SportsSeptember 13, 2023
Former Sikeston and St. Louis star Fred Thatch to be inducted into the Bulldogs’ Hall of Fame
SIKESTON, Mo. – If there wasn’t a mandatory five-year wait after high school, former Sikeston Bulldog basketball standout Fred Thatch would’ve been inducted into the Hall of Fame the day after graduation. But like everyone else, Thatch had to wait, and now his time has come to be enshrined as a Bulldog Hall of Famer...
By Derek James/Special to the Standard-Democrat
SIKESTON, Mo. – If there wasn’t a mandatory five-year wait after high school, former Sikeston Bulldog basketball standout Fred Thatch would’ve been inducted into the Hall of Fame the day after graduation.
But like everyone else, Thatch had to wait, and now his time has come to be enshrined as a Bulldog Hall of Famer.
Thatch, along with three other individuals and two teams, will be inducted during Sikeston’s annual Hall of Fame/Wall of Fame ceremony on Friday. A formal ceremony will take place in the Sikeston High School cafeteria while a second announcement will be made at halftime of Friday’s football game against Farmington.
Thatch, a 2018 graduate, was instrumental in leading Sikeston to three district championships, three sectional championships and two final four appearances while being selected as a first-team all-state performer three times.
His teams were 97-21 against a beefed-up, challenging schedule and he was selected as the state’s Class 4 Player of the Year in both 2016 and 2018.
At a sturdy 6-foot-3, 210 pounds, Thatch left Sikeston as the school’s all-time leading scorer (2,382 points) and the all-time leading rebounder (1,198). He is also second in school history with 488 career assists and third all-time in steals with 307.
Those accolades, among others, made his selection into the Sikeston Hall of Fame a formality, to say the least, but one Thatch is honored to receive.
“I think it’s definitely a big deal,” Thatch said of his induction. “I’m a die-hard Bulldog. I love Sikeston. I love all the coaches. I personally think all the coaches taught me the right way to play basketball. It really helped me at the next level because I understood there are pieces to a team and everybody needs to do their role. From a leadership point of view, I took that with me to college and did everything the correct way. I think that’s some of the big things I learned from Sikeston. I’m really excited to come back home and see all the coaches and all the fans.”
His coach in high school, Missouri Hall of Famer Gregg Holifield, said he watched Thatch come up through his junior high program and knew that he was cut from a different cloth.
“His work ethic was just unbelievable,” Holifield said. “He always came in every day in a great mood. He always had a smile on his face. He had such a terrific attitude that was just contagious. He put in incredible time on his own in the offseason and he’s one of the hardest workers I’ve ever coached. He had an unparalleled desire to win and compete, but he also wanted to make our program great.”
Thatch’s relationship with Holifield and his coaching staff remains strong to this day.
“Throughout my whole process I kept in touch with coach Holifield and came back and went to some of the Bulldog games and spoke to the team a few times,” Thatch said. “The relationship I have with coach Holifield I’ve never had with any of my other coaches. All of my coaches from junior high on up, it’s just a family vibe and I’m still close with all of them. They really do care for all their players. It’s just love and they care about winning and winning the right way. They care about the player’s lives and making them better people and not just better basketball players. They’re doing things the right way.”
After a breakout freshman season, Thatch’s teams at Sikeston were consistently considered among the favorites in Class 4 to capture a state championship. Each time, the road to do so was brutal as the Bulldogs had to navigate through one of the state’s toughest district tournaments as well as facing St. Louis’ top teams in the subsequent rounds.
For three straight years, Thatch’s Bulldogs defeated talented, state-ranked Cape Central teams in the district championship game just to make it into the playoffs.
As a sophomore, the Bulldogs made it to the state semifinals before losing to eventual state champion Vashon in overtime at Mizzou Arena in Columbia.
As a junior, Thatch’s Bulldogs reached the quarterfinals but once again ran into the same loaded Vashon team with numerous Division I players on the roster. Sikeston led by 12 in the first half, but couldn’t hold on and eventually lost by nine to the eventual champions.
Then as a senior, after a thrilling district championship win over Cape Central and an equally exciting one-point sectional win over Hillsboro, Sikeston faced off in the quarterfinals against perhaps the favorite to win it all, St. Mary’s, who was led by dynamic point guard Yuri Collins. Sikeston shocked the state by drilling the Dragons 76-50 to make it back to the final four.
But Thatch’s quest for a state title ended in heart-breaking fashion as the Bulldogs lost to Kansas City’s top team and eventual champion Grandview 59-56 in the state semifinals at JQH Arena in Springfield.
Despite coming up short with the ultimate goal, Thatch always fondly looks back on his time as a Bulldog.
“Being a Sikeston Bulldog helped me gain a love for basketball,” he said. “Just from the fans and the environment, it was just incredible. From a fan’s point of view, you don’t see that everywhere – just the love you get from the fans and the great atmosphere. Even in college at a place like SLU, you don’t see those kinds of atmospheres. By far the environment at the Sikeston games was better. I mean we played some big games and we had huge crowds in college, but you didn’t always feel that electricity. A Friday night game in Sikeston was always just the biggest deal and everybody was going to be there.”
After graduation, Thatch went to St. Louis University to play for Travis Ford and the Billikens. What Ford witnessed from him in high school is what Bulldog fans enjoyed watching for four years.
With his thick, muscular frame, Thatch was an explosive leaper and possessed unmatched strength for a guard.
"I saw a guy that brought a lot of winning,” Ford said. “He was a winner at his high school. He had toughness and was competitive in nature. He was a very versatile player both offensively and defensively. He had great strength and athleticism.”
Once Thatch arrived at SLU, his impact was immediate as he developed a reputation as a lockdown defender.
Receive Daily Headlines FREESign up today!
Ford said he always guarded the other team’s best player and that “he could change the game with his defense.”
As a freshman Thatch helped lead the Billikens to the Atlantic-10 Tournament championship to garner an automatic bid into the NCAA Tournament. He played 11 minutes as the Billikens lost in the first round to Virginia Tech, but it was an experience Thatch said he will always treasure.
“That was amazing – winning the A-10 championship was unreal,” Thatch said. “It was one of the happiest moments of my life. You work all fall and all winter and then for it all to come in place shows you all that work was worth it. Then you get on a big plane and fly out to California. When you get there, there’s so much gear and things they give you. Playing on the national stage in the tournament – it was definitely a highlight of my career.”
Following his freshman year, Thatch was ready to take on a larger role with the Billikens, but he began experiencing what doctors diagnosed as a rare condition called isolated myopathy – which is described as a deficiency characterized by exercise intolerance and progressive muscle weakness.
“My freshman year to my sophomore year I made a big jump,” he said. “I was definitely going to be that guy on the team as far as scoring. Me and Jordan [Goodwin] were working out three times and sometimes four times a day. We really over-did it. So when the season started I was kind of drained, but I didn’t pay attention to it. I’ve always been a worker. I always worked out two or three times a day. My body was telling me one thing and my mind was telling me to keep going. You are working out hard every single day and my body just couldn’t recover.”
Thatch only played six games before being shut down for the season and receiving a medical redshirt – the same year that Covid-19 wiped out the NCAA Tournament.
The following year he bounced back and played in 20 games, averaging 5.4 points but with his minutes limited due to his condition. The 2021-22 season was his best, playing in 34 games and averaging college career highs with 9.3 points, 5.5 rebounds and 1.1 steals per game.
Then last season, he played in 13 games and disaster struck again – this time a torn ACL in his knee, effectively ending his season.
With the extra year of eligibility granted to all collegiate athletes due to COVID-19, Thatch could have returned for one more season but he chose to call it a career and start his life in the workforce.
“I mean I love basketball. I really do, but it became a grind and I was just mentally done,” he said. “When I tore my ACL, I just said that’s it. I had another season left, but I had to face reality and let it go. There’s more to life than just basketball. In my entire college career, I had one healthy year, my freshman year. But I don’t want it to sound depressing. I had a lot of fun. I always had a positive attitude. My teammates loved me. I loved them and they always had my support. I really felt I could have made it to the league if I stayed healthy, but it always seemed like something new kept happening.”
After Thatch’s injury, the outpouring of love from the St. Louis Billiken team and community showed just how much he meant to the program.
"I'm as proud of Fred as any player I've coached,” Ford said. “He took full advantage of every opportunity that SLU and SLU basketball put in front of him. Fred Thatch is the definition of what we want a Billiken basketball player to be. He's represented us in a first-class manner off the court as well.
“Gosh, he graduated college in three years. He's had a leadership role on campus. He's done a great job of promoting our basketball program. And on the court, he battled injuries, but he always did it with an incredibly optimistic attitude that was contagious to everybody. He's a great ambassador for us and we think the world of him. Fred was one of our most valuable players on our team and I really feel we would have made the NCAA Tournament last year if he had not gotten injured.”
Indeed, Thatch’s accomplishments off the court are extraordinary for any student, let alone a collegiate basketball player.
In just three years he earned his bachelor’s degree in Marketing with a 3.6 grade point average. He then earned his master’s in Business Administration in one year and a second master’s degree in Supply Chain Management in one year. He carried a 3.9 GPA for both of his masters.
“He took full advantage of taking a great education and developing relationships with everybody here,” Ford said. “How he conducted himself and the way he carried himself every day, he made people want to help him out. People love him. He’s going to be a very successful businessman someday.”
True enough, while his basketball career didn’t go quite like he envisioned, Thatch said he couldn’t be happier with his life now.
He resides in Ballwin, Mo., and is now working for a private St. Louis-based business called World Wide Technology.
“Life is good,” said Thatch, who turned 24 on Sunday. “I’m happy and I’m healthy. Ever since I tore my ACL, life just turned around for me. It’s like the ACL was the low part of me as far as basketball, but ever since then, everything has been on the rise. I honestly don’t have any regrets. I truly think everything happens for a reason. I’m just enjoying the moment right now. I’ve got the master's degrees and the knowledge. I just want to get some work experience and keep learning and growing. I’m adapting to a brand new way of life.”
Thatch says he doesn’t know where life will take him, but he does have dreams of giving back to the community that helped shape him as the man he is today.
He already has started his brand and has hosted the Fred Thatch Jr. Basketball Camp at the Sikeston YMCA for the last three years, but he has other grand ideas.
“I want to open up a training facility in Sikeston someday,” he said. “People in the Bootheel have a lot of talent but we don’t get the exposure that kids in the city get. I’d love to see somebody go to the NBA from Sikeston High School.”
That is something that Holifield would love to see as well.
“It just shows you what kind of person Fred is,” Holifield said. “He was and is a true Sikeston Bulldog. No one’s more deserving than Fred.”
Story Tags
Advertisement
Related
Connect with the Southeast Missourian Newsroom:
For corrections to this story or other insights for the editor, click here. To submit a letter to the editor, click here. To learn about the Southeast Missourian’s AI Policy, click here.
Advertisement
Receive Daily Headlines FREESign up today!
