Scott County Central's Hatchett is fearless in game's big moments

To Scott County Central boys basketball coach Kenyon Wright, the idea that Bobby Hatchett will feel any pressure entering his last high school final four is as foreign as the idea that Hatchett will get nervous at the end of a close game.

"I'm going to tell you right now, Bobby thrives on big games like that. That's Bobby's favorite thing to do," Wright said, remembering a moment in the second half of his team's six-point win over Maplewood earlier this season.

"He walked over to me and [assistant] coach [Ronnie] Cookson and we're about to say something to him about doing something," Wright recalled. "And he looks at us and smiles and says, 'Now this is what it's all about right here.'

"He thrives on that. He loves that. That's what he gets going on."

Bobby, an all-stater who averages 20.1 points and 6.6 assists a game, remembers the moment as well.

"When the game is tough like that, you see who's, like, real tough," he said. "You see the players that take their game to a higher level, and once you're playing good and you're taking your game to a higher level, it's fun, especially if you get to win."

The senior has done almost nothing but win in his four years as a starter for Scott County Central's varsity team.

The Braves are 106-12 during his time in uniform with three final four appearances. After a third-place finish two seasons ago, Hatchett and his teammates won the state title a year ago and will have a chance to defend their championship this season.

"I love games like that where you've got to really show what you've got because you work out a lot just to prove to people what you've got so you can get a scholarship and things like that," Bobby said, still recalling one of the few close games he's played in this season. "But yeah, I love those types of game.

"If I would have been in a position where I had to score or whatever, I don't think I would have been nervous. Coach Cookson, he helped me out about that. He just said you've got to have heart or you aren't going to be nobody in life. You can't be scared to fail. That's it."

And so the evolution of Bobby Hatchett, fearless basketball player, continues with him poised to complete the dream of one more state title, instilled in him by his basketball-obsessed school before moving on to the dream of a college degree, instilled in him by his education-first grandfather and mother.

Bobby first picked up a basketball when he was living with his mother, Amiee Hatchett, and his uncle Al Hatchett in Memphis, Tenn.

"From age 5, Al used to say it's very easy for him to catch on," Amiee Hatchett said. "He could show Bobby one move and Bobby would catch on. He always told me that Bobby would be good at basketball."

By the time Bobby was in the third grade his family had moved back to Sikeston, which is where his mother's family was from.

It was then that he met his grandfather from his father's side of the family, Larry Moseley, for the first time.

As Bobby recalls it today, their first conversation went like this:

Mom: "Do you know who this guy is?"

"This is a true story," Bobby interjects in the middle of his own tale. "This is how I met him."

Bobby: "No, I don't know him."

Mom: "This is your grandpa."

Bobby: "Hey."

Grandpa: "Do you play ball?"

Bobby: "Yeah, I play ball."

Moseley was something of a legend at Scott County Central, having coached the elementary teams at the school since 1980, when his son and Bobby's father, Mark Moseley, had started playing.

"I got this team out at Scott Central and I want you to play for them. You think you could play?" he asked his newly found grandson.

"I was like 'Yeah, I can play,'" Bobby said.

After a few visits and with Amiee's blessing, Bobby began to play for his grandfather at Scott County Central, where he met a new set of uncles and cousins -- and even a sister -- for the first time.

"That Saturday he brought me out here and I met my grandma and my sister Marquita [Moseley] and from then on my life really just went a different way," Bobby said.

He immediately was placed on the fifth-grade team along with eventual all-state guard D.D. Gillespie and other future Braves stars.

"I learned a lot, but I remember my first game he put me in and I was dribbling too much," Bobby said, laughing at the memory. "I'm talking about that was the only thing I wanted to do. I didn't pass. I didn't shoot. I just dribbled."

That's when he learned his first lesson from his grandfather.

"I sat him down," Moseley said. "You've got to learn how to pass.

"I think it took about two games before he started to kind of do what I wanted him to do. He caught on pretty quick."

And when Bobby started to catch on, Moseley could see all the tools a lightning-quick point guard needs.

"He knew that I wasn't going to grow that much," Bobby said. "He knew I wasn't going to be that tall, so from then on he just worked on my point guard skills, things that I was going to need to know in the future."

Bobby and his grandfather developed a strong relationship that resulted in him moving in with Moseley in the fifth grade and visiting his mother on weekends.

For him, it meant he would get to play basketball at Scott County Central with his cousin and best friend Otto Porter.

For his mother, it meant that Bobby would get to attend a smaller school and she wouldn't have to worry about him being on the streets while she worked long hours and late shifts.

"He always told me to be unselfish," Bobby said of Moseley. "That's why I like passing like I do. He just told me colleges aren't going to like cocky people, people with attitudes. He's just a people person. That's the way he is."

Bobby remembers he was acknowledged by Cookson, the holder of 12 state titles at the time, when he was an eighth-grader playing with the JV during open gym just after Cookson had been rehired out of retirement to coach the team.

"I missed a layup or something and he just snapped," Bobby said. "He never had said hi to me or nothing. He knew who was I was, right, but he always just called me Mark because I look like my dad."

From that point on, Bobby stayed on Cookson's radar, earning him plenty more tongue-lashings early in his high school career.

"A lot of it was playing to my potential," Bobby said. "They knew I could do a lot of things, but back then, like my sophomore year, I was holding back. He would just be like go all out. I was still kind of in my shell and he used to be on me about things like that."

The Braves won a second consecutive Southeast Missourian Christmas Tournament title this season and convincingly beat rival Sikeston after a heartbreaking loss a year ago.

"I'll take all that back for the state championship," Bobby said. "College coaches, they understand how big it is. Like right now all the schools that are recruiting me, they're kind of giving me some time off."

The time off is appreciated. Bobby said he will take the ACT college entrance exam again in April before making a final decision about which school he will attend next year. He's being recruited by multiple Division I programs, but may choose to play at a junior college even if he qualifies for bigger schools.

"I just want to get a scholarship, and I know I will," he said. "I just want to keep getting better and keep getting mentally better, game wise."

Right now, he's thinking about state title No. 2. In April, he'll think about college basketball and the degree he, his mother and his grandfather want so badly for him.

"I always tell him you think of your education because this dream can end any time," Amiee Hatchett said.

Bobby said he plans to open his own business one day, specializing in apparel for high school athletics.

"I just want to be successful," he said. "I want to get my mom a big house."

That sounds just fine to her.

"I'm proud of him," Amiee Hatchett said. "I love him and I just want him to succeed in life. I want him to do better than I did. That's what I want."