DETROIT (10/28/2025) -- The University of Detroit men's basketball team has had a history of smaller guards who have gone on to make big plays.

Walter Poff was just 6-1 and was named First Team All-Missouri Valley Conference in 1953, ending his career with 906 points, and was the first Titan guard to score over 200 points in one season. Ray Albee stood 5-9 and netted over 1,000 career points, helping U-D reach the NIT for the first time in 1960.

The 6-1 pair of Dennis Boyd and Wilbert McCormick helped run some of the best offensive teams in school history in the 1970's, while 6-0 Kevin McAdoo graduated as the school's all-time assist king in the 1980's. 

Rashad Phillips won the Frances Pomeroy Naismith Award, given annually to the best Division I men's basketball player who is 6-0 or shorter in 2001, and 6-1 Antoine Davis tallied 3,664 career points, the second-most in NCAA history when he was done in 2023. 

Enter 5-8 Detroit native Lance Stone, who graduated as one of the best players to ever suit up in the Detroit PSL. At Renaissance, he posted over 1,500 career points and broke the Michigan high school record for assists with more than 850. He was a four-time All-State selection, earned Detroit Mr. Basketball as a junior, the first time a junior ever received the honor, and was the PSL Male Athlete of the Year. 

"Rashad Phillips is the person that people have compared me to," said Stone. "Same build, same heart, and we play with a chip on our shoulders.  I've been compared to him a lot throughout high school and playing in AAU."

While garnering all that attention in high school, Stone was recruited by many programs. He was offered twice by Detroit Mercy, and when it came down to choosing a school, he knew that he was a Detroit kid and wanted to stay home. 

"Detroit Mercy was my first offer when Coach Davis was here," said Stone. "I was always here at practices, and my high school is five minutes up the street, so I was always here. It was like a second home to me. Then, when Coach Montgomery got the job, he offered me again, and I knew I wanted to be here. Coach Montgomery told me that this is a place that wants you, this is a place that wants you to come and play. I had won Mr. PSL, and that was a place in Detroit basketball history, but if you want to stamp your legacy on Detroit basketball, this is the place to be."

The Titans also had another person who helped recruit him, his dad, assistant coach LaMonta Stone, but coach Montgomery had said it was his mother, Tomica, that he had to sit down with. But on the floor, Stone knows the separation between dad and coach.

"He is my dad, but on the floor, I try to see him as a coach. He has been my coach my whole life, and I am comfortable with him coaching. He is great at just being my coach, like a regular player. But I wanted to stay in the city and help turn this program around. My high school team used to be one of the best in the state and the country, winning state championship after state championship. My freshman year, that's all we talked about was the legacy that was behind us. We didn't win the city championship for 21 years until my senior year, and coming here, it can be the same, helping to build a legacy," said Stone. 

The relationship with his dad is special, and coming from a basketball background, one would think that is where the love of the game came from. But basketball was not always the first sport on his mind. 

"I was on track and cross country in high school," said Stone. "Actually, basketball was not my favorite sport growing up. I was always around basketball, but it wasn't my favorite sport. I lived in Ohio when my dad was coaching there, and I played every sport before I moved to Michigan. When I moved to Michigan, he didn't tell me I couldn't play any other sports, but he didn't put me on any other teams. I was more focused on baseball and football than basketball, but I grew to love it."

The other reason for coming to Detroit Mercy was not just the legacy, but also the chance to play with many of the guys he grew up with. He already knew half the team before coming to campus this summer, and that familiarity has helped the team, since college is so different from high school. 

"Everybody is really just bigger, stronger, and smarter, and the willingness to want to win is so much higher," said Stone. "Our team is built solely on the will to win. We have a lot of Michigan kids here, so we've grown up together, played against each other, and played on the same team. Nate and I played AAU together, along with Tyler. TJ and I played against each other. I have known Orlando, Legend, and Keshawn for a long time, so in terms of building that team chemistry, we already have a lot of it.