-9 forward who'll transfer from Hillsborough Community College in Tampa, Fla.

Villa Angela-St. Joseph's cast also features 6-5 senior Daryl Rushton, a 10-point, 10-rebound guy; Jimmy McLeod, who's averaged 12 points and nine rebounds; and sophomore-on-the-rise Ashen Ward.

Lighty opened last year's STOP-DWI Holiday Classic by scoring 22 of his team's 52 points in a two-point squeeze past Hopkinsville, Ky., then had 28 points, eight rebounds and three steals in a seven-point loss to St. Raymond's in the semifinal round.

Similar production may be necessary in Tuesday's opener against a Friendly High squad featuring 6-foot-9, 235-pound Augustus Gilchrist and 6-6, East Carolina University-bound Hillary Hailey.

Binghamton wouldn't get a second crack at VA-SJ and Lighty unless both were to advance to Thursday's championship game.

Wojciechowski said his school accepted an invitation to return to the tournament in January, following initial discussions that took place before the contingent departed Binghamton last December.
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At The STOP-DWI Holiday Classic this week, Lighty performed well, he was named to the All-Tournament Team..

ALL-TOURNAMENT TEAM
•MVP— Heath White (Taft)
•Chase Straw (Franklin County)
•David Lighty (Villa Angela-St. Joseph)
•Darryl Rushton (Villa Angela-St. Joseph)
•Brandon Romain (Xaverian)
•Monsonna Torbert (Taft)
•Eddie Gray (Taft)
•Horace Fields (Landstown)
•Brandon Russ (Taft)
•Percy Harvin (Landstown)
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1/7/06

OSU recruits Cook, Lighty to face off in future home

Saturday, January 07, 2006




Ohio State basketball recruits Daequan Cook of Dayton Dunbar and David Lighty of Cleveland Villa Angela-St. Joseph will go head-to-head Jan. 16 in Value City Arena when their teams play in the Martin Luther King Day Challenge.

The game is scheduled for 4:30 p.m. The schools’ juniorvarsity teams will play at 3 p.m.
All tickets are general admission and are $7 apiece. They are available at the Schottenstein Center box office or at Ticketmaster outlets, ticketmaster.com or by calling 614-431-3600.
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Scout $

1/8/06

Lighty is averaging 20.7 and (as mentioned earlier) had 28 in a 65-57 win over St. Peter Chanel.

Merged the four Lighty threads together...the original basketball one, the football one, and two other threads that were just floating around when you did a search for "Lighty"...that should clean things up a bit.
 
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1/13/06

VASJ star guard David Lighty was in the national media spotlight this past week.

The senior was featured on the cover of School Sports Magazine and was mentioned in a Sports Illustrated story on OSU coach Thad Matta and the incoming freshman class that includes Lighty, Daequan Cook, Mike Conley Jr. and reigning national player of the year Greg Oden.
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1/15/06





Midseason Awards

This weekend marks the midpoint of the high school basketball season. It has been an exciting season thus far, with plenty of teams and players in northeast Ohio making a name for themselves.

Without further ado, here are my picks for the area's top teams and players as we prepare for the backstrech of the season.


F David Lighty, VASJ.

Part of the "Thad Five," OSU's fantastic 2006 recruiting class, Lighty has shown no effects from his ACL surgery during the offseason.




 
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Ohio State 'can wait'

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1/16/06

Lighty and Cook are more concerned with getting a win today, when VASJ faces 9-2 Dayton Dunbar


Daequan Cook and David Lighty have squared off on the basketball court in Columbus before.

Today's meeting between the No. 1- and No. 2-ranked seniors in the state, and two-fifths of the vaunted Ohio State recruiting class dubbed the Thad Five, comes with just a little more fanfare than the AAU battle two summers ago.

Lighty will lead Villa Angela-St. Joseph (7-2) against Cook and Dayton Dunbar (9-2) in a premier nonconference matchup of two state-ranked teams at Value City Arena on the OSU campus.

It will be the first meeting on the hardwood for Lighty and Cook since an AAU game in Columbus the summer before their junior seasons, and the first time the two storied high school programs have played since a state semifinal won by the Wolverines in Dayton in 1987.

The two did not face off last summer as Lighty was rehabilitating from a torn ACL in his right knee suffered in the district final against Chanel in March.

And unless Ohio State coach Thad Matta wants to pit two-fifths of the incoming Thad Five against one another in practice, it will be the last time Lighty and Cook will be opponents.

So what better place for two of the Buckeye State's best to have their one and only head-to-head high school meeting in the very building where Matta hopes to see them working together for the next several years.

Matta's vaunted recruiting class also includes Indianapolis Lawrence North teammates Greg Oden, a 7-foot center regarded as the top high school player in the country, and 6-1 guard Mike Conley. The fifth member of the group is Othello Hunter, a 6-9 forward/center from Hillsborough Community College in Tampa, Fla.

"Hopefully, this game will be something for us to talk about when we are at Ohio State next year," Lighty said. "I'm really excited to go down to play at OSU, but I am trying not to feel any pressure, and I am sure Daequan feels the same. He has proven how good a player he is, and when he gets started, he is tough to stop. I am just going to try to play my best and play hard and hopefully help my team get a win."

Today's VASJ-Dayton Dunbar clash is a glimpse into the future of OSU men's basketball.

Just don't call it a showdown between the pair of Mr. Ohio finalists from a year ago.

Lighty and Cook - both ranked among the top 25 prospects nationally as well - feel as though they have nothing left to prove, and they simply are heading to Columbus this afternoon to win a high school basketball game.
The OSU talk and the individual comparisons can take a back seat for 32 minutes. Winning is the most important thing this afternoon.

"I'm trying to treat it as just another game," Cook said. "I am going there to try to win a game, and I hope my teammates are with me doing the same.

"People know what Dave's capable of, and they know what I'm capable of, so even if one of us has a bad game, it shouldn't matter. I don't look at it as me against him. What is important is that we go get a win. All the college stuff can wait until I am done with my high school career."

While the outcome shouldn't drastically affect either team's ranking in the state polls (Dayton Dunbar fifth in Division II and VASJ seventh in D-III) and it has no bearing on a conference race or postseason seeding, it is hard to imagine it as just another game.

It's not often teams get the opportunity to play regular-season games at Division I college venues such as the home of the Buckeyes. VASJ coach Dave Wojciechowski recognizes the matchup is not only a chance for OSU fans to see two members of the Thad Five, but a chance for the Vikings to measure themselves against one of the top teams in Ohio.

"They are a talented team, and we have some talent, but obviously Dave and Daequan being on the same floor playing against each other adds a little more juice," Wojciechowski said. "Dave's going to be Dave, and Daequan is going to be Daequan, but the supporting casts for both teams are going to be huge. We have to have other guys step up and have big games. But it should be a great weekend overall."

Lighty is hoping the trip to Value City Center is a weekend the Vikings can repeat in late March.

While Cook helped lead Dayton Dunbar to the Division II state semifinals played there last season, Lighty has never made it to the Division III final four in his first three seasons with the Vikings. So it is easy to understand why the 6-foot-5 guard would like today's game not to be his last on OSU's home floor until he is wearing the scarlet and gray next year.

"This is where the Final Four is played, so hopefully we can get back here," Lighty said. "It's real big for us to play well and for the goal to return. It will be good preparing us for the tournament and should help further down the road."

Preparing for a player like Cook is not easy, even though Lighty has checked the 6-4 shooting guard before in AAU games. He said the matchups were pretty even, and he thinks their games are similar, although Lighty said Cook has a better jump shot and he is a little better post-up player.

Lighty called Cook "smooth" and said he makes everything seem "effortless," which are words often used to describe VASJ's leading scorer.

Wojciechowski said expecting Lighty to shut Cook down on his own is unrealistic, but watching the two future Buckeyes go head-to-head will be a sight to watch.

"Individually, Daequan is the best player we have played against, and you can't expect one guy to go out and stop him," Wojciechowski said.

"Daequan has a ton of talent, but I expect Dave to also go out and show that he is one of the top two or three players in the state. He always rises to the occasion. I'm looking forward to Dave being the stud we know he is."

Lighty and Cook have continually risen to the occasion their entire high school careers. Today is one last chance to do it on the very floor where their college careers will unfold.

"It's exciting but sad at the same time for us as a staff because our relationship with Dave and all our guys transcends basketball, and we know we only have a little bit of time left together with the seniors," Wojciechowski said.

"For Buckeyes fans to get a chance to see Dave and Daequan play on this floor one time before seeing them grow and develop as college players is something special. It should be an exciting day for everyone."
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1/17/06



Matta has a right to smile

COLUMBUS - Ohio State basketball coach Thad Matta was smiling in the fourth row behind the scorer's table in Value City Arena on Monday afternoon.
Villa Angela-St. Joseph coach Dave Wojciechowski was not, and for good reason.
A day after watching his Buckeyes lose a double-overtime thriller to Michigan State, Matta needed some good news. Especially after watching his team play solid defense, but managing just 59 points in 50 minutes of play.
The performance of Dayton Dunbar's Daequan Cook against the Vikings was nothing short of spectacular in a 101-53 rout of VASJ.
What was billed as a showdown of Buckeye basketball recruits - Cook and the Vikings' David Lighty, the top two senior recruits in Ohio - very quickly became a one-man show. Cook and Dunbar proved to be too good on this day for Lighty and his VASJ teammates.
It took Cook a few minutes to get his game in gear, missing his first two shots. But after connecting on a baseline shot for his first field goal a little over three minutes in, it quickly became a one-man show.
The 6-foot-4 swingman tormented the Vikings with a dazzling display of creativity to find countless openings for his own shot and to get his teammates involved. The results were 41 points on 17 of 29 shooting, 15 rebounds, five assists and three steals against just one turnover.
Cook also showed he might not be just the top senior prospect in the state. While many consider North College Hill junior O.J. Mayo the best prospect in Ohio, regardless of class, Cook made a strong case for himself Monday afternoon against the reigning Mr. Basketball award winner.
"Cook is tremendous," said Wojciechowski. "He's going to be a tremendous prospect. He was unstoppable today."
Lighty, who scored 10 points on 3 of 12 shooting, and the Vikings kept it close for most of the first quarter until Cook took over, scoring nine points in the final three minutes.
From there it was a rout.
So forgive Lighty if he seemed relieved he'll play with Cook next season, not against him.
"After that performance, you've got to love (Cook). I think it will be a while before I talk to him again," Lighty said jokingly.
Cook's abilities were on full display throughout:
n In the first quarter, Cook faked out a defender on the baseline and buried a 15-foot fadeaway shot.
n In the second, he stole a pass and slammed home the first of his three dunks. In the closing seconds of the half, he buried a 3-pointer to make it 48-21 at half.
n In the third, Cook faked a drive to the inside, before deciding to take it inside following a cross-over dribble that resulted in a thunderous dunk.
n In the fourth, Cook missed on a through-the-legs windmill dunk, but grabbed his own rebound and dropped it in.
"I just came out here today a little harder to give the fans a taste of what to expect next year," Cook said. "But the game was less fortunate for Dave. I just wanted to put on a show."
It's no wonder Matta was in the fourth row smiling like he had just won the lottery.
With Cook, Lighty and Greg Oden, the nation's consensus No. 1 recruit, en route to Columbus next fall for what is considered the core of one of the nation's top incoming classes, Matta might have done just that.
[email protected]
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Got a question for you guys. Do you guys think that there is a chance that Lighty could redshirt.

I honestly have no idea how his knee is feeling, but I think it could still be a while b4 he gets up to tip top form.

Next year on schlorship we will have Butler, Twig, Lewis, Mayes, Harris, Bell, Oden, Cook, Lighty, Conley, and Hunter.

That will be 11 guys with this depth chart:

PG: Butler, Conley
SG: Mayes, Cook,
SF: Lewis, Lighty
PF:Harris, Bell, Hunter
C: Oden, Twig

Much like this year, Bell hasnt seen very much time, and with the look of things next year, barring injury, we should have about 3 differnt guys that could man the 3 b4 Lighty. Those being Lewis, Cook, and Harris/Bell, if you go big and put Twig in at the 4.

I am not asking this question to downgrade Lighty, I am asking, b/c an ACL tear usually take two full years to recover from and we could hope to get him into his best form and then have four years from then.

Thoughts???
 
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