A Hart for basketball

There will be no high school basketball in Illinois any time soon, but St. Bede star Paul Hart will be.

Hart, the reigning BCR Player of the Year, and his family have moved to northern Arkansas this week where he and younger brother, Isaiah, a freshman, are attending Flippin High School and playing basketball.

Bob Hart, the boys father, said they were led to that area by his uncle, who lives near Flippin. Bob said he and his family have been thinking about relocating and this was a good time to do it.

“The coronavirus hit and we thought we’d come down here and let them play some basketball and check it out and see how we like it,” Bob said. “The people are friendly and most of them go to church. It’s a good environment. There’s like a church on every corner. I don’t think I’ve even seen a bar.”

Bob described Flippin, which has a population of 1,300, as a diversified small town. The high school is a 2A school in a six-class system in Arkansas with an enrollment of 861.

The Harts made the eight-hour trip to Flippin Monday and the boys played the next night.

When the Illinois season was postponed, Paul said he just wanted an opportunity to play some basketball and was excited to make the move south.

He came off the bench and scored 12 points with eight rebounds for the Bobcats in Tuesday’s win over Conway Christian. He likely will be in the starting lineup soon.

“He (the coach) just wants me to be comfortable and learning the plays and stuff. I’ll be good,” he said.

Josh Robins, who is in third year as Flippin head coach, likes what he sees from Hart with four practices under his belt and said he has fit in nicely with his teammates.

“It is easy for me to see he is a competitive player that has really taken the development of his game seriously. I anticipate him coming in and immediately impacting the competitive level of our practice,” Robins said.

“We have six seniors on this year’s squad and they have really accepted Paul and believe he is going to help us win games this season. I am confident when Paul is playing in a game he is going to have an impact on the game with his ability to rebound, score, contest shots on the defensive end of the floor, as well as his ability to handle the ball and make decisions.”

The Arkansas season started Oct. 20 and the Bobcats already have nine games in, standing 6-3. Flippin went undefeated (10-0) in conference last year, 27-11 overall, and won the district championship and was runner up in the regional championship. The 2019 team also qualified for the second year for the state tournament.

The freshman Isaiah, 14, is playing on a team of eighth-graders and freshmen at Flippin, according to Bob. Like his brother and sister, Hanah, Isaiah attended and played basketball at Princeton Christian Academy.

From his initial observances, Bob said they seem to play more of an old-school style of basketball in Arkansas.

“They play more inside-out. They throw it to the big guy and he tries to kick it back out, instead of just out like they do up (in Illinois). That will take a little getting used to,” he said.

Paul, 16, burst on the area hoops scene last year with a sensational sophomore year, averaging 24.1 points, 9.8 rebounds, 1.5 steals and 0.5 blocks. The BCR Player of the Year was an unanimous First Team TRAC East All-Conference pick.

He has scored 1,082 points in two years and was on target to overtake big leader J.A. Happ (1,459) as the academy’s all-time leading scorer.

Bob is continuing working from home answering phones for an insurance company and said his wife, Lai, will be looking to work from home as well.