MANCHESTER - Lavell Blanchard has always made it a point to look at situations in life from all angles.
A star on the basketball court from his days in the late 1990s, Blanchard led Ann Arbor Pioneer High School to the 1999 Class A state championship, was the Gatorade National Basketball Player of the Year and averaged 27.7 points, 13 rebounds, four assists, two steals, and 1.5 blocks per game.
Even as a teenager, after hours of shooting alone in the gym, Blanchard would walk up to the top row of the bleachers and sit with his basketball, staring at the court to see it from another perspective.