Norfolk constantly shooting for a title

NORFOLK, Neb. — Pull open the thick gymnasium doors, fix your eyes on the lone figure inside and start counting.

One, two, three ...

Two weeks ago, more than 2,000 people packed this gym two hours before tipoff to see their Norfolk Panthers, the No. 1 team in the state. But tonight, it's quiet. Tonight the loudest sound is leather passing through nylon.

Four, five, six ...

Swish, swish, swish. Every three seconds.

He's 5-foot-10, 150 pounds, scrawny by Class A basketball standards. His white T-shirt is soaked in sweat.

Official team practice finished with shooting drills an hour ago. Jalen Bradley is still shooting. He won't go home until he makes 1,000 jump shots. Alone.

Seven, eight, nine ...

His shots drop through the net and into a machine called “the gun,” which fires balls back to him on the right wing, just inside the 3-point line. The sophomore catches and reloads.

One day he made 255 straight free throws. Another day he made 105 straight jumpers from 17 feet. Another day he made 43 straight 3s.

“I don't try to go for consecutive shots,” said Bradley, who this season made 51 percent of his 3s and 42 of 43 free throws. “I just kind of let it happen.”

10, 11, 12 ...

Today, Jalen Bradley and Norfolk descend on the Devaney Center, where at 2 p.m. they'll face Grand Island and try for the Panthers' first state tournament win in 23 years.

The Panthers are unique in Class A, not only because of where they come from, but how they got here.

Juggernauts hail almost exclusively from Omaha and Lincoln.

But no team in Omaha or Lincoln shoots like Norfolk: 51 percent from the field, 44 percent from 3-point range, 78 percent from the free-throw line. (The latter two numbers would lead Division I college basketball.)

“They're the best-shooting team in the state, no doubt about it,” Bellevue West coach Doug Woodard said.

“Forty-four percent as a team is unheard of, especially when you shoot as many 3s as they shoot. And 78 percent from the line? They have so many kids that shoot the ball so well.”

13, 14, 15 ...

Not every Panther shoots as well or as much as Bradley. But most nights, you'll find a few staying 15 to 30 minutes after practice. This team and this town share a passion for fundamentals.

And that's Norfolk's edge.

Class A consists of 29 teams, but only six are outside the Omaha metro area and Lincoln. Towns like Fremont and North Platte and Columbus try to keep up. It's getting harder all the time.

From 1987 to 2002, “outstate” Class A teams collectively won 28 state tournament games. Grand Island won the state title in 2002. Since then, outstate teams have won just two games and no titles.

The biggest reason: Those schools are shrinking. Norfolk, 27th in Class A enrollment, has one boy for every two at Creighton Prep, one for every three at Omaha Central.

Yet over the past eight seasons, only five Class A teams have more wins than Norfolk. This year, no one does.

16, 17, 18 ...

Bradley's rituals resemble those performed by another sophomore 16 years ago, Ben Ries. He's now Norfolk's coach.

Ries is one of Nebraska's best-ever high school shooters — he made 88 percent of his career free throws — and one of five prep players since 1980 to garner first- or second-team All-Nebraska honors three straight years.

After he graduated in 1996, Norfolk hit a rough patch. One year, the Panthers went 1-19. Then Ries returned in 2002, the youngest head coach in Class A. He was 24.

He focused his reconstruction on one principle: Build from the bottom.

In Omaha, elementary and middle school kids rarely interact with high school coaches. A fourth-grader living at 60th and Center Streets might plan to go to South High. But by seventh grade, he's headed to Burke. By ninth grade, it's Central.

Often, a high school coach hasn't even met a player until he shows up freshman year.

But in Norfolk, a kid who attends an elementary school will probably go to Norfolk High. So Ries reaches out as soon as possible.

Most coaches run camps in the summer; Ries also orchestrates them in the fall, five Saturdays, first through eighth grade. His high school players instruct and rub elbows with 220 kids.

More unusual: Ries' staff directs club teams, sixth through eighth grade. Bradley's dad, a high school assistant, attends every club practice, where he leads fundamental drills the first hour.

Junior high kids learn the same techniques and concepts the high school varsity utilizes.

The goal is continuity.

“When I talk about ‘our program,' I mean the whole thing,” Ries said. “I mean Norfolk basketball, grades 1 through 12.”

The blueprint requires significant time and energy. But the payoff is consequential.

The sooner kids and parents identify with the basketball team, the more they care. It's no coincidence that Norfolk crowds, home and away, were consistently the largest in Class A this year.

Six years ago, Brady Lollman and Nathan Marsh executed Ries' drills at club team practices.

Dribble, pass, screen and cut.

Now they are Norfolk's two best players. Lollman hits 83 percent at the line, 43 percent from 3. Marsh, a big lefty, hits 58 percent from the floor.

Why so efficient? Repetition.

When the Panthers get a lead in the final minutes, they're tough to beat. They handle pressure, milk clock and hit free throws.

“They're one of the smartest teams I've seen in many years,” Bellevue West's Woodard said.

But will it be enough this week? Since winning Class A in 1987, Norfolk has lost six straight state tournament games.

To win it again, Norfolk must knock off city schools, including either Creighton Prep or Omaha Bryan in Friday's semifinals.

Metro teams don't expect much when they see Norfolk, Lollman said. Not much size or quickness on the Panthers' roster. And no player has dunked in a game in Ries' eight years.

“We'll play anybody in HORSE,” Ries said.

Ries' first few years, players often challenged him to a game. Coach never lost — not once.

Then one day he dueled a hot-shot seventh-grader. Ries buried a jumper, Bradley answered. On and on for about half an hour.

Finally, Ries spun the ball on his finger, bumped it off his head and into the hoop. A Pistol Pete shot, Bradley said. “I never practiced that one.”

H-O-R-S-E.

Ries exhaled, then retired.

“I remember telling myself I'd never play him again,” he said.

Five years ago, another shooting great, Kyle Korver, came to Norfolk and shared his wisdom.

Jalen Bradley listened, and every day since June 9, 2005, he's kept a running count of the jump shots he's made.

On this Monday night, he'll go home and write: 509,500.

But even Jalen misses. After he drains 19 straight from the right wing, the ball comes off his hand a hair too hard. It hits iron — and rattles out.

He doesn't flinch. The gun spits out another ball. Catch, release, leather hits nylon.

A new streak begins.