Early in December, the Utah Valley men's basketball team found itself down by three points on the road against Northern Arizona with mere seconds remaining on the game clock.
At the line for the Wolverines was senior free-throw deadeye Ryan Toolson.
Seconds earlier, Toolson had seemingly willed a 3-point shot into the goal, only to have a referee rule he was fouled before the shot attempt, and two shots would be all he would get.
After making his first attempt, Toolson, whose collegiate free-throw percentages rival the best in NCAA history, looked toward Utah Valley coach Dick Hunsaker, indicating he would purposely miss the second shot to give his team a chance at a game-tying, two-point field goal.
"He wanted to miss the next one," Hunsaker said, instead of wanting to pad his stats. "I told him to make it — and he did — which ... speaks of his desire, his competitive fight to win."
In his final season at Utah Valley, Ryan Toolson is poised to make his mark on basketball history, even if it won't ever go down in any record books. With Tuesday's game at North Dakota, in which Toolson was a perfect 6-of-6 at the free-throw line, he now stands with a career
free-throw percentage of 94.2 percent, making 411-of-436 career attempts.
But, given Utah Valley's NCAA provisional status remaining in place through the end of this season, those stats — which are mere 10ths of a point behind the NCAA free-throw percentage record — will never make their way into the official record books. Former Missouri State player Blake Ahearn, who shot at a 94.6 percent clip for his career, will remain alone atop the record book.
"He's right on the brink," said his dad, Mike Toolson. "Whether that's an NCAA record, or off the record, it will always be a record for him, and nobody can take that away. He knows that's a big part of the game — getting to the line."
Ryan Toolson said he's aware of the close proximity of his percentage and Ahearn's career record. He's calculated it out and said he'd be ahead if Ahearn had missed just one more of his free-throw attempts.
"It's always kind of a competition to me to see who's ahead of me," he said. "Or how many free throws I have to make to get ahead of him."
Even if he doesn't make the record books for the NCAA, he's certainly rewritten them at Utah Valley. He's the school record-holder for points in a career, points in a game, field goals made, nearly every 3-point field goal record, and just about anything that says free throw on it.
According to his mom, Cheri Toolson, Ryan Toolson has been getting to the line since he was just a little tyke growing up in Gilbert, Ariz.
When Ryan Toolson was just two, she said, he had a little plastic basketball standard he would play with in the family room. A broken backboard on the standard proved beneficial for the sharp-shooting toddler. Ryan Toolson would bounce a ball down their tile hallway and then run back to the family room. Even without the backboard, Ryan Toolson could make the shot from anywhere in the room.
"That's why we always laugh," she said, "He doesn't use the backboard a whole lot — he never needed to."
In 2003, the tallest team at Gilbert High School wasn't the boys basketball team — of which Ryan Toolson was a member — it was the girls volleyball team, his mom said. But, in spite of what seemed like long-shot odds for a starting five measuring 6-foot-3 and under, the Gilbert Tigers went on to win the Arizona state 5-A boys basketball title. Leading the way for Gilbert was the hot shooting of Ryan Toolson, who was named the Arizona 5A player of the year.
"He wasn't your typical leading scorer on regular teams, because those guys shoot up 30 or 40 shots per game," said Tommy Hambicki, Gilbert's point guard that season. "Ryan took maybe 15 shots per game; he was just really more selective and more of a team player."
Ryan Toolson scored 22 points in the state championship game, which his dad said no one had given the Tigers a chance of winning.
"By golly, who would have ever thought that five kids from Gilbert High — no taller than 6-3, 195 pounds — would win the state championship?" Mike Toolson said. "It was just a great story."
Still best friends with Ryan Toolson now, Hambicki can't say enough about his friend's basketball skills, but he's quick to point out that there's far more to Ryan Toolson than just putting the ball through the hoop.
"You're not going to find a more quality-type person, in my opinion," Hambicki said. "Ryan's one of the few people I can say is a whole-hearted, genuine person."
Just a few short months after the state championship win during their senior year, Hambicki was involved in a rollover accident in which he broke his back, paralyzing him from the waist down.
"He was at the hospital visiting me all the time," Hambicki said. "And always expressed how much I meant to him as friends. He was always there for me like a brother-type person."
Agreeing with Hambicki, Cheri Toolson said a young Ryan Toolson came to her once and gave her $50 of his own money. He asked her to buy a certain pair of Nike shoes, take them to a schoolmate's home, ring the bell and run away.
Ryan Toolson told her the boy had a shoe with a crack in the toe, out of which a cockroach scuttled during P.E. class. He told her he just felt sick when the other kids made fun of him.
"He's just nice," she said. "We'd just sit there and say, 'Hmm, where did you come from?'"
What's nice for Utah Valley is that Ryan Toolson chose to play for the Wolverines. He said a lot of people question his decision to come to play in Orem instead of at BYU or Arizona State.
Signed by Hunsaker in 2002 while in high school, Ryan Toolson was invited to walk on at BYU, which he declined. Even though he wanted to go to school in Utah, he wanted to have the opportunity to play.
"Obviously, he was looking at BYU because his cousin (Austin Ainge) was playing up there and his uncle (Danny Ainge) played there and cousin (Andy Toolson) played there and his dad went there and his mom went there," Mike Toolson said.
"Just looking back now, he's had an unbelievable experience and career at Utah Valley."
Although the best player on the team, according to Hunsaker, Ryan Toolson came off the bench for the Wolverines his sophomore season in his first year back from an LDS mission in Guatemala.
"I had four seniors starting," Hunsaker said. "He lifted all of them because of the mentality and self-assuredness that he has."
Hunsaker said the self-confidence Ryan Toolson plays with is a gift.
"It's a gift and a skill level to make your dream and expectation a reality ... and not accepting less," the Wolverines' coach said.
This season, Ryan Toolson's confidence and motivated play drives his teammates to be better.
"Ryan knows what I expect in our system at Utah Valley, frankly, better than anyone other than myself," Hunsaker said.
He said a number of times this year he'll start to say something to his team and then Ryan Toolson will step in and Hunsaker will back away and let Toolson handle it instead.
In recent weeks, Hunsaker said Ryan Toolson's competitiveness and desire for excellence has driven him to play through some not-so-minor aches and pains as well as illness. Two weeks ago, Toolson scored 21 points in a Utah Valley win against Binghamton after not practicing for the week leading up to it. That's what makes Toolson what Hunsaker calls elite.
"There's no better collegiate player in the state of Utah than Ryan Toolson," Hunsaker said.
Toolson didn't necessarily agree or disagree with the statement, but simply said,
"I try my hardest."
E-MAIL: jdavis@desnews.com
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