Locals revisit Pistol Pete playing in DHS Gym

About every basketball gym has a couple of die-hard fans who can tell some stories. They follow the local team, support it and often tell all their friends about it the next morning at the coffee shop.

So last Friday night, I traveled to Danville High School for the first time to see the Lions host the Easley boys and girls basketball teams. The big news to me, though, was that “Pistol Pete” Maravich played in the DHS Gym from 1961-63 and his jersey hangs on the wall with a picture of him.

Sure enough, Daniel High School grads Troy Porter (1956) and Al Cumbie (1969) were in the bleachers on that night in Daniel and both of them remembered watching Pistol Pete play as an eighth and ninth grader on the varsity team. Porter graduated from the first-ever DHS class.

“He (Pistol Pete) could pass, dribble to his left and around his back,” said the 86-year-old Porter, sitting up in the bleachers. “He was a super ballplayer. One of the memories of him was he would shoot from his side because he was so small. He was known very well in this town.”

“Pistol Pete” is considered one of the greatest basketball players of all time. He went on to play at Louisiana State University as a 3-time All-American and averaged 44.2 points a game. Pete was known for wearing those “floppy socks” around his ankles in college and is still regarded as perhaps the game’s greatest creative offensive-talent in history. Plus, he was a five-time NBA All-Star.

“Pete was a great basketball player. You could tell he was going to be good,” said Cumbie. “When he went to prep school (in 10th grade) his dad Press Maravich was hired by NC State and everybody assumed that NC State hired him to get Pete. But then, Pete finished prep school and Press went to LSU. That’s how Pete went to LSU.”

“I do remember when Pete came back (to town) with LSU and played at Clemson – that was a big deal,” said Cumbie. “I think it was the first year of Littlejohn Coliseum. It was exciting to see. We all knew he was going to be good, but didn’t know he was going to be that good. We were excited for Pete, but we definitely wanted Clemson to win because I’m more of a Clemson fan. It was an exciting game. I would say 300 to 400 Daniel fans went to the (LSU-Clemson) game. Even my dad – who didn’t go to basketball games – went to that one.”

The one interesting thing, too, that Cumbie said is that he thought the movie about Pistol Pete was pretty spot on.

“Very, very close – yeah,” he said about the movie. “There wasn’t much to do around Clemson (and the Daniel area) at that time. On Saturdays, you went to the movies and Pistol Pete was a regular there. The theatre (back then) is where the Tiger Sports Shop is right now. They had booths in there and a counter and drank milk shakes. That’s what everybody did. I think (the movie) was pretty realistic.”

From the Green Wave section: Easley High School fan Cliff Leach (Kimbel’s dad) was also impressed last Friday night by the Pistol Pete tradition of the Daniel High School Gym. “He (Maravich) brought a creativity to the game that wasn’t there yet,” said Cliff. “He was an excellent passer and team player.”