BLOOMINGTON – Greg Miller’s phone buzzed deep into Tuesday night, one text message after another arriving as the IU-Wisconsin game stretched beyond regulation.
On the other end of those texts, John Oxton, Miller’s old friend and adversary, viewing the same game through nearly the same lens — two high school coaches watching their former players, Race Thompson in IU cream and Nate Reuvers in Wisconsin red, going toe to toe in college, just like they’d done in high school.
“You’re just seeing the surface being scratched with how good Race can be,” Miller later told IndyStar. “He has so many skills that once he gets comfortable out on the court and his coach gets comfortable with how much he can do, he’s not just going to be banging and getting rebounds.”
Thompson himself might have envisioned the moment, when he decided to pass up his senior year at Plymouth (Minn.) Robbinsdale Armstrong, reclassify and enroll at IU in August 2017. That was before.
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Before the redshirt year everyone agreed was necessary, since Thompson committed too late to participate in summer conditioning. Before the groin injury that limited him at the start of this season. Before the concussion Thompson would later describe as “the most severe” his parents, a former Iowa volleyball player and Minnesota’s all-time leading rusher, or any of Indiana’s doctors had ever seen.
That was all before.
“It was really tough for me, getting through that,” Thompson said. “But I’m through. I’m back now, better than ever.”
Thompson comes from an athletic family, even if he has basketball mostly to himself.
His father and mother were both college athletes. Two sisters, Indigo and Dominique, played college volleyball. His brother, True, is a 6-4 wide receiver at Minnesota.
Miller started coaching Race Thompson when he reached fourth grade. From the beginning, the Thompsons gave their son space to grow, and trust to his coaches. Miller made them a promise in return.
“One thing we always told his dad: We’re not gonna pigeonhole him and stick him inside as the tallest kid,” Miller said. “He’s got perimeter skills.”
That’s how Race Thompson, 6-8 and more than 200 pounds by the end of his high school career, developed into a stretch four. He averaged 45 percent from behind the 3-point line as a junior, scoring nearly 20 points per game.
Then came Indiana, Archie Miller’s unexpected offer and a big decision.
Archie Miller from his first days on the job preached roster flexibility, promising he would be willing to leave scholarships open if that meant options down the road. When IU approached Thompson with the idea of flipping from 2018 — where he was considered a top-100 prospect — to 2017, and enrolling early, it was agreed Thompson would sit the year to develop physically. Even when De’Ron Davis’ Achilles injury left a hole in IU’s frontcourt, Archie Miller didn’t back out of his promise of patience.
By the time this past preseason arrived, after more than a year off, Thompson was itching for action.
“I want to show like, why I'm here,” he said in September. “The main thing is just doing whatever I can to get wins.”
Those injuries presented the first unexpected change of plans of Thompson’s college career. He sat out the season opener against Chicago State, scored two points in four minutes against Montana State and then all but disappeared.
That, it turned out, was because of the concussion.
“I couldn’t really go to class. I couldn’t do a lot of things. They didn’t want me to go to practice. I was kind of isolated, on my own,” Thompson said during a radio appearance with Don Fischer before IU’s Feb. 10 home game against Ohio State. “I couldn’t be around (lights). I couldn’t be at Assembly Hall, I couldn’t be at the games because it would mess with my eyes. Sound would give me a headache like no other.”
For an athlete, light and noise sensitivity can be two of the toughest post-concussion symptoms to grapple with physically.
That often means minimal activity, which makes it difficult to maintain conditioning. For a significant stretch of November and December, Thompson couldn’t even sit on IU’s bench at home games.
But teammates kept him involved, sending him messages of encouragement. Archie Miller announced after the Northwestern loss in late January that Thompson had been cleared to practice again. By the time he returned home, for a Feb. 16 game at Minnesota, Thompson was finally ready to go.
“I’m definitely 100 percent right now,” he said that day. “Better than I’ve felt since I’ve been (at Indiana), because I basically had two months off.”
He was one of precious few bright spots in that game, a heavy defeat for the Hoosiers. In seven minutes, he grabbed five rebounds and blocked two shots. Six days later, at Iowa, he pulled in four rebounds over 11 minutes. His defensive rebounding percentages both overall and in conference play, in an admittedly small sample size, are encouraging.
Cue up Tuesday night, a visit from No. 19 Wisconsin and the Badgers’ seemingly ageless star forward, Ethan Happ.
Juwan Morgan struggled to start against Happ, trying desperately to walk the tightrope between playing good defense and avoiding the early fouls that have plagued Morgan at times this season.
Archie Miller turned to Thompson. After so long on the sideline, so long quite literally out of the spotlight, Thompson repaid his coach’s faith.
“He's got more physicality than we're accustomed to,” Archie Miller said afterward. “He can bang. He can mix it up a little bit.
“The other thing is he's a really good rebounder per minute. He's rebounding the ball on both ends of the floor for us in his minutes that he's given. He's been able to do that. So that's a big step for him to come in.”
Over 21 minutes, Thompson grabbed a career-high seven boards. Of vastly greater importance: He limited Happ, who scored 10 of his 23 points in the 10 minutes before Thompson saw the floor, and only 13 over the rest of the game before fouling out.
“My teammates, I know they have faith in me,” Thompson said afterward. “They keep telling me I'm good, you got this. This is what we do for a living. There was no reason for me to be nervous. That's what we do. I think I just played to my strengths and did what I had to do.”
Thompson’s return comes at a vital time for Indiana.
His minutes offer the Hoosiers greater cushion behind Morgan in the post. He allows Archie Miller to field bigger lineups more consistently. And he introduces potential versatility into a frontcourt that a month ago was desperate simply for bodies.
Thompson’s high school coach said there’s much more to his offensive game than Thompson has been able to show so far.
Thompson’s college coach agreed, saying his impact will grow “as he gets some confidence.”
Thompson’s teammates are just happy to have him back.
“Raceis an absolute beast,” Davis said after Minnesota. “Soon as he gets healthy, he's going to be a big contributor to this team."
Follow IndyStar reporter Zach Osterman on Twitter: @ZachOsterman.
INDIANA VS. NO. 6 MICHIGAN STATE
Tipoff: Noon, Saturday, Assembly Hall.
TV/Radio: Fox-59/WIBC-93.1 FM.
