In the 26 years since he left the UA basketball program, Harvey Thompson has lived the kind of life you see on late-night, reality-series TV.
He worked in parole probation. He monitored and chased down truants. He counseled those involved in teenage pregnancies and worked with special-needs kids.
"I've seen it all," he says. "It has been rewarding, but there are times I don't miss working with such severe issues."
When Thompson was an all-city basketball player at Cholla High School in 1980, he might've accepted a scholarship to Nebraska and escaped a lot of local drama. Instead, he chose to play at Arizona, which meant he played for Fred Snowden in 1981 and 1982, Ben Lindsey in 1983 and Lute Olson in 1984.
"It's a wonder your brains aren't scrambled when you play for three coaches in three years," Olson said in 1984.
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Thompson indeed got caught in the scramble; he started but four games in his college career and was one of only three Wildcats to run the Snowden/Lindsey/Olson gauntlet.
"It kind of roughed me up," he says now. "But the one thing I understood, even when I was being recruited, was that not everybody makes it to The League, to the NBA. I knew there might be a different life for me after basketball."
So Thompson graduated with a UA degree in fine arts and rolled up his sleeves.
Now, 30 years later, he rides shotgun as his daughter, Cashala, attempts to dribble her way into college basketball and beyond. They agree on one fundamental, the same in 2010 as it was in 1980: It isn't going to be easy.
Cashala Thompson is probably the top returning senior girls basketball player in Southern Arizona. She averaged 15.7 points for coach Steve Botkin's 24-5 Sahuaro Cougars last season and has attracted recruiting interest from West Coast (Cal-Irvine) to East Coast (East Carolina) and parts in between (Utah Valley State).
"The summer has been exhausting; I've been training 24/7," she says. "But it's worth it."
A typical day-in-the-life of Cashala Thompson wears you out just reading about it:
5:30 a.m. - Weight-training and conditioning at LA Fitness with her dad.
7 a.m. to 10 a.m. (most days) - Attempting a minimum of 700 jump shots.
7 a.m. to 2 p.m. (Mondays/ Tuesdays) - Shadowing orthodontist James A. Weaver to begin preparations for an education/career as an orthodontist.
Noon to 2 p.m. - More basketball skills work at the Sahuaro gymnasium.
2 p.m. to late night (three days a week) - Drive to Phoenix to practice with the AAU Arizona Swish traveling team.
7 p.m. (other nights) - Summer league basketball games in Tucson.
9 p.m. (most nights) - Video reviews of basketball workouts and games with her dad, and examination of taped men's and women's college basketball games.
"In July," she says, "I traveled with the Arizona Swish to Oregon, Tennessee, Atlanta and to Augusta, Ga. When we played in Augusta, there were about 200 college coaches in the gym when we played. It was great exposure."
She began her summer schedule, hoping to play against accelerated competition, by playing on a men's team at the Jewish Community Center.
And yet, after all this work - Cashala is also a 3.0 student - Harvey Thompson's daughter doesn't yet have a solid scholarship offer. It might be that a dozen coaches are waiting to see how Cashala performs in her senior season at Sahuaro before making a commitment.
That works, too. Harvey didn't sign a scholarship with Arizona until after his senior year at Cholla.
"I know how it goes," he says. "I work in a mentoring program, part of an academic tutoring program at University High School, so I know how difficult it is to get a scholarship.
"Cashala wants to be an orthodontist. She's a good student and she understands that an orthodontist makes more money than a WNBA player. Basketball isn't going to be her life, but it can help her get the kind of life she wants."
The Cougars don't begin official workouts until early November. That gives Cashala about three months to work on her jumper and her GPA, rehab a sore knee and meet potential recruiters.
"My think my stock has risen," she says. "I've had to sacrifice a lot of things a typical teenager does to get to this stage in basketball, but in the end, it'll all be worth it. My goal is to get a free education, play college basketball and set up my future."
Her future begins now. She is not unprepared.
Contact columnist Greg Hansen at ghansen@azstarnet.com or 573-4362.
