Jack Schroll knew this was the last time he and Doug Sadler would return from a game together as referees.
For over a decade they officiated hundreds of basketball games together, car-pooling so many times through Georgetown and Horry counties as they were on this dark December night in 2004, making their way back from a game at Carvers Bay High.
As Schroll pulled his Kia Spectra into a convenience store parking to refresh he knew had to say something. Schroll had seen Sadler in too much diabetes-induced pain on the court this night, so much that Sadler had to switch officiating positions to take pressure off of his throbbing right foot.
But how do you tell a man who has put 39 years of his life into officiating, who officiated all those doubleheaders after a full day of teaching, that his days as a referee are over?
It was tough, but in the privacy of the dark corner of the convenience store parking lot, Schroll felt compelled to speak.
"How does it feel to have officiated you last game Doug?" Schroll asked Sadler. "I'm an ex-navy Corpsman ... you have to give it up."
Sadler was stunned by the statement, though he knew Schroll was right. His right foot had been hurting. He could hardly run.
"[His diabetes] restricted blood flow to his feet," Schroll said. "The pounding of the game aggravated it. The last game he had trouble with it."
Sadler was concerned about his discolored big right toe connected to the diabetes he was diagnosed with in the early 1990s: "I was hoping against hope that it wasn't anything serious," he said.
But it was. In early 2005 doctors removed his right leg below his knee. While he was in the hospital, doctors determined part of his left leg also had to be removed.
Sadler has taken his loss remarkably well saying last week that "it could have been worse."
Still, for the man whose career earned him and an induction into the South Carolina Basketball Officials Hall of Fame in April, such an affliction seemed unjust.
A fair game
Sadler's sharp dark eyes had seen unequal playing surfaces before due to his family's dark skin.
His late mother was her class valedictorian, but worked as a domestic worker for a pharmacist in Clover. His late father commuted to a textile mill in Gastonia, N.C., though Sadler says he was talented enough - had he had the opportunity - to play professional ball.
Sadler graduated from all-black Roosevelt High in 1964 and then attended South Carolina State. There, three students were killed by police during a heated protest of the segregation of a local bowling alley in 1968. The event became known as the Orangeburg Massacre.
"I could have taken a real militant stance," said Sadler, who wasn't involved in the protest. "But I chose to go another route."
Sadler listened to his mother who had preached fairness and equality to her three sons - Sadler's brothers are now ministers - and that they were "as good as anybody, maybe not better, but as good."
Maybe that is why Sadler chose to officiate to make one aspect of life fair - life on the court.
"I always thought Doug was the same ref on the road or at home," Socastee boys basketball coach Tommy Johnson said. "I always thought Doug was fair."
Hall of Fame skills
As a youth player and even a high school athlete, Sadler never saw a future for himself as an official. But at South Carolina State - after his organized playing days were over - Sadler became interested and took an officiating class.
"Some things you have a knack for," he says.
He proved to be a decisive decision maker on the court. Schroll said he was also a great interpreter of the rules.
"It's not enough to know rules you have to know the philosophy of the game," Schroll said. "Basketball is a contact sport: Did a player place an opponent at a disadvantage or gain an advantage? If you called every thing in a game you'd be there for three hours.
"[Sadler] has a great basketball mind."
Sadler also possessed great tolerance, a virtue that is necessary in the hostile environments of tight, turbulent high school gyms where Sadler says he was accused of "losing over 1,000 games but never winning one."
His "deaf ears" were appreciated by area coaches.
"He didn't have rabbit ears where he was always listening to what was coming from the bench, looking for a reason to give someone a technical," Johnson said. "He would let someone say what they wanted to say within bounds."
Says Sadler: "[The coaches' complaints] are kind of like a callous. Like a constant abrasion [that hardens]."
Sadler quickly learned it was best to avoid conversation with coaches when possible.
"Good officials know if they talk to one coach they'll have to talk to the other," Sadler says.
Most important to Sadler is that he never saw himself, as an official, as the center of attention.
"People come to watch players play," Sadler says. "And sometimes watch a coach coach."
His beliefs were validated as he approached the podium to accept his Hall of Fame plaque in Columbia joining just two other officials [Schroll and Bryan Fink] enshrined from District 11.
It was a validation by peers to the quality of Sadler as an official, to his body work that included multiple Beach Ball Classics, the North-South All-Star game and a state championship - the highest assignment that can be offered to an official during a season.
"The difference between Doug and an average official is, I bet you a dollar that he has a rule book next to him," Schroll said. "And as soon as the season ends I bet he picks it up for an hour of two."
Passing the torchThe season is not over for Sadler.
He is walking now with prosthetics. He is not giving up.
Though he can not be running the sidelines, he and Schroll are now working with young officials passing on the knowledge they have gained over a combined 87 years of experience.
"What good is knowledge if it is not shared?" Sadler asked. "What if Einstein had not shared his knowledge."
And whether it's working with young officials, helping struggling students at Whittenmore Park Middle School or observing officials at a high school game, Sadler is still staying involved with the game, kids, and his passion of officiating.
"He's got spirit," Schroll said. "Just because you can't run the floor doesn't mean you can't be involved."