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Lamar Alan Davis Jr. went by a simple nickname — "Boo."

And his teammates on the Dayton Basketball Club's Kingdom Elite Amateur Athletic Union team would always tease him: "Hey, Boo, remember us when you get to the NBA."

Those hopes were dashed on Saturday morning when Davis, a Trotwood-Madison High School freshman, collapsed and died during an open-gym workout at Wayne High School in Huber Heights. He was 14.

Wayne coach Travis Trice knew Davis and invited him to the open gym, which began at 9 a.m. Davis and his father arrived at the school at 9:30.

Lamar Sr. said his son played well in his first game, and was standing on the sidelines, getting ready to play again, when he collapsed about 10 a.m.

Paramedics attempted to revive Davis, and he was rushed to Children's Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead at 11:08 a.m.

"I'm still numb from the shock," Lamar Sr. said from his Trotwood home on Saturday night. "I still don't believe my son's gone."

Word of the tragedy swept through Trotwood. The junior varsity and freshman football teams played back-to-back home games, and news of Davis' death was announced over the stadium's loud speaker.

The announcer asked for a "moment of silence for one of our classmates and future stars at Trotwood" who had died.

"I can't even begin to imagine what his parents are going through," said Lynn Soto, whose son, Jonathan, was Davis' AAU teammate. "They were just so proud of him. Basketball was going to be his ticket to college."

And beyond.

Davis was a 6-foot-5, 210-pound player who averaged 20 points, 10 rebounds and five blocked shots a game for a 60-12 squad in the spring and summer of 2007, only his fourth season of organized basketball.

With a 40- to 42-inch vertical leap, Davis quickly matured into a dominant player— a man among boys.

"He had all kinds of scouts and colleges recruiting him already," his father said. "He was one of the top kids in the state. Coaches were telling me he was going to be one of the top kids in the country the way he was playing and progressing.

"He was pretty much on his way. He was an honor-roll student. He had tons of friends. Coaches loved him. Everybody loved him. Anybody who met him just fell in love with him."

And that includes Davis' AAU coach, John Hardwick, who discovered him in 2004. Hardwick heard stories about a kid shooting basketball in the driveway of his grandparents' home.

"That's when I went over and talked to his parents," Hardwick said.

Davis' first team was the Dayton Tigers, who practiced and played at the West Dayton Boys Club. He played the next two years with the Dayton Nets before joining Kingdom Elite in 2007.

"The kids idolized him," Hardwick said. "They're talking about putting a picture of him on sweatshirts. Boo would send text messages to me all the time. We texted back and forth Friday night. Finally, I started getting tired. I told him, 'I will see you Saturday' because me and his dad were going to get together. I just never thought it would be under these circumstances.

"I'll tell you what kind of influence he had. College coaches from all over the place were calling me, asking about Lamar. That's the impact this kid had. He was a phenomenal athlete. As far as potential, I put him above (University of Dayton freshman) Chris Wright. Lamar could dunk, block shots and just flat-out shoot the basketball."

At a recent showcase of Ohio's young talent in Columbus, Davis made the all-star team — as a freshman.

"He was so strong," Lamar Sr. said. "He goes to all these showcase camps and makes the all-star teams. He was something special."