Earl The Pearl: Langhurst Transfers Winning to Division I Level

By Paul Meyer
www.rmucolonials.com
Feb. 24, 2009

Meyer On Morris Link

Moon Township, Pa. - Feb. 24, 2009 - By all rights, the Robert Morris Colonials this week should be relaxing a bit - figuratively getting out some golf clubs - and preparing for the start of the Northeast Conference tournament, secure in the knowledge they've clinched the outright regular-season championship.

By all rights last Thursday night, they'd have won at Monmouth, which had lost seven consecutive games and was just 4-10 in the NEC.

Didn't happen.

OK, but by all rights, they'd have regrouped and won Saturday night at Wagner, which like Monmouth was 4-10 in NEC play when the long weekend began.

That didn't happen, either.

In fact, nothing was all right for the Colonials in those two games.

And so ...

"The country club is over,'' RMU coach Mike Rice said after those two soporific losses. "I hate the mentality of this team right now. They're fat cats. There will be some interesting practices this week at the Sewall Center. We're going to chop them down to size.''

Rice and his staff hope to re-toughen a team that had won 13 consecutive league games this season and 15 consecutive NEC road games over two seasons before hitting an offensive wall in the East.

Now the only streak that's intact is the two-game losing streak the Colonials will take to last-place Saint Francis (Pa.) Thursday night in yet another attempt to wrap up the championship before second-place Mount St. Mary's visits Saturday in the regular-season finale.

It will help the Colonials in Loretto if junior guard Jimmy Langhurst can reprise the solid performance he gave there last season. Langhurst was 2 of 5 from 3-point range, made all six of his free throws and finished with 12 points, three assists, a steal and no turnovers in RMU's 65-55 victory.

That's the kind of game that should be the norm for Langhurst, who arrived at Robert Morris three years ago fresh from becoming the all-time scoring leader at Willard High School in Ohio.

Langhurst, though, figured his role could change in college.

"I knew Division I's a whole different ball game,'' he said. "I just wanted to fill my role. If it was as a scorer, I'd score. But if not, then I'd distribute the ball and get my buckets when I could. That's fine with me. As long as we win, I could care less.''

Winning and Langhurst are not strangers.

In his three seasons at RMU, Langhurst has played on teams that are a combined 62-29. And his four high school teams were a combined 81-17.

Langhurst was a superstar high school player, which wasn't surprising considering his genes. He's the fourth member of his family to hold the Willard career scoring record.

That began when his grandfather, Earl James Langhurst, set the record in the late 1930s before going on to a football career at Ohio State. Langhurst's uncle, Jim, later established the record with 974 points. Then Langhurst's father, Jay, beat it by two points, finishing with 976.

"They always argue about that,'' Langhurst said with a laugh.

There's no argument now.

Early in Langhurst's Willard career, fellow guard Nick Dials, who would walk on at Ohio State and then transfer to Akron, set the record with 2,180 points. Three years later, Jimmy regained the record for the Langhurst family, finishing his all-Ohio career with 2,199 points. That makes him a bit of a celebrity back home.

"It's a rich basketball town,'' he said. "The tradition at Willard is just basketball. It's something like a 'Hoosiers'-type deal.''

Oddly, Langhurst never had a hoop in his driveway.

"Everybody thought that was weird,'' Langhurst said, "but if I wanted to play, I would find a place. That's the great thing about basketball. You can find a place no matter what. If it's snowing or raining, you can go inside the gym. If it's nice outside, you go outside and find a court and shoot.''

Langhurst, who also considered attending Youngstown State, is a pure shooter.

"The best H-O-R-S-E shooter you're ever going to find,'' Rice said.

Langhurst can thank who knows how many school custodians for that ability.

"When I got to high school, I became friends with the janitors,'' Langhurst said. "My dad said, 'Those are good guys. Be friends with them. They'll let you in the gym.' And those guys always let me in - even late at night.''

Not surprisingly, Langhurst is an excellent free throw shooter. He's a career 85.2 marksman at RMU .

Again, that runs in his family.

"My whole family has shot free throws well,'' he said.

Langhurst said being a successful free throw shooter is mostly mental. But how does he block out the pressure and the loud fans at road games?

"I think it's repetition,'' he said. "When I was little, me and my brother (Anthony) used to go out and shoot. He always put pressure on me. He'd say, 'All right, 10 pushups for whoever loses.' That puts something on the line. Or he'd say, 'Make these two free throws, you win the game.' I think that works. He was always yelling in my ear - 'You're going to miss it!' Or he'd call me names or stand behind me and whisper in my ear. My dad would do the same thing.''

Langhurst paused, remembering.

"You learn to block it out,'' he said. "You really do.''

Langhurst said his longest streak of consecutive free throws made at Willard was 20.

But that wasn't the Willard High School record.

"My uncle has the record - 28 in a row,'' Langhurst said.

Like everything else at Willard, it's all in the Langhurst family.

WEEKEND RMU REVIEW

The Colonials, second to Sacred Heart in field goal percentage (48.6), shot under 40 percent from the field against both Monmouth and Wagner. They had only three double figure scorers in the two games - Jeremy Chappell against both teams and Langhurst against Wagner. Chappell made only 11-of-34 field goal attempts over the lost weekend.

"Good teams find a way to win,'' Rice said. "Right now, our team is finding ways to lose a ball game. Inexcusable. Our guys aren't matching the intensity and focus of other teams right now. We're going to figure this out. It's going to take some very hard work to get this fixed.''

NEC NUGGETS

Fairleigh Dickinson lost at Central Michigan 68-62 Saturday in a BracketBusters game ... The Knights played without leading scorer (16.3 points per game) and rebounder (5.9) Sean Baptiste, who didn't make the trip because of illness ... Central Connecticut continues to struggle from beyond the arc at home. The Blue Devils were 3-of-11 in a 78-73 win against St. Francis (N.Y.) Saturday and are just 12-for-61 (19.7 percent) from long range in their past five home games ... CCSU managed that win despite being outrebounded 42-24 ... CCSU was without Ken Horton, Tamir Johnson and Chris Baskerville - all out because of concussions ... Quinnipiac's 78-73 victory at Long Island was the Blackbirds' first NEC loss at home ... Sacred Heart's Joey Henley has made his last 16 field goal attempts ... Monmouth needs much help if it is to qualify for the NEC tournament. "Our backs are against the wall I think for the 50th time in the last two years,'' Alex Nunner told the Asbury Park Press.