At the culmination of a summer in which he spearheaded Michigan’s Strictly Skills AAU with 29 PPG–including multiple games of 5+ 3-pointers– you can no longer pigeonhole 2024 point guard Noah Vanlaningham as strictly a “shooter.”
Scott Eubank, the founder of Strictly Skills and Vanlaningham’s head AAU coach, is adamant about this.
“Noah’s shooting and IQ are certainly unique assets of his game, but he really possesses the type of athleticism where he can really get any shot he wants,” Eubank explained.
“He can rise up off two feet in traffic and dunk it emphatically. He’s got a really high IQ as a scorer and a playmaker. You just don’t see too many kids at 5-11 go out and get a bucket like he does. He flips a switch in big games. He goes off on individual scoring binges. There’s no doubt in my mind, he’s a special player. His relentlessness and how hard he works is going to translate to the next level of play.”
This switch Eubank references was flipped in a hostile environment, during a four point loss to the plenty tough Michigan Titans this summer.
During a game filled with heated exchanges, augmented physicality, excessive fouls and expletive laden jawing sessions between refs and coaches and even fans, Vanlaningham’s nose for the bucket was evident.
He wound up turning in a game best 39 points, hitting 3s through draping closeouts and barreling his way to the rim through hard contact.
Vanlaningham’s memorable performance even garnered plaudits from the opposing team’s coaching staff.
Your quintessential 1200+ shots per day workaholic, Vanlaningham’s unbridled drive has paralleled his emergence.
He’s trained at a furious pace with both Eubank and his son, Tanner Eubank, a deadeye shooter who starred at Paw Paw HS and later Kalamazoo Valley College, for six consecutive years.
With Strictly Skills’ rapid evolution as the local Kalamazoo area’s epicenter for skill development, Vanlaningham is shaping into the program poster boy.
“I think last season I was considered more of just a shooter,” Vanlaningham said.
“This summer, I’ve really learned to get to the rim when defenders are trying to push me off the line.”
The rising junior’s transition into more of an all around, three level scoring threat has been predicated on an increase in his strength, quickness, and vertical.
Vanlingham will inherit a bigger role at Mattawan HS (MI) this season, the veteran focal point on which the team leans.
He’s also a primary ball handler and distributor and will have a hand in a lot of the offensive output.
Scott Eubank cites Vanlaningham as “the ultimate winning kid,” a guy who routinely wins the plus minus whenever he’s on the floor.
And while the humble and unassuming Vanlaningham has never been a kid who harps on wins and losses, he takes some perspective from each and every performance.
What did he learn from the aforementioned Michigan Titans loss in the aforementioned hothouse environment, where the combo guard morphed into the mad bomber with career best 39 points?
“I think I showed I could play with toughness and mirror that toughness and apply it to my own game,” Vanlaningham said.
“They were playing really physical and really aggressive and talking trash, so it really gave me the motivation to go out and give them some buckets.”
A traditional 3-point play followed by back to back deep 3-pointers got Vanlaningham jump started during the first half.
He then seized the hot hand, kept his foot on the formidable foes’ throats until the very end.
“I think I have to show that toughness and grit when I play being that I am a smaller guy and I don’t pass the eye test,” said Vanlaningham, who has heard from Western Michigan, University of Indianapolis, Notre Dame College, and others.
“I differentiate myself just from the workload and all the time spent in the gym. The reality of it is, I’ve got to work that much harder since I’m 5-11.”
Vanlaningham recalls countless sweat drenched hours playing against his coach, Scott Eubank.
The elder Eubank never took Vanlaningham lightly in one on one games.
Never.
Not even when young Noah was a diminutive middle schooler. Eubank was always going full throttle, and burying the poor kid with a barrage of jumpers.
Now, with Vanlaningham’s recent growth and development of a killer instinct, the scene has changed.
“Coach can’t beat me anymore,” Vanlaningham said. “He doesn’t even want to play me anymore.”
