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Zavier Simpson’s alarm clock rings.
It’s 5:00 a.m. Zavier and his dad, Quincey, head to the gym to work out before school, as they’ve done routinely since Zavier reached eighth grade.
In an hour, the sun will rise. In two, Zavier will drive to school. In three, Zavier returns to the court, squeezing in shots between classes and during study hall.
In a few days, Zavier’s Lima Senior squad will play Westerville South for the state title. In Lima, Ohio, basketball is the lifeblood of the community. Zavier’s team is 28-0.
“When our basketball program is doing good, the air smells different,” Quincey said.
He already won a state title two years prior with Lima Central Catholic before transferring to play for his dad. For Zavier, this state title would mean so much more than another trophy on his shelf.
A state title meant, for a fleeting moment, he’d share the triumph with his community. He’d show kids that there’s more to the world than Lima. In Lima, Ohio, basketball is the way out.
Lima’s population ranks 34th among Ohio cities. It’s more dangerous than 96% of American towns. Lima City Schools District has one public high school.
For many kids in Lima, sports are their only option. The streets would engulf them otherwise. The rec centers are their sanctuary, basketball their religion.
“If you’re a decent basketball player in Lima, you can probably go play anywhere and hold your own,” Quincey said.
When Zavier won Ohio’s Mr. Basketball award in 2016, it was the fifth time the winner came from Lima. His uncle, Greg Simpson, captured the award in back-to-back years in the 90s, followed by Aaron Hutchins a few years later and Jamar Butler a decade after. Lima is also home to former Kentucky and Michigan State stars Tyler Ulis and Travis Walton.
Now, seconds tick off the clock in the state title game. With little time remaining, the score reads 55-55. Then a game-winning floater, one that will be dubbed “The Shot” in Westerville, crushes Zavier’s — and by extension, Lima’s — championship dreams.
“We all felt that we let the whole community down,” Quincey said.
As the team bus returns to Lima, police sirens blare. Sirens are common in Lima, but this time, the police cars are an escort, parading the bus through waves of fans back to the school, where a crowd of more fans awaited their return.
Lima built Zavier. It forged a Mr. Basketball, a local legend and one of the most successful players in the history of Michigan basketball.
Tomorrow, Zavier will rise before the sun. He’ll continue to work and improve his game. It’s the only way to succeed at Michigan. It’s the only way out.
*****
Zavier Simpson wouldn’t stop until he hit 200.
On this night, Zavier knocked out 200 pushups. The next day, he’ll knock out 200 more. Maybe one day he’ll do more than his older brother, Isaiah.
Quincey imbued his household with the competition. Zavier and Isaiah fought to best each other in pushup and leg lift competitions and raced up and down stairs and hills. No matter the age or size gap, Zavier battled Isaiah.
“He would always want to prove himself by doing just as much as his older brother,” Quincey said.
If the competition was one pillar of Zavier’s early life, basketball was the other.
With Quincey on staff at Lima Senior and a coach and orchestrator of many other camps, basketball surrounded Zavier early.
Before he could dribble, he shagged balls for Quincey’s teams, watching in awe at the basketball players before him.
“When I was a kid I used to visualize them like they were the top of the world because that was the position I wanted to be in,” Zavier said.
Before Travis Walton starred at Michigan State, Zavier grabbed his rebounds during Lima Senior’s practices. Jamar Butler’s dad was like a grandpa to Zavier. For Zavier, there was no “before basketball.”
Once Zavier could take the court himself in fourth grade, his competitive drive carried him, from local city games to his dad’s camps.
“At a young age, I started to notice how much he battled,” Quincey said. “He was always competing really hard and that was kind of rare to have for kids that age.”
Despite having his dad perched on the sidelines, basketball under Quincey was never easy for Zavier. Under his dad, there would be no favoritism – quite the opposite, in fact.
When Zavier erred, Quincey punished him harder than any of the other players. He’d run more sprints. His dad would yell louder. He’d captain the inferior team in many games. He’d fight through referees calling against him.
“It made me more mentally strong,” Zavier said. “It made me just want to work extremely hard so I won’t need any help.”
Quincey’s punitive style proved as effective, as his undersized son dominated the opposition, racking up MVP trophies at camps like the Buckeye Prep Elite Showcase in sixth grade.
Eighth grade marked the first of Zavier’s 5 a.m. workouts – a tradition he’s carried to this day – inspired by increasingly difficult competition.
Zavier and Quincey traveled to Atlanta for a top 100 camp, featuring the nation’s top talent, players like Jayson Tatum and Harry Giles, who would be ranked at the camp’s end.
Quincey, always brutally honest, didn’t think Zavier played well enough to reach the top 20, but well enough for the top 40. As the camp ended, 40 names passed, not one of them Zavier Simpson. His fell in the next 10 – the honorable mentions – Zavier emblazoned as one of the 50 top young prospects in the country.
In response, Zavier cried for an hour straight in the car ride home. Zavier’s pain ate at Quincey, so at that moment, he made his son a promise. Quincey and Zavier would work every single day so he’d never feel that pain again and his self-esteem wouldn’t drop that low. To keep his end, Zavier had a choice to make.
“We can go back home and we can play football, or we can really get in the gym,” Quincey said.
With Zavier’s choice obvious, daily 5 a.m. workouts were born.
Zavier grew as a player and saw success, winning a state title with Lima Central Catholic his sophomore year. Yet, as Zavier saw college offers fly at less accomplished players, he knew a change had to happen. So Zavier left a positive environment, a private school, for Lima Senior to play for his dad.
On the floor, Zavier commanded as always, pushing his teammates in hard. The fiery competitiveness fostered from a young age surged in these practices with Zavier at the helm.
“The kids that he played with, they loved playing with him,” Quincey said. “They probably didn’t like practicing with him much because he was so demanding and he didn’t allow you to take shortcuts.”
Zavier carried his success into his senior season, when he broke out as a superstar. An undefeated season heading into the title game. Ohio’s Mr. Basketball. Breaking the Ohio single-game scoring record twice in the same season against the same Fremont Ross team.
And finally, colleges began offering Zavier. Xavier would fittingly be the first high major school, followed by Iowa State, Wisconsin and Illinois among others.
But one school in Zavier’s focus, Michigan, wasn’t ready to offer. Michigan impressed Quincey and Zavier on their visit – the basketball, facilities, academics, everything they wanted was there – but John Beilein didn’t offer, not yet.
“That’s why we respected the process with him [Beilein] so much because he was honest from the very beginning,” Quincey said.
He and Tom Izzo were both chasing a point guard from Detroit named Cassius Winston. When one landed Winston, the other would offer Zavier. And when Winston signed with Michigan State, Beilein offered Zavier a scholarship on his next unofficial visit.
Despite being the last school to offer, Quincey knew Michigan was right for his son. He always preached patience with his players – it doesn’t matter when a school offers, he’d tell them.
“This is where you need to be,” he told Zavier on the car ride home from that visit.
Later on the drive, Zavier tapped Quincey on his leg. He’d be spending the next four years in Ann Arbor.
*****
People didn’t understand it.
“What are you doing?” onlookers asked Zavier.
“I wasn’t a big fan of it, to be honest,” Quincey said.
At first, it was an accident. Zavier didn’t do it on purpose. But as the ball flicked off of his wrist and fluttered into the hoop, it felt natural. The next day, Zavier practiced it with intent. He believed it would work, so it did.
With that, the legend of Zavier’s hook shot and the “Captain Hook” moniker was born.
An anachronistic relic of an era gone by, fewer and fewer centers wielded a hook shot with frequency. What was a six-foot point guard doing, attempting to weaponize this shot?
To succeed at Michigan, Zavier had to stand out. In his freshman season, Simpson played less than nine minutes a game. Under his dad in high school and AAU games, Zavier almost never exited games.
“You go to Michigan and you get a reality check,” Quincey said.
For Zavier, his hook shot made him stick out. Zavier didn’t fit the mold of a typical Beilein point guard. He wasn’t a deadly shooter or a high-powered scorer.
Despite lacking the typical traits of a Michigan guard and despite his age, Zavier carried himself as always, competing in practice and in games, just as he always has, earning Beilein’s trust. It’s all he’s ever known.
“Once he started to see his toughness, once he started to see the competitive edge and how he defended and how he held everyone else accountable and made those guys defend, I think it was a great marriage,” Quincey said.
From a young age, Zavier’s booming voice inspired those around him. That trait never vanished, not even in one of the country’s most esteemed basketball programs.
“His voice definitely carried a lot of weight, kids kind of gravitated towards him.”
Single-handedly, Zavier changed the Michigan basketball culture from an offensive-minded to a defensive-minded one. That shift culminated when, as a sophomore, Zavier led his team to the National Championship Game. Michigan fell short to the buzzsaw that was Villanova but then 20-year-old Zavier held National Player of the Year Jalen Brunson to nine points, shooting 4-of-13 from the field.
Following that performance, the pain of loss overwhelmed Zavier. How could he have willed his team to win? How could he have avoided letting his team down?
“He was hurting for a long time and I was hurting for him,” Quincey said. “It took him a while to get over that.”
In response, Zavier turned to his evergreen escape, the gym.
Heading into his senior season under a new coaching staff, Zavier continued to grind. That constant work sprouted an unlikely friendship with new video coordinator David Metzendorf.
Going from an assistant to a video role, Metzendorf had lots to learn. To be the best, he’d spend hours in his office: The first one in, the last one out. It was the only way.
While Metzendorf improved his craft in the early mornings and the late nights, one player would always be on the court, shooting, in the early mornings and the late nights.
“Before me and X even had a relationship on a personal level, he respected me because he saw me in there and I respected him because I always saw him there,” Metzendorf said.
Immediately, Metzendorf couldn’t miss Zavier’s relentless work ethic, especially in regards to his own job. No player requested more film than Zavier, always looking to watch and learn. They’d often joke about who worked harder.
Zavier asked for all of Michigan’s live practice footage to craft an edit for a player’s only film room to talk about their effort, addressing everyone on the roster, from five-stars to walk-ons. He’d compile all of Michigan’s loose balls, charges and hustle plays to inspire his teammates.
Zavier’s pick-and-roll mastery mesmerized Metzendorf, where he stunned in practice with all manner of reads and passes. Zavier took practices in his senior year as seriously as he always has – if team managers miscounted even one of Zavier’s makes, he’d be furious.
“He wanted to get the highest score every time,” Metzendorf said. “He wanted to win everything, every drill and he went about it the right way.”
In practice or not, nothing kept Zavier from the gym. Before Michigan left for the Battle 4 Atlantis tournament in Nassau, Bahamas, Metzendorf entered the office early – at around 5:30 a.m. – before the team bus left. Like clockwork, he found Zavier getting shots up; he’d been there for at least an hour at that point.
That constant work helped Zavier lead Michigan to a Battle 4 Atlantis tournament victory, toppling future lottery picks Cole Anthony and Tyrese Haliburton and powerhouse Gonzaga on the way to a title. It’s what made Zavier the winningest player in the history of Michigan Basketball and it’s what will give Zavier a chance at the next level.
“I like guys that help you win and that guy did it more than anybody in the history of University of Michigan basketball,” Metzendorf said.
*****
In Lima, a generation of kids rise before the sun.
Their alarm clocks ring. It’s 5:00 a.m. They’ll head to the gym to work out before school.
In an hour, the sun will rise. In two, they’ll drive to school. In three, they’ll return to the court, squeezing in shots between classes and during study hall.
They’ve heard the stories about Zavier Simpson, the legends of daily 5 a.m. workouts, the records broken, the titles reached and the titles won. Each morning, kids across Lima race the sun like Zavier did for so many years. If Zavier Simpson can make it out, they can too.
Zavier Simpson made it out of Lima. He’s a college basketball icon and likely has a long professional career ahead. Yet, Zavier doesn’t forget where he came from. Zavier champions his stardom, especially with kids.
“He’s a guy that loves to come home and be around kids and talk to kids and explain to kids, show them the way,” Quincey said.
Wherever he goes, Zavier Simpson leaves legacies behind. His on-court achievements aside, he left Michigan as a role model off of the court.
When Michigan faced Ohio State in football, Quincey couldn’t help but notice how much the students loved his son. And in the concession line, Quincey felt a tap on his shoulder.
“Hey Mr. Simpson,” the man said. “I want to thank your son for everything that he’s done for Michigan.”
When Michigan players visited the children’s hospital, Zavier lit up rooms, coaxing smiles and laughs out of every kid he encountered. During summer camps, he’d push kids on the court and sign their autographs off the court, sticking around to make sure no camper left without a signature or a picture, no matter how long it took.
“People see him as a serious tough competitor, and he is, but he has the biggest heart,” Metzendorf said.
Years later, Zavier and Quincey don’t talk about that state title loss. It’s still a touchy subject. Quincey wagers nobody on that team has watched that game back. They had the chance to do more than winning a title, to make a real change, and they blew it.
But that loss isn’t what sticks out to the community in their memories, it’s not what sticks out to the kids of Lima, the kids who live in the same rec centers Zavier did.
Once upon a time, Zavier was a timid senior who avoided the spotlight of stardom. Now, he embraces his status. It’s more than basketball.
Stardom bred from all of the 5 a.m. workouts didn’t result in a state title. But that’s not what Zavier worked so hard for. Zavier wanted to impact the community, the next generation and that’s exactly what he did.
“Now he’s embraced it, he stops and talks to kids, he smiles a lot more,” Quincey said. “I think he understands now this is what he’s put all the work in for and this is what comes with being Zavier Simpson.”
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