DRIVING FORCE
Senior point guard Wilburn guiding a deep, talented LC team
Tye Wilburn played frazzled at times last year. He played like a player with the weight of a team on his shoulders — alone at times.
Those days are in his rearview mirror. The Lake Central point guard is healthy and happy, feeling good about where his team is at, about where he is and about where they all are going.
The burden has been lifted. He has returned to top form as one of the best point guards in the area.
“I wanted to show I could still do it,” Wilburn said of last season. “I just forced it.”
Wilburn’s predicament was a complicated one for a teenager.
He started as a freshman. There were always high expectations. He was best buddies with Tyler Wideman, the Indians’ Butler-bound center. All the ballers knew of the Wideman-Wilburn duo and how talented they were.
At the end of his freshman year, Wilburn broke his knee cap. It was an excruciating, freak injury — one that he didn’t really want to talk much about.
Wilburn returned to the court his sophomore year and played well with a team led by Glenn Robinson III and Taylor Lehnert.
That team had experienced guys.
The Indians had one senior starter last year. That was Mike Miklusak.
They were puppies, with the exception of Wideman and Wilburn.
Wilburn felt compelled to do it all. In the back of his mind, too, was the nagging thought of the injury. He was healthy physically but he didn’t have to barrel into the lane all that much when Robinson was there. Mentally, there were still some hurdles that he had to clear with the injury last season. Thankfully, that is behind him.
The truth is, Wilburn is the player Lake Central could least afford to lose.
Dave Milausnic, the Indians coach, is playing perhaps with the deepest, best team he’s ever had. The Indians use nine players. They have Wideman inside, a pair of stretch forwards in Tyler Ross and Corey Dickelman, a spot-up 3-point shooter in Matt Meneghetti, who comes off the bench, and depth at the guard position with Robert Ryan and Joe Bannister.
It’s hard to believe that an LC team could possibly be better than the one that had Robinson, Wideman and Wilburn on it but this team fits that description.
The only gut buster of a loss this season for the Indians came at home against Bowman in a game they’d love have back. LC was ahead by double digits in the first half but the Eagles wore the Indians out in the second half. Indianapolis Tech beat the Indians on the road. With Trey Lyles, a Kentucky recruit, Tech is the best team in the state.
Any really good team has a very good point guard. Wilburn is that player this year. “Every phase of his game has dramatically improved,” Milausnic said. “He’s confident. He distributes the ball well. He manages the game. He’s done an unbelievable job.”
His stats bear that out. Wilburn is an efficiency machine. He is averaging 12.8 points per game, 3.8 rebounds, 4.4 assists, and three steals. The breakout number? He is shooting 52 percent from the field, a very good per- centage for a point guard. Wilburn is making 61 percent from 2-point range. That means when he gets through the defense and puts a shot up, he will likely score.
Wilburn says his good play is an extension of what happened last year near the end of the season, when the Indians started to jell. They won four straight then before losing to Munster in the sectional.
Milausnic believes that Wilburn has fully embraced what it means to be a senior — and that why he is playing well. Seniors get choices. They can either agonize about their final days or savor all the moments they have left.
Wilburn is making memories, good ones, he hopes to take with him forever.