ST. PAUL, Minn. – In the big time world of high school sports, it's the smallest player on Minnehaha Academy's freshman basketball team who might be making the biggest impact.
“I saw the 20th guy,” says head coach Larry Suggs. “And he was standing about 4-foot-5.”
That young man is Liam Hollidge who had the bravery so few of us do, to put himself out there and try something for the first time.
“Watching Netflix, playing video games didn’t seem right to me,” recalls Liam, a freshman at Minnehaha. “So I said to myself if I didn’t play basketball then I will always regret that decision not too.”
Little did anyone know it would be a decision that would affect the entire team.
“I am not sure how many people we have on our team,” says teammate Bennett Theisen. “But we all rally around him.”
Head coach Larry Suggs taught Liam the game of basketball from scratch.
“I said to Liam, 'First we need to learn how to catch the ball,'” recalls Suggs.
An interesting thing happened, he won everyone over. Which is what made one small shot last Thursday a really big deal.
Liam made his first three-pointer -- in a game he had learned just a few weeks earlier.
“It felt great because everyone was cheering for me,” said Liam. “And everyone was happy for me.”
The Redhawks won that game. Liam got the game ball and the freshman basketball team at Minnehaha Academy has learned a valuable lesson about courage.
“He never really stuck in my mind as a kid who could have such an impact on me like he has,” says Theisen.