Maize’s Cade McGaugh goes on tear against Southeast after two years away

Down 10 early in the first quarter Saturday at Koch Arena, Maize boys coach Chris Grill gave the basketball to a player with a twice-surgically-repaired right knee.

Cade McGaugh stood tall against Southeast.

He picked his spot at the top-left side of the key and buried a three. A few seconds later, he did the same thing on the other side of the arc. And again. He scored an and-one bucket in the paint and capped his day with a pair of fourth-quarter free throws that put the score out of reach.

McGaugh accounted for 12 of Maize’s first 13 points, but more than that, he gave the Eagles the spark they were looking for in their 82-73 victory against the City League power-Buffaloes in the AV-CTL/GWAL Challenge. Grill said McGaugh’s moment was one he desperately deserved.

As a freshman on the junior varsity team at North, McGaugh tore his ACL in a game against South. With the season-ending injury, he didn’t feel he was going to get another opportunity at North, and he transferred to Maize.

But he had never suffered an injury like it, so he rushed the recovery process to get back on the court as quickly as he could. Only six months into a typically 12-month recovery, McGaugh started playing again.

Because the ligament wasn’t fully repaired, he tore it again as a sophomore after he planted awkwardly in practice.

“People lost hope in me,” McGaugh said.

McGaugh said with everything seeming to be working against him, he thought about walking away from basketball. The rehabilitation process is grueling, he said.

And even after the ligament has completely healed, only the first half of rehab is done. McGaugh said the mental side was a challenge as well.

“You don’t have enough confidence in yourself to cut on it,” he said. “You feel like you could just tear it right there.”

McGaugh said because of all the bed rest that doctors prescribe, patients “start to lose all memory” in the knee and have to “start from the bottom.” After months of doctor visits, then working to walk, jog, sprint and cut again, McGaugh said he had to make his comeback to basketball.

“It’s something that I love that I couldn’t give up,” he said.

Grill said once McGaugh was back with the team, though he wasn’t 100 percent healthy, he never came to practice with an ounce of negativity.

“I’m more excited about his attitude and his behavior every day,” Grill said. “Guys like that, it makes a difference on your team. Starting their high school career, they had a lot of high expectations and things they were gonna be able to accomplish, and now he’s just now getting an opportunity to get some of those things done.”

Grill’s son Caleb, McGaugh’s friend and teammate, said there were days spent hanging out when McGaugh brought up the rehab and his urge to get back to basketball.

“I just told him to stay positive and to get through his recovery and he’ll be fine,” he said. “He never complains really because he just has fun out there.”

McGaugh finished with a season-high 16 points in Saturday’s win, a victory Caleb said carried a little extra weight for his teammate because of the opponent.

“I know he wanted another crack at a City League team since he went to North,” Caleb said. “I feel like if we wouldn’t have had him tonight, I don’t know if we would have won.”

McGaugh is as close to full health as he has been since he was playing middle school hoops.

Maize is 7-2 and first in AV-CTL I after an eye-popping 52-29 win over second-place Salina Central on Friday. Because of the back-to-back with Central on Friday and Southeast on Saturday, finishing the weekend 2-0 put a stamp on Maize’s resume as a legitimate threat for a Class 5A championship.

Chris Grill said his expectations for his team the rest of the season are to get better with every game. But McGaugh, a junior, and Caleb Grill, who averages more than 15 points per game, said they want a ring.

“A ring would mean the world,” McGaugh said. “It would show that the coach from North High didn’t believe in me and that I went to a different school and believed in myself.

“ … They gave up, but I didn’t.”

This story was originally published January 14, 2018 at 5:00 PM with the headline "Maize’s Cade McGaugh goes on tear against Southeast after two years away."