Taylor Statham: The path less taken

(Ed. Note: Due to technical maintenance to Blogger's user interface, we have been unable to publish any posts for the last 24 hours. This post should have been published on Thursday afternoon. Thank you for your patience)

Generally speaking, when a man takes a shot below the belt, its not considered 'lucky'.

Anyone that has been brought to tears while trying to stifle the urge to vomit after getting hit in the groin knows this. But for Taylor Statham, the knee he took to the nuts back in November may have saved his life. While practicing with his Westwind Academy team out in Pheonix, Statham slid over to take a charge that ended with the errant knee. When the pain didn't go away, Statham went to a doctor who diagnosed him with testicular cancer, sending the 6'6" wing from a path towards a Division I scholarship (Fresno State, Pepperdine, and Western Michigan were among the schools to offer him) to one that saw him go through three months of intense chemo-therapy.

As the chemo dried up the cancer (the good news is that Statham is cancer free as of three weeks ago), so did his scholarship offers.

But that doesn't mean the kid lost his ability. Statham comes from a basketball family -- both of his parents played in college and his uncle, Steve Hale, played at North Carolina with Michael Jordan and was once described as one of the best defensive players Jordan ever played against. Statham also notched a 25 point, 13 rebound, and 11 assist triple-double in a game that he played in between chemo sessions. He's been playing with AAU program Team Xtreme this spring, hoping that he will be able to land a scholarship offer before the start of the 2011-2012 season.

This is how Statham described himself as a player in an email to us: "I'm a lights-out shooter, I make jaw dropping passes, and I'm a complete gym rat. I'll never be outworked. I'm a 6'6 SG/SF. I gained 25 pounds this year, then lost it all, but I'm back up to 205. Where I'm from a lot of people look up to me and I can't let them down. I'm really looking to pick up a full-ride scholarship because the treatment has really hurt my parents financially."

Here's to hoping Statham reaches his goal of becoming a scholarship basketball player.

And if that dream never comes to fruition, Statham can find solace in the fact that he has a second lease on life. Basketball or no basketball, that's a blessing that cancer doesn't always grant.