Indiana 2023 commit Gabe Cupps named Ohio Mr. Basketball

Published Mar 30, 2022

Alec Lasley • TheHoosier

Senior Writer

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Indiana 2023 commit Gabe Cupps was named 2021-22 Ohio Mr. Basketball by the Media, announced on Wednesday. He had already received the award as voted on by coaches.

Cupps helped lead Centerville (OH) to a 29-1 record and State Championship runner-up appearance.

Centerville carried a 45-game winning streak over the last two seasons into the State Championship game this year. Centerville won the 2021 State Championship.

Cupps averaged 14.3 points, 6.8 assists and 2.0 steals per game this season.

Below is the full release.

COLUMBUS, Ohio –Centerville junior Gabe Cupps was announced as Ohio Mr. Basketball Wednesday by a statewide media panel.Centerville High School and the Ohio High School Athletic Association will hold a ceremony at 3 p.m. Wednesday to present the award to Cupps in the Centerville gymnasium. Media are invited to attend.

Cupps helped lead Centerville to 45 consecutive wins, which included a state championship in 2021 and a state runner-up finish two weeks ago. This season he averaged 14.3 points per game, 6.8 assists, 2.5 rebounds and 2 steals. He has committed to play basketball at Indiana University.

Akron St. Vincent-St. Mary’s Sincere Harris was runner-up in a field that included Sean Jones of Gahanna-Lincoln, Elmore James IV of Lyndhurst Brush, T.C. Molk of Dover and Sean Craig of Sylvania Northview.

Now in its 35th year, the prestigious award was first given by the Associated Press in 1988. It has been voted by the Ohio Prep Sportswriters Association since 2017.

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It is a simple sentence, but it explains so much about Centerville junior point guard Gabe Cupps.

“Gratefulness leads to grittiness,” Cupps said.

It is that grittiness that doesn’t show up in the box score that separates Cupps from most players.

Taking charges, diving for 50-50 balls on the floor or throwing his body out of bounds to save a ball don’t show with points (14.2), assists (6.8) or rebounds (2.5), but they are part of the chemistry that makes Cupps tick.

“I saw it in my parents and grandparents growing up,” Cupps said. “They were never given anything.“Everything they have they worked hard and earned and I learned that work ethic from them.”

That work ethic culminated Wednesday when Cupps was named the 35th winner of the Ohio Prep Sportswriters Association Mr. Basketball becoming the first Elk and Greater Western Ohio Conference player to earn the honor.

Akron St. Vincent-St. Mary’s Sencire Harris was runner-up in a field that included Sean Jones of Gahanna-Lincoln, Elmore James IV of Lyndhurst Brush, T.C. Molk of Dover and Sean Craig of Sylvania Northview.Cupps joins a club that includes current NBA players Luke Kennard (a two-time winner) and LeBron James (a three-time winner) and admits the names in the group is a little weighty compared to him.

“It is super cool,” Cupps said. “I never thought about winning Mr. Basketball and these guys are at a super high level.

“I think of how I was raised as a farm kid in St. Paris and looking these guys have pretty good gifts they were blessed with. I hope I am setting an example for how hard work can get you anywhere you want to go and I hope it is something the younger kids see.”

Cupps moved to Centerville in the third grade when his father – Brook – became the head coach of the Elks, but kept the same hard-nosed work ethic.Not to mention that gratefulness that lead to grittiness.

“The reason I play so hard is because of how grateful I am for the game,” Cupps said. “What if I was never able to play the game the way I can? How lucky am I to be able to play the game and to play something I love so much?

“I know it is cliché, but that’s why I play every game like it is my last game, my last practice, my last shot, my last pass, my last dribble. I am just grateful to be able to do something I love so much.”

Cupps jokes his family says he is a competition addict.He loves the game within the game.And, if he’s playing, he’s playing to win.

“It doesn’t matter if it is checkers or horse in the backyard, or a basketball game” Brook Cupps said. “He’s not joking and I think that translates to how he plays.”

As a child, Cupps would go to the basement and work on dribbling with his left hand, then his right hand.

He would pick a spot on the wall and challenge himself to have 50 straight good passes to that spot with his left hand and his right hand.Brook would reward him with a sticker – something he picked up from when he played at Graham for the legendary Dave Zeller – and Gabe would eat it up.

“I had a giant sticker board in my room and I put all the stickers I got on it so I could keep track,” Gabe Cupps said. “It was setting mini-goals for me and I think that helped develop my passion.”

It is a passion that has carried over to the Breakfast Club.Every morning, Cupps - and a lot of his teammates - are in the gym by themselves getting up shots.He has not missed one since before he was in junior high even though it starts at 5:30 a.m.

"I am not thinking about the hours of sleep I am missing,” Cupps said. “I am thinking about of it as an opportunity to work and get better.”

Gratefulness to grittiness.

That is why the Indiana commit often leaves the court with new bruises from diving out of bounds to save balls, hits the floor to get loose balls and takes pride in drawing a charge on the defensive end of the floor.

“What he struggles with is people who don’t do that,” Brook Cupps said. “When he was being recruited, a lot of the coaches talked to him about that and how much they loved that passion to play the game.”

The award caps off a year that saw Cupps become the fourth player in Elks history to go over 1,000 points.

He also set the school career assist record, helped lead the team to 45 straight wins and made the rounds of college visits before picking Indiana over a final three that included Stanford and the Ohio State University.

In all, it has been a surreal year.

“I never really thought it would happen,” Cupps said. “I wanted to go Division I and I was going to work as hard as I could to make that happen.

“It shows that you can still get what your goal is and that for all that hard work, you get something for it.”

The work is his home.

Brook has heard from people that they wonder if he will maintain the same work ethic when he gets to Indiana.Watching him from the time he was working on dribbling with his left hand in the basement as a child to being in the gym at 5:30 a.m. the day after dropping the state title game this year, he has no doubt it will never leave.

“Work is home base for him,” Brook Cupps said. “If something is going good for him, it is because of the work he put in. If things are going bad, he will be in there because he wants to get better.

“It’s his mindset. It’s what he does.”

And, it is a mindset he will take into next season when he has new wingmen after fellow first teamers Tom House and Rich Rolf head off to college.

“I am just going to work as hard as I can,” Cupps said. “I am going to let the game play out the way it can, but it is another opportunity for me to play the game I love.

“I don’t have to prove anything to anybody, I am just going to play as hard as I can.”

Ohio Mr. Basketball Winners

2022 – Gabe Cupps, Centerville

2021 – Malaki Branham, Akron St. Vincent-St. Mary

2020 – VonCameron Davis, Columbus Walnut Ridge

2019 – Samari Curtis, Xenia

2018 - Dane Goodwin, Upper Arlington

2017 - Kaleb Wesson, Westerville South

2016 - Xavier Simpson, Lima Senior

2015 - 2014 Luke Kennard, Franklin High School

2013 - Marc Loving, Toledo St. John's Jesuit

2012 - Justin Fritts, Mentor

2011 - Trey Burke, Columbus Northland

2010 - Jared Sullinger, Columbus Northland

2009 - Jared Sullinger, Columbus Northland

2008 - William Buford, Toledo Libbey

2007 - Jon Diebler, Upper Sandusky

2006 - O.J. Mayo, North College Hill

2005 - O.J. Mayo, North College Hill

2004 - Jamar Butler, Lima Shawnee

2003 - LeBron James, Akron St. Vincent-St. Mary

2002 - LeBron James, Akron St. Vincent-St. Mary

2001 - LeBron James, Akron St. Vincent-St. Mary

2000 - (tie) Tony Stockman, Medina; Chester Mason, Cleveland South

1999 - Isaac Jefferson, Columbus West

1998 - William "Sonny" Johnson, Garfield Heights

1997 - Kenny Gregory, Independence

1996 - Jason Collier, Springfield Catholic

1995 - Damon Stringer, Cleveland Heights

1994 - Aaron Hutchins, Lima Central Catholic

1993 - Geno Ford, Cambridge

1992 - Greg Simpson, Lima Senior

1991 - Greg Simpson, Lima Senior

1990 - Bob Patton Jr., Youngstown Liberty

1989 - Jimmy Jackson, Toledo Macomber

1988 - Jimmy Jackson, Toledo Macomber

All-Ohio Teams AnnouncedThe Division III and IV boys basketball All-Ohio teams were announced Monday, followed by the Division I and II All-Ohio teams on Tuesday. The teams were selected by members of the Ohio Prep Sportswriters Association.

More about the Ohio Prep Sportswriters Association can be found at: http://www.ohsaa.org/news/OPSWA