{"id":56,"date":"2018-12-20T12:33:17","date_gmt":"2018-12-20T20:33:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/?p=999931886"},"modified":"2018-12-20T12:33:17","modified_gmt":"2018-12-20T20:33:17","slug":"cabrillo-high-school-basketball","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/cabrillo-high-school-basketball","title":{"rendered":"’10 fingers are overrated’: Cabrillo High basketball player leads team in scoring despite disability"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

Cabrillo High basketball player Elijah McGeen leads team in scoring<\/a><\/p>\n

Senior Elijah McGee is leading the Cabrillo boys\u2019 basketball team in scoring this season, and he\u2019s basically doing it with one hand.
\nMcGee, 17, was born with Amniotic Band Syndrome\u2014 a congenital disorder caused when the fetus has an appendage wrapped up in uterine bands during the pregnancy.<\/p>\n

Posted by Long Beach Post<\/a> on Thursday, December 20, 2018<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n

Senior Elijah McGee is leading the Cabrillo boys\u2019 basketball team in scoring this season\u2014and he\u2019s basically doing it with one hand.<\/p>\n

McGee, 17, was born with amniotic band syndrome\u2014a congenital disorder caused when the fetus has an appendage wrapped up in uterine bands during the pregnancy. That\u2019s what happened to McGee\u2019s left hand, and despite only having a fully developed left thumb, he\u2019s excelled athletically and in the classroom.<\/p>\n

Casey Dowling, McGeen’s mom, said she knew something was wrong almost immediately after her son was born.<\/p>\n

\u201cI didn\u2019t see him for almost four hours after he was born,” she said. “I didn\u2019t even know what he looked like, or what was wrong. When they brought him back in he looked perfect to me. All I could think about was the things he wouldn\u2019t be able to do in life, but that only lasted a week or so. I came to terms with it. There\u2019s no reason for him to not learn to tie his shoes. There isn\u2019t anything he can\u2019t do.\u201d<\/p>\n

McGee was also born deaf, and although he grew out of the blockage that caused it, he had to attend speech and physical therapy throughout his childhood. Dowling also suffers from lupus and rumitoid arthritis, and McGee\u2019s older brother Matthew Dowling, 19, is autistic.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Casey Dowling stands next to her two sons Matthew Dowling, center and Elijah McGee, right, at Cabrillo High School In Long Beach December 13, 2018. Photo by Thomas R Cordova<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

It would make sense for the whole family to feel hard done by with medical misfortunes, but that\u2019s not how they see it.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt first my mom used to tell me that God made me this way on purpose, so I should just be used to it,\u201d McGee said. \u201cI don\u2019t really even think about it anymore.\u201d<\/p>\n

Dowling is originally from California, but McGee was born in Virginia where Dowling was serving with the U.S. Navy. McGee’s father is not in the picture.<\/p>\n

His mom’s military background played a big role in raising her children.<\/p>\n

\u201cI didn\u2019t not let him try things even though it scared me,\u201d Dowling said. \u201cI let him get on the monkey bars, and he fell and busted all the teeth out of the front of his mouth. I felt like a bad mom. But, he\u2019s got his teeth and he survived. It didn\u2019t scare him so why should I let it scare me?<\/p>\n

\u201cHis wanting to do stuff made me more willing to want to let him do it. I didn\u2019t want him to get older and ever wonder what it\u2019s like to play basketball, or anything that someone does on a daily basis with two hands. Ten fingers are overrated.\u201d<\/p>\n

McGee has always been fast and athletically gifted, so he excelled at football and running track while growing up in South Carolina. However, watching his older brother play basketball inspired McGee to try out for the local team, and he fell in love sport. His life changed dramatically again three years ago when Dowling moved her family back to Long Beach.<\/p>\n

\u201cI didn\u2019t really want to start over and make new friends,\u201d McGee said. \u201cThe hardest part was getting used to all of the people. It\u2019s more crowded here. I was born in the South so I\u2019m used to it being slow over there.\u201d<\/p>\n

McGee said the family atmosphere of the Carbillo basketball program and teammates like Sirjohn Hardiman, Allen Hewlett and Miguel Figueroa helped him feel at home. Being really good at the sport also helped, and it didn\u2019t take first-year coach Kyles Hawkins long to notice he had a special player to lead this team this season.<\/p>\n

\u201cA lot of coaches try to force him one way but it doesn\u2019t work,\u201d Hawkins said. \u201cHe\u2019s learned through life and obstacles to get through it. It\u2019s unique in this day and age of basketball to be able to compete, and to be our leading scorer, it\u2019s really amazing.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"
Cabrillo\u2019s Elijah McGee In Long Beach December 13, 2018. Photo by Thomas R Cordova<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

McGee also got a lot of support from the local Frontline AAU Travel Ball Program, which specializes in giving back to the low income families, single parents and veterans of the greater Long Beach area.<\/p>\n

\u201cJust the way that he plays you can\u2019t tell that he has a disability,\u201d Frontline coach Seti Lam Sam said. \u201cI do the same things with him that I would do with any other player. We go through all of the drills. He doesn\u2019t want to be labeled as that guy who gets left out of a drill because of his disability. He\u2019s going to do everything that we do regardless.\u201d<\/p>\n

McGee is an aggressive player who loves to take the ball to the basket and get to the free throw line, but he also has a smooth jump shot that has helped him average over 15 points per game this season.<\/p>\n

\u201cI have younger kids in my program right now who look up to him as a mentor and older brother,\u201d Lam Sam said.<\/p>\n

McGee is also an accomplished artist. He grew up drawing his favorite comic book charters, and even has some original art hanging in the Columbia Museum of Art in South Carolina. This month he won a writing contest at the local Boys & Girls Club, and wants to study architecture while hopefully still playing basketball in college.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy mom always inspires me and tells me to keep going,\u201d McGee said. \u201cIf you really want to do something, just keep trying. When I first started playing I was scared I wouldn\u2019t make the middle school basketball team. But I made it, and it made me think I could do anything.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThere isn\u2019t a day where I wake up and think that my son has one hand,\u201d Dowling said. \u201cHe\u2019s Elijah. He still has to clean his room and wash the dishes. They\u2019re all plastic because he drops them a lot, but he still has to do everything other teenage boys have to do. He\u2019s no different.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“He doesn\u2019t want to be labeled as that guy who gets left out of a drill because of his disability. He\u2019s going to do everything that we do regardless.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":238,"featured_media":16419,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"newspack_sponsor_sponsorship_scope":"","newspack_sponsor_native_byline_display":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_native_category_display":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_underwriter_style":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_underwriter_placement":"inherit","inline_featured_image":false,"newspack_ads_suppress_ads":false,"newspack_popups_has_disabled_popups":"","_":"","_author_alias":"","cap-aim":"","cap-description":"","cap-display_name":"","cap-first_name":"","cap-jabber":"","cap-last_name":"","cap-linked_account":"","cap-newspack_employer":"","cap-newspack_job_title":"","cap-newspack_phone_number":"","cap-newspack_role":"","cap-user_email":"","cap-user_login":"","cap-website":"","cap-yahooim":"","newspack_article_summary":"","newspack_email_html":"","newspack_email_type":"","newspack_featured_image_position":"","newspack_hide_page_title":"","newspack_hide_updated_date":false,"newspack_post_subtitle":"","newspack_show_share_buttons":"","newspack_sponsor_byline_prefix":"","newspack_sponsor_disclaimer_override":"","newspack_sponsor_flag_override":"","newspack_sponsor_only_direct":"","newspack_sponsor_url":"","newspack_article_summary_title":"Overview:","newspack_show_updated_date":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[27],"newspack_spnsrs_tax":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-56","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports","tag-basketball","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/238"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=56"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16419"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=56"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=56"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=56"},{"taxonomy":"newspack_spnsrs_tax","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/newspack_spnsrs_tax?post=56"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=56"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}