Wayne Montgomery found something of a surrogate father in his basketball coach at Thornton Fractional North High School in Calumet City. He lost his father at a young age, so it was Tim Bankston who taught him how to be a man.
He demonstrated a firm handshake. He preached honesty and discipline. He also was a stickler for academic success, consistently asking whether Montgomery studied for exams and finished homework.
“He gave me those things that maybe my mother couldn’t,” Montgomery, now 35, said.
It’s why Montgomery was so devastated when he learned Bankston, 60, had been fatally shot on the city’s South Side Wednesday morning.
A local basketball star who led Chicago’s Simeon Career Academy to a state title in the ‘80s and went on to coach at south suburban T.F. North, Bankston was found with a gunshot wound to his abdomen inside an Auburn Gresham residence just before 10 a.m., per Chicago police and the Cook County medical examiner’s office.
Bankston, of Gary, was pronounced dead on the scene. Authorities reported no other injuries.
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Police are investigating the shooting as a homicide and as of Thursday morning had not made any arrests. The medical examiner also ruled his death a homicide.
According to a police report obtained by the Tribune, Bankston had stopped by the apartment of a friend who wasn’t home at the time. When the friend returned home, he told police he found his rear door left open and Bankston unresponsive on the floor.
“Not a bad bone in his body,” Montgomery said. “He was so much more than just a coach. A mentor, a friend, a teacher. He touched so many lives.”
As news spread of Bankston’s death, tributes from former classmates, students, players, friends and community members began pouring in.
Bankston was best remembered as a player for his starring role in Simeon’s 53-47 victory over Evanston Township High School in the 1984 Class AA final. After Simeon, Bankston went on to play at Bradley University for one year, then two years at Loyola University Chicago.
He continued his career as a coach, taking over the basketball program at south suburban T.F. North in 2002. Bankston was inducted into the Illinois Basketball Coaches Association Hall of Fame in 2004. At T.F. North, Bankston established the annual Bob Hambric Shootout, in honor of the famed late Simeon coach.
In a statement Wednesday, Thornton Fractional High School District 215 said it was “profoundly saddened” by the loss and that grief counseling is being provided to all staff and students. He joined the district in 1997 as an assistant basketball coach and special education teacher’s aide.
“He was not just beloved; he was a mentor that countless alumni credit for being the overriding influence that made them into the positive, productive members of communities that they are today,” the district stated.
Bankston worked as an assistant coach under Rick Runaas, who is now the coach at Lemont High School. It’s going to be a struggle starting the school year without his friend around, he said.
“He just had such a gregarious personality and he made everyone feel welcomed,” Runaas said. “He embraced everyone.”
Bankston was also quite competitive, Runaas said. He couldn’t help but laugh at some of the things Bankston would say to his players or the referees when they coached against each other over the years.
“He was rough on everyone. But it’s because he wanted to succeed,” Runaas said. “He wanted to teach his kids what it took to succeed, not just in a basketball game but in life.”
Hillcrest High School coach Don Houston likewise said Bankston was a “great leader and a great competitor.” He coached with “such great passion,” and it was a pleasure to coach against him, Houston said.
“You always had to be prepared to face him and his teams,” Houston said. “He was always someone that was great to talk to before games. He was just a great person.”
Other longtime friends were mourning his death as well. Ald. David Moore, 17th, met Bankston during freshman year of high school, in shop class at Simeon. They got close, Moore said, after fighting in school. Asked if he remembered what the fight was about, Moore laughed and said yes, “but I’m not going to say.”
In the years since, they stayed friends. Though they didn’t talk every day, they’d check in on each other, Moore said.
Bankston was “hilarious,” Moore recalled. “He kept you laughing.” But when it came to basketball, he possessed a discipline for the sport that shined even as a young player. His legacy, though, will stretch far beyond the court, Moore said. It will endure in the “many young kids … he mentored and kept out of jail, kept out at games and kept out of the graveyard.”
“The number of lives that he’s touched, I don’t think that people can count them,” the Southwest Side alderman said.
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Bankston also had a penchant for the unexpected. He recently became interested in flying drones and talked about wild boar hunting, Runaas said.
As a coach, students and players couldn’t help but gravitate toward him, largely because of his “infectious personality,” said Montgomery, who played at T.F. North from 2004 to 2008. But that doesn’t mean he wasn’t a tough coach.
Montgomery described him as “no nonsense” and someone who didn’t accept less than 100% effort and focus. He joked that his practices at Purdue University Northwest in Hammond weren’t as difficult as those in high school.
“He was definitely hard on us, but he definitely cared about not only me, but everyone that was on the team,” Montgomery said.
He hopes to pass down some of the life lessons Bankston imparted to his 10-year-old son. When catching up with Bankston a few years ago, he even offered to help out Montgomery’s son with basketball.
Years ago, Bankston, in an interview, recalled visiting a former T.F. North player of his at college. They went out to dinner. Bankston later mourned that same player after he was stabbed to death at 22 years old.
“No one can believe it. It’s just so sad,” Bankston told the Daily Southtown at the time.
“He grew up in tough neighborhoods,” Moore said of Bankston. “And so, in these times, with the youth that we’re dealing with — they’re dealing with a lot of trauma, they’re dealing with a lot of things — Tim was able to relate to them in other ways that many other adults could not.”
One of Bankston’s teammates at Simeon was Ben Wilson, a top-ranked player who was fatally shot in November 1984 on the eve of his senior season.
“His life experiences … gave him insight and credibility as he inspired hundreds of students and athletes to be the best players and people they could be,” Thornton Fractional High School District 215 stated.
Bankston’s family, briefly reached over the phone Wednesday evening, declined to comment.
Moore was coming home from an event in Englewood when he learned about Wednesday morning’s shooting, which took place on the 7600 block of South Emerald Street, police said, just a block away from his house. He saw the police tape and immediately got out to see what was going on.
“One of my friends walked up to me and said, ‘Tim was gone, man. Tim was gone.’”