4 Baskets for $10K

I was helping my two son's summer/fall tournament and wood bat baseball team in a fund raising effort this evening. We were working for Aramark running one of the concession stands at the Davidson/Western Carolina University Men's Basketball game. During our halftime rush we heard a roar from the crowd in the Ramsey Center. It was not until the start of the 2nd half that we learned there was a winner in the Sonic Drive In halftime contest. A student is selected from the stands to go onto the court and he/she has 25 seconds to hit 4 shots. Sounds easy right. The shots have to be in this progression, first a layup, second a free throw, thirdly a three pointer and lastly from half court. You get one ball and must retrieve your own rebounds. Sounds a little tougher now, huh?

At approximately 10 minutes to go in the game, this clean cut All-American type college kid comes to the concession stand. He was having trouble talking and was shaking. He finally gave us his order, then he apologized for being a little shook up as he was the winner of the $10,000.00 prize money from Sonic Drive In. One of the 15 year old boys in our group asked him what he was going to do with the money. I was waiting on the typical, college sophomore response of "party down at Spring Break" or " keg party at my apartment this weekend". But, he said, "Oh, my Dad is a financial adviser and I am going to give it all to him to invest for me until I finish school". Now, get this, he further stated something along the lines of it will sure make a good down payment on my first home. I thought, wow I like this kid and a half dozen 15 and 16 year old boys just stood there slack jawed, staring at what they thought had to be the biggest idiot they had ever met. I told the young man, if he stays in the area after graduation to come see me at the Western Carolina Properties office on Speedwell Road and I would help him with that first acquisition. I just hope that the kid's Dad is as responsible with the money as his son.