It’s an early morning in the late 2000s and Silas Melson and his father Tony Melson are walking to Woodlawn Park in Portland for one of their many games of one-on-one.
“We were there like every day,” said the elder Melson. “We started playing and I went up about 4- 1, and I kind of start talking trash like ‘You knew this was going to happen.’ We were playing to 11.”
The final score of the game was 11-4, with Silas finishing on a 10-0 run.
Before settling on basketball, Melson played baseball and football. His father played football at Portland State and said he hoped his son would follow.