Quinn Cook stood waiting by the basket to see if Jerami Grant could back up the talk.

It was the beginning of Grant’s sophomore year at DeMatha (Md.) Catholic High School, and he wanted to prove to his good friend, and teammate, that he could dunk. In one quick moment, Cook’s skepticism turned to disbelief.

Grant threw it down.

“I told him now he better start catching my ‘oops,” Cook said. “I think in that year we got about two or three.”

Grant and Cook had been best friends since they played county basketball together when they were just 7 and 8 years old. Their lives were basketball, whether it meant sitting at home together playing basketball video games, or watching Tracy McGrady — Jerami’s favorite player — go up against Kobe Bryant, Cook’s favorite player.

On Saturday, the focus will remain on the hardwood when Cook’s Duke travels to the Carrier Dome to play Grant’s Syracuse at 6:30 p.m.

“We’ve been friends since we were in kindergarten,” Grant said. “We always played together.”

The two continued to play together at DeMatha, one of the premier high school basketball programs in the country.

Their 2009-10 team included the Orlando Magic’s Victor Oladipo, Georgetown’s Mikael Hopkins and Pittsburgh’s James Robinson.

With all the talent surrounding him, Grant was the quiet one on the team. He hadn’t quite broken out of his shell.

Cook was the outgoing one. He had a different handshake with every single teammate. When they were together off the court, nothing was different. But on the court, Cook tried to fire Grant up.

“Being the athlete that (Jerami) was, you could count on him for a block or dunk” DeMatha head coach Mike Jones said. “Then the first opportunity after those plays, you’d have Quinn running up to him. He’d run up to him and do the handshake with him.”

The Stags went 32-4 that season and won the Washington Catholic Athletic Conference Championship. It was an outstanding season, but it still had its bumps in the road. The team started out 16-0.

Their 17th game was against Mater Dei in the Hoop Hall Classic in Springfield, Mass. The game was televised on ESPN, and despite all the excitement surrounding it, DeMatha lost.

After that game, with players in the locker room crying, Cook was the guy that told everyone not to worry, and that there were better things to come.

“You only remember the losses, you never remember the wins,” said Marcellous Bell, who played for DeMatha that season. “It kind of brought us together and helped us build toward that championship goal.”

Cook was right, and DeMatha eventually won the city championship, and it was largely due to the play of Grant and Cook.

In the championship game, Grant, who had first shown off his dunking prowess to Cook only at the beginning of the season, threw one down with authority.

Cook, who was in more disbelief than when he saw it for the first time months before, ran over to Grant and gave him a huge hug. Cook said it was the best play of the season. A photo of their moment was plastered on the Washington Post the next day, and it still remains tacked to Jones’ wall.

Jones, DeMatha’s head coach, has led a countless number of terrific basketball teams. He doesn’t like to compare them, but was willing to relent when it came to the talent of that 2009–10 team.

“You won’t get me to say they were more talented than other teams,” Jones said. “But common sense, well, it is what it is.”

On Saturday, Jones said he plans to do whatever he can to watch his two old players go at it, even though the Stags have a game in California.

Watching his old players means a great deal to him, and he also knows that Cook and Grant playing against each other means a lot to their former teammates.

They’ll take the court as opponents, but consider each other to be more than that. “That’s my little brother,” Cook said.

“To play Jerami in college, it’s just surreal. I watched him grow up.”

Published on January 31, 2014 at 4:35 am

Contact Sam: sblum@syr.edu | @SamBlum3