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1985-86 Ohio Boys Basketball Team
1985-86 Ohio Boys Basketball
BASKETBALL TEAM
By Andy Tavegia
To tell the story of the 1985-86 Ohio Bulldogs, you have to go back a few years to 1979-80.
That’s when a fellow by the name of Brad Bickett moved into town. Known as a diverse and multi-talented athlete, he joined a group of Bulldogs that already had been playing together for a few years.
Bickett provided the final piece to a difficult yet tiny puzzle that few teams across the state could solve in the mid 1980s. For three seasons, Ohio High School – with an enrollment less than 70 -- won 79 of 88 games and climbed all the way to the state championship game. This wasn’t a team of head toppers; the tallest player only was 6-foot-2 in. But it was a group of players where everybody knew his role to provide a suffocating defense with a strong full-court press and an offense so fundamental it wound up with two players scoring NOW WHERE are they more than 2,000 points.
And ask the players of that team, that’s what made it so difficult to stop.
“It was probably the most unselfish team I have ever played on,” said Lance Harris, an all-stater and one of those two 2,000-point scorers along with Bickett. “From Tim (Farraher), to the Doran boys (Dan, Dave and Doug), to Darren (Schultz), everybody played a role at a different time. Where Brad and I got a lot of the press and all-state honors and everything, none of that would have been reachable or obtainable for us or the team if it wasn’t for all the unselfish dirty work that the other players were willing to put in. It was on the press, in the offense setting screens for Brad and I,
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Accomplishments
• Coached by legendary coach
Lloyd Johnson, the Bulldogs went 29-3 and finished second in the 1986 IHSA
Class A State Tournament • The school remains the smallest school enrollment (69 students) to ever play for a state title in any sport • At the state tournament, the
Bulldogs beat Decatur St.
Teresa (73-50) and Frankfurt (45-43) before falling to
Teutopolis (82-45) in the state title game • Seniors Brad Bickett and
Lance Harris were named to the five-person All-
Tournament Team
or guarding the best players sometimes. It was just a group, team effort, which it had to be. Everybody had to box out, everybody had to play defense. Everybody had to do their thing to perfection for us to be successful against the good teams.”
The best example may have been the sectional championship game in that 1985-86 season.
In front of another overflow house, this one at Princeton, Ohio trailed an undefeated Newark team – a team with far superior height and a future Division I player in Larry Hilt -- that many considered to be the clear favorite for the state crown by two in the closing minute. In the midst of a timeout prior to a clutch freethrow attempt, coach Lloyd Johnson remembers the mood fondly.
“Just before we broke that huddle, little Dave Doran, a little left-hander, says to me, ‘Coach, they’ve gone into a zone and they’re leaving me open 15 feet out. They don’t even come out and guard me. What do you want me to do if I get the ball?’” Johnson said. “I said, ‘Shoot it, Dave. You’re the best shot on the team.’ Lance was standing there and heard it and said, ‘Yeah, Dave, shoot it.’
So what happens? Hilt missed the front end of that one-and-one, which
See Ohio Page 40
CONGRATULATIONS! CONGRATULATIONS!
1985/1986 OHIOBOYS BASKETBALLTEAM
OnBeingInductedIntoTheHallofFame
We We Are Are So So Proudof Proudof Youall!Youall! CONGRATS OHIO BULLDOGS!
102N. Main St. |Ohio,IL61349 815-376-2954 |DimondBros.com
FROM PAGE 39 was grabbed by Farraher, the undersized muscle man and accomplished rebounder. He gets the ball to Harris, who finds Dave Doran 15 feet away for a jump shot that ties the game.
“That’s the kind of kids that we had,” Johnson said.
Farraher grabbed another clutch rebound the next trip down, setting up Bickett for the game-winner and Ohio’s second consecutive sectional title.
“I can still see that ball going up and up and up and then down through the basket,” Johnson said. “The roof went off the gym. It was just a fairytale type of book, something like ‘Hoosiers.’”
It may have sounded like a Hollywood script, but the story was quite real. It continued with blowout wins over Marengo in the supers and Decatur St. Teresa in the state quarterfinals before a narrow 45-43 win over Frankfort in the semifinals.
The amazing Cinderellalike run had a bittersweet conclusion with a tough 82-45 loss in the state championship game to Teutopolis, the only team other than Annawan to beat Ohio in 85-86. But that didn’t at all dampen what remains one of the greatest high school basketball stories not only in the Illinois Valley, but also the state of Illinois. No school that small ever has played in a state championship game.
“I think this group always kind of played for our community,” Bickett said. “It’s small school basketball. It’s what everyone attached themselves to. This group really wanted to do it for our community because we knew that we made our people in Ohio pretty proud and around Bureau County. That meant a lot to this group, not only playing for ourselves and our coaches, but playing for everyone. That was kind of neat.”
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1985/1986OhioBoysBasketball Team Illinois ValleyHallofFame TeamInductee
1985/86OhioBasketball Team Brad “Thunder” Bickett Congratulations From Your Bureau ValleyStorm Family.Thankyoufor all that you havedoneforus. We aresoProudofyou!
Photo from June 2019 Illinois Valley Sports Hall of Fame Inaugural Banquet
Nick Guerrini and other members of the 1995 Hall High School Football Team accept their 2019 IV Sports Hall of Fame induction plaque from emcee Lanny Slevin.
FILE PHOTO
