A Raider Legacy: Doniphan's Max Owen commits to TRC

Legacy means a lot in sports. Passing something down from one generation to another.

For Doniphan’s Max Owen, he’ll continue the legacy of the Owen Family at Three Rivers College as he committed to play basketball for the Raiders, just as his dad Mike Owen did in the 1990s.

“A big relief just being able to know that I kind of have a good vision of the future,” he said after his recent commitment.

Owen was a 1,000-point scorer for the Dons in his career and averaged 19.3 ppg and 6.2 rpg during his senior season.

Basketball wasn’t all Owen played for Doniphan in high school as he was a standout on the track for the Dons as well but that wasn’t where his heart was.

“I was pretty successful in that too,” he said of track. “I had a lot of coaches asking me about track but I knew that I wanted to continue with basketball mainly because I love the sport … Track, it was fun to do it but my heart belongs to basketball.”

For most basketball players growing up, they hit a point where they realize playing at the next level was possible but that wasn’t the case for Owen.

“My whole plan was to play college basketball. I neverw thought it would just end at high school,” he said. “I always told myself I would play at the college level. I always tried to keep that goal in my mind.”

Owen’s coach at Doniphan, Daniel Cagle, coached Owen for seven total seasons, including three years in middle school and junior high before being at the helm of the Dons all four years of Owen’s time in high school.

When asked if he knew Owen would turn into the player he is, Cagle said the one thing most people already knew plus some other things he’d observed about Owen.

“I knew he was going to be tall,” he said. “I also paid close attention to Max

because I knew he was going to be good eventually but at that age he was talented but he couldn’t really shoot, never played outside at that age. Mostly inside guy. He started developing around junior high, around seventh grade, he was in the gym a lot. He fell in love with the game.”

Cagle said the best part of Owen’s game right now is his ability to shoot the deep ball even though opposing defenses dialed in on him throughout the season.

Even

with the added pressure, Owen still

shot 38.7% from long range.

But he knows there’s still more in the tank.

“I think there’s still a lot more in him when he gets aggressive,” he said. “I think he’s a really talented kid and I think there’s more in him than we even got in high school.”

Owen joins another area TRC commit in Dexter’s Cole Nichols with both suiting up for the Raiders next season.

Owen said it’ll be great to have those behind him to continue to be in his corner.

“It’ll be nice because I’ll still have the support,” he said. “It’ll be great to still have that to keep me going and make sure I stick with it.”

Cagle agreed.

“I like to go watch Three Rivers play but I will go to more games and my excitement level, and I think everybody is like this around here, is a lot higher and you’re more into it when you’ve got local kids that you know are going to be playing. Kids you follow and have a connection to,” he said.

Owen’s former coach also said what kind of player the Raiders would be getting.

“The athletic ability is going to be there,” Cagle said. “He can defend at that level and he can really shoot the basketball. I think for him, he’s going to have to get used to handling the ball versus that type of pressure he will see and then also just his confidence level. Being able to understand he can do more than just shoot the basketball. I think he’s capable of being a guy that that can attack the rim a little more. Sometimes he settles for the three too much. With his athletic ability, I think he can do more than that offensively.”

Even though he’s not going far from his hometown. Owen said he’s already looking forward to being out on his own and having to make decisions for himself.

“Independence,” he said. “I’ve lived with my family my whole life and always having help, it’s only 30 minutes, I’ll still have help but I’ll also have independence with basketball and life. That’s something I need in my life and I’m looking forward to trying that out.”