‘Meant the world to me’: Monzy Jackson excels in first Wichita State basketball start
The ESPN alert made everything in the world of Monzy Jackson come to a crashing halt.
Demaryius Thomas, a former Pro Bowl wide receiver for the NFL’s Denver Broncos, was found dead in his Atlanta home on Dec. 9 at the age of 33.
Coming from where Jackson hails from, a small town named Dublin in the middle of Georgia, there aren’t too many professional athletes to look up to. Thomas, who grew up 20 minutes away in Montrose, was larger than life to kids in that part of Georgia.
Jackson idolized Thomas, even more because they are actually distantly related — Thomas, who was a first cousin to Jackson’s grandfather, is a cousin twice removed to Jackson.
“I always dreamed one day I would be in the NBA and he would be a retired NFL player and I would sit with him and we would talk about how we both made it out,” Jackson told The Eagle. “When I found out the news, I ain’t going to lie, I broke down. That the first time in a long time I just broke down.”
Little did Jackson know at the time that less than two weeks later, he would make his first Division I start on the Wichita State men’s basketball team and play the best game of his career.
Jackson scored a career-high 15 points and matched his career high with eight rebounds in Wichita State’s 102-66 win over Prairie View A&M on Wednesday at Koch Arena. Afterward, Jackson spoke about how much it meant to him to honor Thomas.
“This actually made my day,” Jackson said at the podium. “My cousin passed away recently and it’s just been on my mind. I want to live my life and dedicate my career to him and I feel like I made him proud tonight. Seeing my name on the jumbotron, I’m from a small town, Dublin, Georgia, so just seeing my face and hearing my name called out, that meant the world to me.”
Thomas’ impact for middle Georgia kids like Jackson
By Jackson’s count, only three athletes — all football players — from his area have played professionally: Thomas, Erik Walden and Bud Dupree.
It was right before Jackson’s 12th birthday when he watched Thomas’ most iconic play, an 80-yard touchdown catch and run from Tim Tebow on the first play of overtime in the Broncos’ AFC wild card win over the Pittsburgh Steelers.
“Seeing him make it out, it just inspired me,” Jackson said. “I was a young boy and I remember telling my mom, ‘I want to be just like Bay Bay (Thomas’ nickname in Georgia), except I want to play basketball.’ He always motivated me because I wanted to be the next one in the family and I knew that I could do it.”
It hurt Jackson when he could not make it back home to Dublin, where Thomas’ procession and funeral were held last Saturday.
He’s looking forward to paying his respect to the family this weekend when he returns home during Christmas break.
“The news was so crazy because he was just 33 and you would never think something like this could happen,” Jackson said. “When I found out, it hit me different. I didn’t really want to get on my phone because every time I was on social media I would see a picture of him. It’s hard to believe it’s real.
“That’s why I looked up to the sky (during the game) and just said, ‘Long live 88.’”
Jackson delivers best game in first start
Before Wednesday’s game, it had been a fairly quiet season from Jackson, who was averaging 4.1 points and 3.1 rebounds in just 13.5 minutes in WSU’s first 11 games.
Despite the limited role, Jackson usually would have a hustle play every game that would spark the Shockers. In Wednesday’s game against Prairie View A&M, Jackson showed how valuable his energy and passion can be to WSU right from the start.
He had six points in the first two minutes of the game and scored 13 of his career-high 15 points before halftime.
“Monzy is always going to be Monzy, he brings us energy and makes the hustle plays and gets our guys going,” WSU junior point guard Qua Grant said. “We love him.”
After starting power forward Joe Pleasant strained his hamstring in practice earlier this week, an injury considered minor, the opportunity for Jackson to prove himself in an extended role presented itself in Wednesday’s game.
Jackson has always thrived playing in short bursts where he knew he could expend all of his energy on the court. On Wednesday, Jackson proved he can bring the same level of play with extended minutes and for a team that often needs energy on the offensive end, Jackson could prove to be a valuable asset moving forward in a larger role.
“He definitely took advantage of (the opportunity),” WSU coach Isaac Brown said.
“I thought he played under control. I told him, ‘All I need you to do Monzy is reverse the basketball. Don’t think about scoring because that will get you taken out the game.’ I thought he reversed the ball, ran the offense, took good shots and defended at a high level. I thought he was tremendous to start the game.”
The hustle play of the season (so far)
Jackson has become a fan favorite in his time with the Shockers for his highlight-reel hustle plays and he may have delivered his best one yet in Wednesday’s game.
The sequence began midway through the first half when WSU center Kenny Pohto swatted a shot that looked like it was falling out of bounds. But Jackson has never seen a loose ball he didn’t think he could reach, so he darted toward the sideline, took one giant step just inside the lines and reached over to grab the ball and throw it back into play to jump-start a WSU fast break.
Meanwhile, Jackson crashed into the WSU bench and knocked over three chairs as he fell to the ground.
“It’s that never-give-up mentality,” Jackson said. “I actually seen (teammate) Steele Chapman move out the way. I was like, ‘You ain’t going to catch me?’”
The Shockers pushed the ball in transition and found a wide-open three for Qua Grant. The whole time Jackson had picked himself up, untangled himself with the chairs and sprinted the length of the court — he had just cross halfcourt when Grant’s shot went up.
Jackson went straight to the basket, timed his jump perfectly and grabbed the ball in the air and laid it back into the basket to draw the loudest applause of the game from WSU fans.
“It becomes contagious when you’ve got one guy on the team playing all out with reckless abandon,” Brown said.
Grant confirmed as much afterward.
“It gets the guys going and it gives you a little extra boost of energy because you know he’s going 110 every time,” Grant said. “Once you’re tired and you see a play like that, you go, ‘I’m not tired, for real. I’ve got to go harder.’”
Jackson’s lone regret was that he didn’t finish the play with a put-back dunk, a forgivable offense considering how much energy he expended during the entire sequence of events.
“I was disappointed in myself because normally I dunk the ball there,” Jackson said. “I should have dunked it.”
This story was originally published December 23, 2021 at 8:25 AM.
.jpg)