Manhattan's Laue, playing with one arm, is an inspiration

Kevin Laue usually doesn't come off the bench until late in the game, if at all. The 6-11, 230-pound center is averaging a shade more than three minutes per game in his freshman season for Manhattan College.

But he might lead the NCAA in one very important statistical category: lives touched.

Laue became the first one-armed athlete to play NCAA Division I college basketball when he suited up for the Jaspers this season. And it's a good bet that no college athlete has impacted as many strangers as he has.

Hundreds of people, each with his or her own story, have reached out to Laue. Some stories stick out more than others.

There was the Facebook message from the one-armed waitress working extra shifts to put herself through college. There was the comment from a man in Italy who had lost hope after losing a limb. And there are e-mails upon e-mails from parents all over the country, thanking Laue for giving their disabled child a role model.

"I play with one arm, I was born this way and I've accepted it,'' Laue said. "For me, the great thing about all this is I'm getting to inspire people by playing basketball, by doing something I love.''

Laue (rhymes with wow) believes he is lucky: He could have been stillborn. When he was in the womb, the umbilical cord was wrapped twice around his neck, with his left arm wedged in between. The arm's circulation was cut off, severely stunting its growth so that it ends just below the elbow, but doctors said its position allowed blood to reach the brain. Said Laue, "My arm saved my life.''

Laue grew up in Pleasanton, Calif., and was encouraged to play sports like other kids. From the start, his mother refused to coddle him. She bought him tie sneakers, not Velcro, because she didn't want him to feel different from other kids. He played Little League baseball, swinging the bat one-handed like a mallet. Jim Abbott, the one-handed pitcher who threw a no-hitter for the Yankees in 1993, was one of his early heroes.

Kids could be cruel growing up, but he learned early that a sense of humor was the best way to deal with them. Said Laue, "I sometimes tell people that a shark bit my arm off.''

As he grew and grew, basketball became his sport. Laue attracted some notice from college recruiters as a junior at Amador Valley High when he developed into a ferocious shot-blocker and aggressive rebounder. He also showed he could hit open jumpers, using his shorter left arm to pin passes against his right hand and guide his shot.

He showed how he could catch a pass by using the nub of his arm to buttress the ball's landing as he gripped it in his gigantic right hand. And when he rebounded, he used his right arm to haul the ball down and into his body.

But after suffering a broken leg his senior year, he failed to get a Division I scholarship offer.

Franklin Martin, a filmmaker and former Hofstra basketball player, had met Laue at an AAU basketball tournament. He encouraged Laue, an "A'' student, to move to Virginia and enroll at Fork Union Military Academy, a school whose basketball program has produced more than 1,000 Division I basketball players.

"I knew right away when I met Kevin that he was someone very special,'' said Martin, who is producing a documentary film on Laue's life. "He's been a fighter since before he was born. He could have settled for a smaller school, but I just felt he needed to dream big.''

Although Laue had an impressive year at Fork Union, by the end of the basketball season, no one had stepped up with a full-ride Division I scholarship offer. Laue was strongly considering Colgate, which was offering only the promise of a possible scholarship down the road, when he got a call from Manhattan coach Barry Rohrssen.

Rohrssen had a scholarship open up in April when guard Chris Smith informed him he was transferring. At about the same time, Brother Thomas Scanlan, then the college's president, read a newspaper story about Laue and e-mailed athletic director Bob Byrnes to ask if they had considered recruiting him.

Rohrssen brought Laue in for a visit and immediately liked him. The coach said he got calls from friends and fellow coaches who were concerned that he was risking his job by "wasting'' a scholarship.

"I didn't see it that way,'' Rohrssen said. "Coaches give all kinds of chances and breaks to guys who don't deserve them because they might help them win. I felt if anyone deserved a break, it was a guy like Kevin, who was a smart kid who had done everything right.

"This is not just about basketball. Some things are bigger than basketball. Kevin has an incredible story, and it has really affected a lot of people.''

In an odd twist of fate, one of the people Laue's story has affected most is a childhood friend of Rohrssen's.

Skip Connors was at a hospital in Manhattan getting ready to bring home his newborn son when a neighbor called him on the cell phone to tell him that Manhattan had signed a one-armed player. Connors' son, Jackson, had been born with only one hand.

"I had been going through a time of not knowing, not knowing how to deal with the unknown,'' said Connors, who coincidentally had played basketball his freshman year at Manhattan. "I couldn't believe it. As soon as I could, I called Barry.''

Connors has become a regular at Manhattan home games and a close friend of Laue's. He recalls getting choked up the first time he saw Laue tie his shoes with one hand. Connors is saving newspaper clippings, video clips and other mementoes from Laue's career so he can show them to his son when he gets older.

Laue has played in 14 of the Jaspers' first 25 games, shooting 3-for-7 from the field and 1-for-7 from the free-throw line and totaling 12 rebounds. He had eight of them against Vanderbilt.

Laue is looking forward to contributing more on the floor as he learns the system and adjusts to the college game at Manhattan. But at the same time he is following his dream, he is thrilled that he can encourage others to follow theirs.

Said Laue: "Honestly, I never thought of myself as inspiring, but I do love helping people. If my playing basketball can do that, I think that's great.''