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Scoring 1,000 over a 4-year high school career is considered to be pretty good. Reaching the 2,000 point mark is rarified territory indeed. Before last night, among the tens of thousands of (if not hundreds of thousands) of players in Indiana high school basketball history only 54 players had reached the rare air of 2,000 career points.
Purdue signee Isaiah Thompson became the 55th such player last night:
Congrats again to Isaiah Thompson. He is already the school's all-time leading scorer and is the first player in school history to surpass the 2000 point mark. He has done this playing against the top competition in the state and while fully buying into the team concept.
— Zionsville Athletics (@ZCSeagles) February 13, 2019
Thompson passed Celtics head coach Brad Stevens last season as Zionsville’s all-time leading scorer, and when he joins Purdue next year he will give us two 2,000 point scorers on the same team. Eric Hunter Jr. reached the mark last year, finishing 7th in state history with 2,583 career points.
Thompson is officially at 2,013 points with two regular season games left, plus the state tournament. Zionsville is favored in sectional 7 at Kokomo starting in two weeks, but will face challenges from pretty good teams in Lafayette Jeff and Logansport. Zionsville is ranked 8th in this week’s Class 4A poll at 16-5 with two losses to No. 6 Cathedral, a loss to No. 2 Carmel, No. 1 Warren Central, and to Pike by a single point.
Assuming they get out of the sectional Zionsville could face Carmel in a rematch in the Logansport regional along with No. 9 Homestead.
Thompson’s 2,013 points currently has him 53rd on the state scoring list, and getting into the top 50 only requires 10 more points over the remaining three (at minimum) games.
The following 2,000 point scorers in Indiana history have played at Purdue:
No. 6 Rick Mount - Lebanon - 2,595
No. 7 Eric Hunter Jr. - Indianapolis Tindley - 2,583
No. 30 Kyle Macy - Peru - 2,137
No. 35 Dan Polombizio - Michigan City Rogers - 2,092
No. 43 Bryson Scott - Fort Wayne Northrop - 2,042
No. 55 Pat Manahan - Delphi - 2,003
To reach the top 25 Thompson would need 2,156 career points, so 143 more. That can be done with a decent tournament run to the regional, assuming he has a draw that gives him three sectional games. That would mean he would only need to average 24 per game over the next 6 games, which he is more than capable of. He is currently at 23.4 per game this year.