Pair of unusuals

The Vikes' Daniel
McColl drives
inside against
Mission Bay
Dec. 3, 2016.
(Photos by Ed Piper)

 

Teammate Reed
Farley skies to protect
the basket in the
same game.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

By Ed Piper

The past year saw two unusual student athletes graduate after four years at La Jolla High.

I include "athlete": Both had GPA's in the 4-point something's. Way up there.

Everybody in the Viking family is familiar with them: Reed Farley, in basketball, and Daniel McColl, in everything--basketball as a teammate of Farley's, football, and finally volleyball.

I think God has a great sense of humor. In Reed's case, when he injured his knee in late January 2017, ending his high school career, he was five points shy of Steve Higgins' career total for second place all-time at La Jolla.

Five measly points.

I know Reed has a sense of humor. I haven't talked to him specifically about this, but I'm sure he would have a big chuckle over the irony of it. All he needed was to score the layup he injured his leg on, hit a three, and make a free throw, and he would be second all-time among Viking boys scorers.

Not that second place is that great. Nothing to be ashamed of, though.

Higgins played his Viking basketball in 1968-1970, long before there was a three-point arc or a shot clock to hurry up the number of shots.

Looking at the LJHS all-time points board, Grayson Moyer, who played just before I began covering Viking football and basketball, 2001-2004, is way ahead of both Higgins and Farley at 1,772 points. No way Reed was going to reach that, even if Reed shot every time down court and Coach Paul Baranowski's team went to the state championship. You just can't make that many points from where Farley was standing.

Unusual? Yes, in the talent he displayed. I have said this multiple times before in this column: No other Viking boys basketball player has evidenced the level of individual talent that Reed Farley did during my 13--I'm starting my 14th--years covering Viking sports.

Plus he is just an incredible team player. The other guys loved him, and enjoyed interacting with him, because he is just a good, fun, outgoing guy.

Now for McColl, who played in the front court, knocking bodies over, while Farley was often out at the point, or not infrequently coming in from the left baseline (opposite McColl's low post on the right baseline) to take an alley oop for a slam dunk (i.e., a year ago in summer league at Grossmont, and several other times--fun to photograph).

What Daniel did that was totally extraterrestrial was this: He built up his body to 255 pounds for football, and ran not around but over and through people as a bruising running back on offense and a scary linebacker on defense for the LJHS football team.

I remember watching him hang out with his fellow basketball players, I think his junior year. He walked up to someone and bumped into them with a small smile on his lips. The other kid's body moved. Daniel enjoyed it. He could physically move people around like that, even off the gridiron.

But, like Farley, McColl is a good guy. I'm not implying otherwise.

Then, when volleyball called to him, after his senior year of football he worked his body down to a stunning 205 pounds--for basketball, then volleyball.

All it got him, along with his grandmother Yolanda's high estimate of his athleticism, and tons of desire, was CIF Player of the Year in volleyball. He led Coach Dave Jones' boys team to the school's first Open Division championship in any sport. (The Open Division, for any of you who don't know, is the highest division in CIF.)

As Jones pointed out, McColl never played club volleyball, as did all the star volleyball players around him--he, measuring an adequate 6'2", dwarfed by 6'8" Nathaniel Gates, 6'7" Gabe Vargas, 6'7" Chase Blackwell. You get the idea. These guys all devoted year-round to volleyball, and McColl, playing volleyball only during the high school season, went from a bench-sitter his junior year to leader and Player of the Year his senior year.

Phenomenal.