REMEMBER WHEN

BURNSVILLE, W.Va. —  Danny Heater just shrugs when asked about the night 40 years ago when he scored 135 points in a high school basketball game.

He says he doesn’t think about it much anymore.

HEL-LO! It was 135 points! A record that still stands!

“I was happy and sad at the same time,” Heater said when pressed about the game on Jan. 26, 1960, in Burnsville High’s basement gym. “I was embarrassed. I wasn’t raised that way to embarrass people. I didn’t know what to say.

“What do you say when you’ve done that to somebody?”

How about: Play some defense.

The Burnsville coach at the time, Jack Stalnaker, still regrets the 173-43 victory over Widen High, despite his good intentions to win a college scholarship for the son of an unemployed coal miner.

Stalnaker was a tough coach but had a soft spot for Heater, a shy, clumsy kid who would dribble a ball from class to class and once broke his wrists running into a wall at the gym, which had a court 20 feet shorter than a standard court.

Stalnaker came up with the idea before the game to have Heater break the 74-point state scoring record.

“When the coach told us that, we went out to warm up and I said, ‘No, no.’ I didn’t want to do it,” Heater said. “I talked to all the guys and they said, ‘Go for it.”’

Heater, a 6-foot-1 guard who averaged 27 points a game, scored 50 points, mostly on layups, in the first half for a 75-17 lead.

“If I’d shoot and miss and our guy got the rebound, instead of putting it back up, they’d throw it back out to me,” he said.

Burnsville’s full-court press and fastbreak style gave Widen coach Bob Stover fits.

“If I hadn’t been a young coach and afraid of getting suspended, I would have taken my kids off the floor at halftime,” Stover said. “It was a farce.”

All five Widen starters fouled out.

A few hundred spectators attended the game in this town about 80 miles from Charleston, although the gym didn’t have seats for them.

Something else was missing -- Heater’s family. Dad was home sick and Mom decided to stay with him.

At halftime, Heater’s sister, Carolyn, was summoned from a nearby hangout. She watched him break the state record early in the second half, after which Stalnaker called a timeout to take Heater out of the game.

His players had other ideas.

“The boys all got up and said, ‘Coach, you made a fool out of yourself already,”’ Stalnaker said. Some mentioned going for the national record of 120 points.

So Heater stayed in. He scored 55 points in the final 10 minutes.

Stover and Widen’s players were among those who shook hands with him after the game.

Stalnaker telephoned a Charleston newspaper and had a tough time trying to convince a reporter of Heater’s stats: 53-of-70 from the floor, 29-of-40 from the foul line. He also had 32 rebounds and seven assists.

After a few barbs were traded, the paper printed the story which eventually was distributed nationwide.

“I must have gotten 50 to 100 telegrams from ships at sea and troops overseas and individuals saying ‘how stupid’ and ‘what the hell kind of a coach is he?”’ Stalnaker said.

“It’s nice to know it did bring some attention to Danny and his teammates. Now that I’m not coaching and retired, I don’t have to think about running up the score. I just see it from the angle that I intended, that is to help out a poor kid with an unemployed father.”

Heater, now 57, never received a scholarship offer. A retired state senator paid his way to attend college in Richmond, Va. But Heater lasted just six weeks before being overcome with homesickness and guilt over his family’s economic troubles.

He returned to Burnsville and found a job close to home. He eventually moved to Washington, D.C., and for the past 33 years has been an airline ticket clerk.

Heater’s record, certified by National Federation of State High School Associations, is 35 points more than Wilt Chamberlain’s NBA record. Bevo Francis of Division II Rio Grande (Ohio) College holds the collegiate record with 113 points.

“I never thought it would last and I didn’t think it was that big a deal to begin with,” Heater said. “To last 40 years, to me, it’s really something.”