My
memories of Dan Cassidy, a humble, happy, one-of-a-kind young man
BY ED WRIGHT
Dec. 15, 2009, 9:30
a.m.
My first encounter with Dan Cassidy, who passed away tragically Friday
morning in a one-car incident at the age of 21, came during a
winter night in late 2002 in the East Middle School gymnasium.
I was the coach of the 7th-and-8th-grade Plymouth Canton Junior
Basketball Association's Lakers. Dan played for the Celtics, my team's
opponent that night.
Since my son was one of the younger players, I wasn't up to
speed on the talent levels of the eighth graders, which Dan was at the
time.
When it came time prior to the opening tip to pass out
man-to-man defensive assignments to my players, I used the old
"I'll stick my most-imposing player on their most-imposing-looking player, my
second-most athletic player on their second-most-athletic-looking player," and so on.
When I got down to my fifth player -- the somewhat unathletic
kid who would have rather been at piano lessons than playing basketball
-- I pointed at Danny Cassidy and I said, "You cover that skinny guy
over there."
My bad.
Once the first five-minute segment had mercifully ended, the
score was: Danny Cassidy 14, Lakers 2.
The skinny, fair-skinned kid who looked like he had just stepped
out of a Mark Twain novel, swished seven jump shots from all over the
court.
To say the least, I re-arranged my defensive alignments for the
second half.
Unfortunately, the last night I ever talked to Danny Cassidy was
Jan. 19, 2007, the night he nailed one of the most remarkable,
game-winning, buzzer-beating shots I've ever seen, lifting Salem to a
38-37 victory over Walled Lake Central.
I still remember our post-game interview like it was yesterday.
He emerged from the long hallway that connects the Rocks' locker room
to the second level at Salem with his hair still wet from a shower, a
baseball cap tipped up and slightly cocked to the side, and his Salem
letter jacket on.
I introduced myself, he smiled shyly, shook my hand firmly and
gave me his account of the play.
"We ran a stack (formation) on the in-bounds play, then I set a
screen for Grant (Stone)," Cassidy told me. "I rolled off the screen
and I guess I was the only one open. J.P.
(Truesdell)
got me the ball, I pumped-faked, took a dribble and got a good look. I
was kind of surprised I was able to get it off in time."
He recounted the shot in a humble, "geez, I was just doing my
job" manner that I'll never forget.
The last impression I'll remember from that interview was that
while we were talking, Cassidy's teammates walked out of the locker
room, sometimes individually; sometimes in groups of twos or threes,
and each one of them stopped to give him a hug or a high five.
You could feel the love they felt for this guy, their humble
friend with no ego.
That same love emerged this past Friday morning when the phone
rang at 3:11 a.m. at the Ypsilanti house that was shared by his closest
friends.
"It was Dan's brother, Mike, calling, wondering where Dan was,"
a close friend of Cassidy told me. "Dan went to a restaurant with some
of our other friends earlier in the night and came back to our house
after midnight to get his keys. The strange thing was, he didn't stay
for awhile and hang out like he usually does. He just grabbed his keys
and left."
Cassidy's friends filled up their vehicles' gas tanks and went on
a street-by-street search of Ypsilanti for their missing buddy.
"We were hoping his car had broken down or he had a flat tire or
something, and that we'd find him and help him," the friend recalled.
After three hours of not locating Cassidy in Ypsilanti, the
friends gathered at their house before heading back out to look for Dan
just before 7 a.m.
"We decided to drive north on Prospect, to see if we could find
him in that direction," the friend said.
"After driving east on Geddes for a little ways, we spotted two
fire trucks and two police cars off on the side of the road. We got out
of our cars and started running toward the scene, but the fire fighters
yelled at us to stop. We knew it wasn't good."
Down the embankment, not far from where the fire trucks sat,
their best friend's car was partially submerged in a man-made pond.
Given the time that had elapsed since Danny had last been seen
alive and the number of emergency vehicles that were at the scene, the
friends knew in their hearts that the worst-case scenario had unfolded.
They knew that the nicest guy they had ever known, the kid who
never stopped smiling, the friend who everybody liked, was no longer
with them.
And the void his passing will leave is one that will never be
filled.
Rest in peace, Danny Cassidy.
(NOTE: To watch a video clip of Danny Cassidy's amazing,
buzzer-beating shot against Walled Lake Central on Jan. 17, 2007, visit:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tW-xSR8_gao&feature=related
Ed Wright
can be reached at (734) 453-1980 or info@plymouthcantonsports.com.
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