What do we know about Larry Bird’s years as a high school hoop star? This book tells the tales Springs Valley

If you’ve ever seen the film “Hoosiers,” you should have a feel for how important basketball is in the state of Indiana. In fact, fans there have a saying: “In 49 states, it’s just basketball … but this is Indiana.”

Basketball is practically a religion in the Hoosier State, where heroes from the past remain heroes today. And that label applies most of all to the best basketball player ever to be born and raised in Indiana, one Larry Joe Bird.

Bird retired in 1992, yet countless fans around the world still know the highlights of his pro career: Hall of Famer, Olympic gold medalist with the Dream Team, winner of three consecutive NBA Most Valuable Player Awards, and three-time NBA champion with the Boston Celtics.

His collegiate achievements are also well-known: Bird was National College Player of the Year when he led the unheralded Indiana State Sycamores to 33 straight wins. They made it all the way to the 1979 NCAA championship game before suffering their only loss of the season to Magic Johnson and Michigan State.

But what about Bird’s high school career? Despite Hoosiers’ obsession with high school hoops, very little has been written about what Bird did when he wore the black and gold uniform of the Springs Valley Blackhawks in French Lick, Indiana. Outside of local coverage, there was no reporting about Bird and his teammates facing rivals such as the Jasper Wildcats, Loogootee Lions and Paoli Rams – until now.

Dr. Randy Mills is a retired professor who taught at Oakland City University in Indiana, and his book, “As if by Magic,” tells the story of Bird’s Springs Valley years in careful detail. Mills covers Bird’s youth from the time when he was just Mike and Mark Bird’s kid brother all the way to Larry’s eventual landing at Indiana State.

Mills is an award-winning historian and author whose prolific works include books about military history and soldiers’ experiences in war, a biography of Indiana’s first governor, and scores of articles on historical topics published in magazines and professional journals.

Springs Valley Herald

The author was practically destined to write about Bird’s high school years. Mills knew Indiana’s rural culture, having himself come from a tiny town in southern Illinois. He played high school basketball there against competitors such as Doug Collins, the future overall first pick in the 1973 NBA draft, and chronicled those experiences in a memoir, “An Almost Perfect Season.” To top it off, Mills was acquainted with Mark Bird, who played basketball at Oakland City.

“I knew Mark from college,” Mills recalled. “Larry would come to the games, and he was just this shy guy who looked down at the floor if you made eye contact with him. So I knew Larry’s story from the ground floor.”

When Mills considered writing about Larry, the author soon realized that Bird’s high school story had not yet been told anywhere. “As a historian, that’s really exciting to be the first one to open that box up,” he explained.

Mills researched his topic deeply, interviewing Bird’s friends, teammates, coaches, and opposing players and coaches. He also scoured local newspapers, school yearbooks, and other publications to find Springs Valley box scores, game reports and any other articles about Bird’s high school playing days.

“Old newspapers, now you can get them online,” Mills shared. “I found the sportswriters of that day and their wonderful detailed articles. Those were great, insightful things they wrote.”

Bird made an instant impact in his first varsity game, which came in the famed statewide boys’ postseason tournament.

“Larry broke his ankle playing junior varsity at the beginning of his sophomore year,” said Mills. “He wanted to come back and play, and Coach (Jim) Jones said if you can do these killer sprints, we’ll let you play. So he ended up playing his last three games of junior varsity. Then Coach Jones let him dress for sectional play. That’s a big deal. If you make it to the sectionals, you have a lifetime of stories to share.”

“Sectionals” is the first level of the tournament, which is the event that drives high school hoops hysteria across Indiana. From 1911 through 1997, all schools, regardless of size, took part in one open tournament, with one state champion emerging from the hundreds of hopefuls. The most famous title-winner – and the inspiration for “Hoosiers” – was the 1954 champs Milan High School, with just 161 students.

Since 1998, the teams have been divided into four classifications based on school enrollment. Girls teams also have a tournament that began in 1976.

In that first tournament experience, Bird – wearing the number 33 that he inherited from brother Mark – got some unexpected playing time that Mills points out “changed his life.”

Mills noted that in one of the old newspapers, “I found a wonderful narrative where the sportswriter said: ‘And the surprise of the game was young sophomore Larry Bird, who came in and made two quick baskets underneath and got the team going, and then he made the two winning free throws.’”

Louisville (Kentucky) Courier-Journal

Another news report was headlined, “Land and Bird Propel Springs Valley, 58-57,” Larry receiving top billing with the team’s leader and high scorer, Steve Land. And just like that, basketball fans across Indiana were introduced to Larry Bird.

In his junior year, Bird was 6-foot-3, weighed 155 pounds, and became a starter, but when he came back for his senior year, he’d sprouted to 6-foot-7. He was already displaying traits that would become his trademarks in the future: He spent every available minute in the gym, was quick to trash talk, was a team player who hated to lose, and got great satisfaction from delivering an assist to a teammate.

In Bird’s senior year, long-time coach Jones retired and was succeeded by Gary Holland. It was Holland’s first head coaching job and Land had graduated, thus Blackhawks fans had low expectations. But Holland gave his players more on-court freedom than Jones had, which suited Bird well.

After an early Springs Valley winning streak, even the 2,700-seat high school gym wasn’t big enough to hold all the passionate Blackhawks fans. From the book:

“As the 1973-1974 season progressed and the crowds grew, Friday night games in the valley turned into ‘a frenzied blur of factory workers trying to get off work, get to the bank, clean up, grab some supper, and get to the game in time to get a good seat. Getting to the game late not only meant the possibility of standing for the entire game but also meant finding a parking space on a side street in the nearby neighborhoods.’”

We won’t spoil anything more about how Bird’s seasons played out; just know it was a magical time at Springs Valley – which brings us to the book’s title. “Like Magic” refers not to Bird’s famed rival/friend, Magic Johnson, but to how some perceived it was actual wizardry that helped Bird progress from a J.V. sophomore to a record-setting scorer as a senior.

“It was like somebody waved a magic wand on him because he wasn’t even playing his sophomore year,” said Mills. “Nobody was looking at him after his junior year. He was good, but he wasn’t great. And then he grows the four inches and now he just comes out of nowhere…as if by magic.”

“But there was something else besides magic,” Mills continued. “This didn’t come out of a vacuum. People helped him, and not only his coaches and key people, but also the coaches he played against and the people he played against made him better. All those things came together to propel Larry to Boston greatness. And I wrote about all those elements: the other teams, the other players, the other coaches, Larry’s coaches, the people who just were there at the right second to make the difference.”

Mills used the term “almost miraculous” to describe how Bird, through basketball, was able to emerge from Orange County, one of the poorest in Indiana, and build the life and career he did.

“I mean, it’s almost scary to think of how close we were to not talking about Larry.”

Mills hopes that Bird will learn that the book has been published, and will read and appreciate it. The author feels that anyone whose background is similar to Bird’s will quickly relate to his story.

And most of all, said Mills, “The Larry Bird story was just fun to write.”