Michigan State's Cassius Winston, center, stands with teammates during a moment of silence in honor of Winston's younger brother, Zachary, before the team's NCAA college basketball game against Binghamton, Sunday, Nov. 10, 2019, in East Lansing, Mich. Michigan State won 100-47. (AP Photo/Al Goldis)

A death, a decision, and one day beyond basketball

Brendan Quinn
Nov 11, 2019

By midday Sunday, there were no remnants of something so unthinkable, something so unspeakable. The 700 block of Erie Street was quiet. The sirens that swirled the night before, splashing light across the train tracks, across the facade of the frat houses on one side of the street, across the billboard-sized sign reading, “The one place for every you,” were gone. No police tape. No wreaths. No candles. No sign that everything is different now.

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The day after Zachary Winston’s death, there was only one impossibly gray sky above Albion, Mich. It stretched everywhere.

Forty-five minutes to the north, in East Lansing, that’s where the Winston family gathered Sunday, wondering about questions that only come with more questions.

They learned of the tragedy late on Saturday night. They learned their son and brother, Zach, was hit by a train and died. At Albion College, train tracks run alongside a portion of the campus and slice diagonally across Erie Street, where flashing red lights and large crossing signals warn of inbound trains. That’s where Zach, a sophomore, died at age 19.

It was only Friday that Zach had played a game at Mount Union in Alliance, Ohio. He scored 3 points in 15 minutes. It was his first game of the season.

All the natural questions are here. You don’t want to imagine what happened or try to understand why. All you do know is it’s a tragedy and a family is being ripped inside out. It doesn’t particularly matter that Cassius Winston, Zach’s big brother, happens to be a bona fide star and one of the finest young men in college basketball. He’s exactly that, however, and because of it, Sunday’s news went from being one family’s agony to national news.

There’s no natural setting for this kind of mourning, but of all the options, out and in the open is one very few would dare choose. For Cassius Winston, though, the place he felt most comfortable on Sunday just happened to be one broadcast live on national TV and played in front of almost 15,000 people.

Michigan State had a game scheduled against Binghamton and it was Cassius’ decision whether to suit up. Tom Izzo learned of Zach’s death just after midnight the prior evening and was with Cassius until 4 a.m. in the aftermath, and for much of the morning on Sunday. He trusted Winston to do what was best for himself.

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If Winston wanted to start and play all 40 minutes? Sure.

If Winston wanted to head home to Detroit, disappear from the world? Absolutely.

Tipoff was at 7 p.m. A shootaround was at 2 p.m.

No one was quite sure what to expect. When 2 o’clock rolled around, Winston wasn’t on the floor. Fifteen minutes later, he walked into the gym. So did Reg Winston, his father. And Khy Winston, his younger brother — the third of the Winston boys and a freshman at Albion, where he was teammates with his Zach. All three came looking, perhaps, for a moment of normalcy. With that, Michigan State attempted to prepare for a game that, on this day, seemed so decidedly small and insignificant and, just maybe, unnecessary.

Michigan State, a 36-point favorite, didn’t need the Winston family to get through Sunday’s game.

It sure seemed, though, as if the Winstons needed basketball to get through Sunday.

Cassius Winston (5) and his brother Zachary chat together following a Michigan State-Albion exhibition game on Oct. 29. (Adam Ruff / Icon Sportswire via AP Images)

When evening arrived, the band played the same old songs and the seats at Breslin Center began filling in. This was when it became clear that the air was different. Everything was different. Eighty minutes before tipoff, Cassius and Khy sat together courtside. Both wore hoods, looking out from underneath. Khy slung an arm over his older brother’s shoulder. Cassius pulled back his hood, brushed away the tears and walked into the team’s pregame warmups.

For someone with everyone rooting for him, Winston looked like the loneliest man in the world on that court. All eyes followed him. None understood him. Winston seemed to slip into an impression of himself, going through stretches and drills like it was another game on another night. It was still unclear whether the All-American would indeed play. If at any point he decided to pull himself from the lineup, he was free to do so.

“We left it 100 percent up to Cassius,” Izzo said afterward.

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And he made his decision. Winston stood in uniform alongside his teammates across the floor for the national anthem. He bobbed up and down during a moment of silence that must have felt claustrophobic. Teammate Kyle Ahrens put his hand atop Winston’s bowed head.

Winston’s introduction drew a pulsing standing ovation. Assistant coach Mike Garland, a 65-year-old father of three, grabbed him by the head and shoulders, pulled him in close for a last-minute message, and hugged him. He and Izzo fought through tears as Winston walked onto the court and glanced into the crowd, seeing Reg and Khy sitting a few rows off the court. Winston forced a smile. Wendi Winston, his mother, did not attend.

The next two hours, like Winston’s style on the court, played out in slow motion, but went by in a flash. As usual, he was sublime. He hit a 3-pointer one minute into the night and shook his head, pushed out his bottom lip and looked at his father and brother. He finished with a 17-point, 11-assist double-double, a performance that came complete with an array of harrowing passes through traffic and deft scoring. He looked like Cassius Winston.

It was the moments in between when the ball stopped bouncing that the emotion returned. Some minutes on the bench went by with Winston wearing a faraway stare. During a delay in the action with a little over six minutes left, Binghamton’s Sam Sessoms walked over, put his arm around Winston and whispered a message. “I appreciate it,” Winston mouthed. When he checked out for the final time, with 4:46 remaining, another standing ovation washed over the building. Izzo soon joined him, sitting down next to Winston and talking as play rolled by on the floor.

It was all a reminder that Sunday was only the beginning. Monday will be harder. Tuesday, harder still.

Zach Winston is remembered as being the most outgoing of the three Winston boys. He had his own style, his own smile, and an endearing disposition. He was a staple around the Michigan State program for years, joining in offseason workouts and sitting in the postgame locker room in the chair next to his brother’s locker. Speaking to reporters after Sunday’s 100-47 win, Xavier Tillman called him “the kindest-hearted person I ever met.” Ahrens added, “He was a brother.”

As Izzo noted, this is a moment that blurs all lines between games and real life. On Saturday night, when they learned of Zach Winston’s death, Michigan State players were at an East Lansing hotel where the team stays prior to game days. Garland was the coach assigned to stay with the players for the night. He opened up his room, where everyone gathered to sit with Cassius. Izzo showed up shortly thereafter and brought Winston downstairs to wait for his family to arrive. Seeing their teammate walk out into the night, Michigan State players were left to sit and think. It was suggested that everyone go call their families, tell ’em they love ’em. They all reached for their phones and went their separate ways.

There are no blueprints for moments such as these. It’s life.

As for Cassius Winston and the Winston family, there’s tomorrow.

(Top photo of Cassius Winston: Al Goldis / Associated Press)

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Brendan Quinn

Brendan Quinn covers college basketball and golf for The Athletic. He came to The Athletic from MLive Media Group, where he covered Michigan and Michigan State basketball. Prior to that, he covered Tennessee basketball for the Knoxville News Sentinel. Follow Brendan on Twitter @BFQuinn