Three Rivers’ Reeves finishes third on ballot

(MCT) — There were signs — years ago — that Lexi Gussert just might be something special when it came to basketball.

As a sophomore, she scored six straight points for Crystal Falls Forest Park to erase a five-point deficit in the final 40 seconds and beat Watersmeet in a tournament game.

The year before, as a freshman, she scored 19 points in the fourth quarter and nearly brought Crystal Falls back in a regional final loss to Bark River-Harris, which advanced to the Class D finals.

But before that, she was making three-point shots with regularity as a sixth-grader. And before that, the annual tournament in L’Anse changed its rules because Gussert, as a third-grader, played on a team of third-graders as well as on a team of fifth-graders in a different division.

We can go back even further to learn why basketball was going to play such a big role in Gussert’s life.

“My grandma got me a doll and a baby stroller,’’ Gussert said. “I just chucked out the doll, threw a basketball in there and walked that around the block.’’

And how old was Gussert at the time?

“It was for my first birthday party,’’ she said. “I was one.”

Now she is The One.

Gussert became the 33rd recipient of the Miss Basketball award today, given