INDIANAPOLIS — On one side of Gainbridge Fieldhouse, Luke Ertel’s family is wearing homemade Indiana Mr. Basketball shirts. On the other side, three middle-schoolers from Mt. Vernon are holding up signs that say, when read consecutively:
Thank
You
Luke
This is a night where the story is appreciation – from Luke, from his family, from his young fans – and the story gets the right ending, too: The Indiana All-Stars defeat the Kentucky All-Stars 94-80 Saturday night, and the Purdue-bound Ertel is named MVP after finishing with 21 points, eight rebounds and eight assists.
What the box score doesn’t show is the way Ertel had assimilated himself into the flow of play, taking what was there and not one thing more, until the game was on the line and Ertel decided to stop taking what was there – and to take what he wanted.
With the score tied at 70 with less than five minutes left, Ertel made two steals, handed out two assists and scored nine points. He also broke down the bigger, stronger, more athletic Kentucky defense twice to set up teammates near the rim, where they were fouled and hit their free throws. Those don’t go into the box score as assists, but let’s be honest:
Luke Ertel did that.
On his final night representing Mt. Vernon, which he led to the 2026 Class 4A title while becoming the school’s first winner of the IndyStar Mr. Basketball award, Ertel did what he’d done for the last four years there – and what he will do for the next four years at Purdue. He competed. He led. He won.
And he was grateful.
“… but you have to appreciate it”
This the first time I’ve seen your son play, I’m telling Mike and Amy Ertel shortly after the game starts Saturday night, but it’s not the first time I’ve seen him in a gym.
Then I tell them about a kid they know well, Julien Smith, Ertel’s former teammate at Mt. Vernon who transferred to Cathedral after their sophomore season but was initially declared ineligible by the IHSAA. Two days later the IHSAA was overruled, and Smith made his Cathedral debut at his new school in late November 2024. I was there that night with Smith’s family, and noticed three players from Mt. Vernon sitting nearby.
One of them was your son, I’m telling Mr. and Mrs. Ertel, and if you didn’t know better – but I knew better – you’d have had no idea there was a future Mr. Basketball winner in the crowd.
“Well,” Mike Ertel tells me, “he’s the youngest of five kids, and we keep him pretty humble. I think he has the right mix of confidence and humility.”
I’m just listening, watching Luke grab another rebound. Mike continues.
“Appreciation is the No. 1 factor in our family,” he says. “We’ll do anything for you, but you have to appreciate it.”
We’re touching on something important about Luke Ertel, something that speaks to who he is, but it’s so vague, right? I mean … appreciation? How do you describe that? I’m asking Mike to do just that, so I can describe it for readers in this story. I prompt him: Is Luke a kid who says “thank you?” What does Luke’s appreciation look like?
Luke’s mom, Amy, gives it a shot.
“We do anything we can for him,” she says, then stops herself and gestures at her husband, Mike. “He’ll do anything him – making him breakfast before school, shooting in the driveway, getting him to the gym…”
Mike looks away from the court, to his wife.
“Well,” he says, objecting softly, leaving it there. You can see humility runs in the family.
“But you have to appreciate it,” Amy Ertel says, completing her sentence, echoing what Mike had said moments earlier. “That means respecting your parents, respecting your family. It’s saying thank you, and he’s a ‘thank you’ kid. Let me try to think of an example for your story…”
Mike speaks up: “Appreciation is easier to see when it’s not there.”
And it’s always there with Luke, huh? That’s what I’m asking his parents.
They’re nodding.
Amy goes back to her notebook. Remind me to get back to her notebook, OK?
Thank you.
Luke Ertel sparks Indiana All-Stars past Kentucky
The Indiana All-Stars are too much for Kentucky, right from the start. Well, Luke Ertel is too much for Kentucky, right from the start. Shortest starter on the court, he grabs five of the game’s first 10 rebounds, overall – and five of Indiana’s first six rebounds – and he turns them into points, grabbing defensive boards and passing ahead to Plainfield’s Noah Smith for a layup and to South Bend St. Joseph’s Nick Shrewsberry for a 3-pointer.
Indiana scored another basket off an early Ertel rebound, this one off the offensive glass, when he leapt for the ball, grabbed it and – in the same motion, before he landed – shoved a bounce pass through traffic to Smith under the basket for a layup.
The Mt. Vernon cheering section behind the Indiana All-Stars’ bench has been enjoying the moment, particularly the three rising sixth-graders holding their signs:
Thank (held by Grayson Burkholder)
You (by Kase Webber)
Luke (by Graham Lockwood)
Next to the kids is Kirk Webber, Kase’s dad. He’s telling my why these youngsters chose to spend their Saturday night driving 30 minutes, each way, to watch a high school exhibition game in a mostly empty NBA gym.
“It’s just their appreciation for everything Luke’s done the last two years,” Kase’s father tells me. “That run to semi-state, then the (2026 Class 4A) state championship – so many great memories.
“Plus, they go to camps at Mt. Vernon. You get there and you think, ‘Man, (Luke’s) not going to be here’ – and there he is. Luke’s there, and he’s so humble. He plays hard, never celebrates himself. As a dad, man, I appreciate that. That’s how you’re supposed to do it.”
On the other side of the court, Amy Ertel is jotting down letters and numbers in her notepad. It’s one of those tiny notepads, maybe four inches by six inches, and she has boxes full of them back home. Amy and Mike Ertel raised five kids, five athletes – they’re all here tonight, by the way, wearing T-shirts with Ertel and No. 1 emblazoned on the back – and Amy has a notebook for each season of each kid’s high school career. Volleyball, football, basketball … that’s a lot of seasons, and a lot of notebooks.
And then there’s Luke’s older brother Michael Ertel, a former Indiana All-Star and possibly the best player in Mt. Vernon history until Luke showed up. Michael played five seasons of college, at Louisiana-Monroe and UAB, and has played the last several years professionally in China.
“It’s a lot of notebooks,” Amy says.
Amy watches Mike’s games on the Internet, and she jots down notes: Every shot – made or missed – and then a notch each time there’s something to add under the letters A (assist), T (turnover) and R (rebound).
“They’re just mom stats,” she says. “Just something to keep my mind busy so I don’t go crazy!”
Luke Ertel’s furious final minutes
Amy’s filling up the page in Luke’s 2025-26 basketball notebook Saturday night – she’s a pro at this – but in the final minutes Luke’s might just give her a writer’s cramp. The score’s tied at 70 when he steals the ball and finds Crown Point’s Dikembe Shaw for a basket (and free throw). He’s setting up Butler-bound Baron Walker of Noblesville for two free throws, then hitting two free throws of his own.
Now he’s hitting a 3-pointer, then driving into the lane and spinning for a right-handed floater – he’s a lefty – then making the inbounds pass under the basket and finding Northridge’s Brady Scholl for a dunk (and free throw).
One minute the game’s tied at 70, but next thing you know Indiana’s subbing out Ertel with 1:06 left so he can leave to a standing ovation. He has just sparked a 22-5 run in 4½ minutes, and this game is over. Amy Ertel can put away her notepad. The kids in the Mt. Vernon cheering section can put away their signs – Thank You Luke – and in a few minutes Ertel can sprint back to the locker room with his celebrating Indiana All-Star teammates and put away his MVP trophy.
After all that, after he emerges into the hallway for an interview, I’m telling Ertel about the three kids with their signs.
“That’s awesome,” he says. “I’m not surprised – they’re from Mt. Vernon.”
I ask him what it means – why it happens – that three kids would come all this way, just to show their appreciation for his high school career.
“I think to the community, winning a first state championship and a Mr. Basketball award shows what’s possible if you work hard, do the right things, do the little things,” he says. “I’m like anyone – I’m not very tall, I’m not very fast or athletic. It just takes a lot of hard work and playing hard to get there.”
Then I tell him about what his dad had told me, about appreciation being “the No. 1 factor in the family.”
“That’s definitely something he would say,” Luke says with a smile. “Just appreciating my family, my school, my town, the game of basketball – appreciating every time you can step on the floor. Our coaches (tonight) said, ‘This the one chance you have to be an Indiana All-Star. You don’t get another chance, so make the most of it.’
“That’s what we tried to do.”
Soon he’ll head back out to the court, where his family is waiting with their homemade Mr. Basketball jerseys and those tiny statistics scribbled into a tiny notebook. And then they’ll all go home, back to Fortville, grateful for the final night of their Mt. Vernon adventure and ready for whatever comes next.
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This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: Doyel: Mt. Vernon’s Luke Ertel heads to Purdue partly because of family pillar
Reporting by Gregg Doyel, Indianapolis Star / Indianapolis Star
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
By Gregg Doyel, Indianapolis Star | USA TODAY Network
