Needles embraces Russells as family

The telephone was going to ring. T.C. Russell knew it as sure as he knew his name. It was going to ring, and he was going to answer, and life immediately would become more chaotic than the streets of Pamplona with a bunch of bulls running through.

It was going to ring, and he was going to answer because there are people among us with a heart as big as their conscience.

“My wife said, ‘OK, now you’re done talking about it, so go get them and bring them home,’ ” T.C. said. “That was the end of it.”

More importantly, it was a beginning.

Darra Russell is a fine high school basketball player and today a Class 2A state champion for Needles (Calif.), which outlasted Agassi Prep 81-78 in the title game Saturday at the Orleans Arena.

It is fitting the senior scored his team’s final two points, that it was Russell who stood at the free-throw line four times over the last 16.3 seconds.

When you know the depths of sadness he has, you sure as heck want to be the one who delivers others to the mountaintop.

His uncle T.C. drove from Needles to Las Vegas that May afternoon in 2003, drove here and collected Darra and his four siblings ranging in grades from second to a high school junior and took them from an existence of drugs and danger. Took his brother’s children off the streets and offered them a home and, for the first time in forever, real hope.

Darra’s mother was at The Orleans on Saturday to see her son score 25 points and grab eight rebounds, but his father wasn’t. The last anyone heard, he was sitting in the Clark County jail.

“My brother has always walked that fine line,” said T.C., a deputy sheriff when he isn’t assisting the Needles team. “He has had opportunities. Some take them. Some don’t.”

But to Darra, he had countless moms and dads watching. T.C. is a Needles graduate, former UNLV football player and legal guardian of the Russell children; his wife, Cynthia, holds everything together; and Needles is the small town 90 minutes south of here that embraced those five kids as its own.

“An amazing place with amazing people,” Darra said. “We had guardian angels come and get us. If they hadn’t, I’d probably still be on the (Las Vegas) streets doing something I have no business doing. We’re good kids for the most part. We make mistakes like all kids, but we’re good kids.

“Needles took us all in and put its arms around us and welcomed us from the first day. How I live my life from here on out is how I will repay everyone there.”

He missed an entire year of school while living with his parents during those tumultuous times. Just stayed home and never went. Just sort of skipped the sixth grade.

Darra repeated the time upon arriving in Needles, and as his academic standing improved, his athletic skills matured. He and fellow senior Stevie Kidd — an outstanding player who scored 27 points on Saturday — now have won state titles in football, baseball and basketball.

You could see Darra at the junior-college level to start, a player with versatility and control to his game. His coach has known him for eight years and started him since he was a freshman.

“It’s very emotional,” Needles coach Jeff Plank said. “Darra has been through some tough adversity in his life. But I think we were able to give him some direction, a light at the end of the tunnel. He’s a great kid. It’s a success story that goes way beyond Needles.”

Two years ago, Darra attended the state tournament here and kept the stat book for the girls team. That day, before departing, he told a few arena officials that he would be back in 2009, that the Needles boys would return and win a championship.

On Saturday evening, he stood at the free-throw line four times over the final 16.3 seconds and transformed that dream into a reality.

“I saw the atmosphere here that night and just wanted to get back so bad,” Darra said. “So we worked and pushed and pushed and did it. … In a way, I wish my dad could have been here to see it, but he’s not. But my family is. Needles is family. The whole town.

“The past was hard, man. Real hard. But being here now, having won state … I’m telling you, life doesn’t get better than this.”

Las Vegas Review-Journal sports columnist Ed Graney can be reached at 702-383-4618 or egraney@reviewjournal.com.