Friday, May 23, 2008
Younger Moats rising as prospect
Wilson's athleticism off the charts
Doug Doughty
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For the time being, Nicci Moats remains the most prominent basketball player in her family, but that may not be the case for long.
Moats’ younger brother, Matt, is a 6-foot-6, 210-pound rising sophomore at Lord Botetourt High School, where he had an immediate impact this past season as a freshman.
“The doctors are saying, based on the growth plates and so forth, that he could get as big as 6-10 [and] maybe 7 feet,” Moats’ father, Dale, said, “but they’re kind of hovering around 6-10.
“I’ll take 6-10. Six-ten’s a nice, round number. I could see in my mind, 6-10 and about 250 [who can] shoot the ‘3.’ He can really shoot the ‘3,’ even though you don’t see it much because, at Botetourt, he was pretty much inside. And, he’s getting now where he’s using that to draw the defender out to him, and then he’s going to drive past him.”
Dale Moats, whom I interviewed 30 years ago when he was a two-sport star at Buffalo Gap in Augusta County, still likes to go out in the driveway and bang against his son. Dale played basketball at William and Mary but had big-time potential as a quarterback if he had chosen to go that route.
Matt has two older sisters, Tisha and Nicci, who signed with Tennessee in 2005 and played briefly for the 2006-2007 Lady Vols’ team that won the national championship. She subsequently transferred to James Madison, where she sat out the 2007-2008 season, and will not go to school in 2008-2009 while pondering her next move.
Matt is playing this summer with a showcase team called East-Coast Scholar-Athletes out of Roanoke. It is coached by former Roanoke Valley Christian coach Gerald Almond. Matt also works on his agility at The Edge, a Roanoke training facility “where they pretty much guarantee a 4- or 5-inch increase in your vertical leap,” Dale said.
“But, he’s got to make sure he comes home with good grades at the end of this year before dad is going to continue that. He’s a good student, but every once in a while he slacks off, like boys do.”
The only time I saw Matt Moats this year, he had 14 points against William Byrd in the Blue Ridge District Tournament and reminded me of a young Travis Watson, who was barely 6-6 but finished his University of Virginia career as the No. 2 rebounder in school history.
Watson wasn’t a tremendous leaper but he was powerful. Moats isn’t a leaper yet and while “he wants to become one,” according to his father, what I liked best about him was his hands and his footwork.
“His footwork is very good,” Dale Moats said. “He works a lot on his footwork, doing the ladder drills and stuff, and his hands have always been very, very soft. He can really catch the ball. His hands are bigger than mine. He’s definitely got good footwork and he better have good footwork. He wears size-17 shoes already.”
Moreover, he’s watched a ton of basketball.
“All the time,” Dale said. “He watched his older sister play. He watched Nicci play. He’s played against them in the back yard. He plays pick-up. He and I get out and play. Just watching him play, he’s got a pretty good instinct for the game. I think he’s got the potential to be pretty good.”
COVERING THE Western Valley District track meet last week gave me my first look at George Washington High School running back David Wilson and it was hard not to be impressed.
Wilson won the high jump, long jump, triple jump and 100 meters. He finished second to a teammate in the 200 meters and was later kidded by the meet announcer, who told him, ‘They’d have put you on a Wheaties box if you’d won all six [including a relay Wilson anchored].”
“Think they’ll let us run it over?” asked Wilson, who scored points with me with his quick wit.
I always was struck by the fact that Wilson was up in the press box to check the team scores and not to bring attention to himself individually. He conducted himself in a mature manner, but what jumps out at you is his powerful physique. Even in a track uniform, he looks like a football player.
North Carolina assistant Ken Browning was the only college football at the meet but you can be sure Wilson will be eyeballed at upcoming meets. He already has close to 20 Division I football offers.
