When Georgia Tech forward Robert Sampson and his siblings were growing up in Richmond, Va., they often matched up in two-on-two games — Sampson and his older brother Ralph III against their older sister Rachel and their father Ralph, merely one of the greatest college basketball players of all-time and a 2012 inductee into the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame.
“I know we were winning those games, even though he probably said the opposite,” Robert said Tuesday of his father. “We were definitely winning those games.”
Indeed, Ralph Sampson said that at least until his boys reached high school, he and Rachel held the upper hand.
However, he said, “they caught us sooner or later and beat us to death.”
For Robert Sampson’s next game, the stakes and circumstances will be considerably different than those driveway contests. On Thursday night, Sampson and his Yellow Jackets teammates will play Virginia, the team his father took to its greatest heights, in the Cavaliers’ John Paul Jones Arena. Further, Virginia is undefeated and No. 2 in the country, a spot it hasn’t occupied since March 1983, when the elder Sampson was dominating college basketball.
Robert said Tuesday that he expects heckling, but “it’s all good. I’m my own person. That’s what my dad keeps telling me. It’s not really pressure, but it’s going to be loud and interesting for me.”
The elder Sampson will be at the game with family. He attended the Clemson game a week ago, but before that had not been to a Cavaliers home game in years, he said Monday.
“It should be a fun game to just be there, playing against my alma mater and watching him play, watching in that environment,” Ralph Sampson said.
Robert Sampson most likely will come off the bench for the Jackets, as he has done for all but one of Tech’s games this season. A transfer from East Carolina, Sampson is averaging 6.4 points and 6.1 rebounds in 21.8 minutes for the Jackets. He scored a season-high 16 points with eight rebounds Saturday against Pitt.
Like his father, Sampson can score from all over the floor and can handle the ball. He often is the first on the floor for loose balls.
“He’s had his moments where he’s shown his ability to do a lot of different things, to be versatile for us,” coach Brian Gregory said. “I’ve been pleased with him.”
As a father, Ralph Sampson attempted to keep the pressure off his sons as they grew up in basketball. He strove to be “Dad” and not one of two men to win the Naismith Trophy (national player of the year) three times. He told them pressure was internal, not external, that no one could make them do something they didn’t want to do.
“When I was a kid, I grew up playing soccer, swimming and football a little bit, but basketball stuck,” Robert said. “For some reason, basketball stuck. Then I started loving the game even more. Plus it was a bonus because my dad was in there, and he could teach me a little bit more from there.”
Robert, who attended Northview High for his first 2 1/2 years of high school before transferring to schools in Las Vegas and then Potomac, Md., played three seasons at East Carolina before transferring to Tech for his senior season. His family lives in Johns Creek.
He has been to Charlottesville, Va., many times, but this will be his first time as a visiting player. Ralph III, who played at Minnesota, lost to the Cavaliers in Minneapolis in November 2010.
“Unfinished business,” Robert said Tuesday with a laugh.
The elder Sampson, who has been able to attend only one Tech game this season as he has tended to his father’s medical issues, will be in the arena rooting for his son and the Jackets, if quietly. He will trust that his instructions about pressure will stick.
“He’s going to be hyped up and excited and ready to go,” Ralph Sampson said.
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