Kewpies point guard keeps low profile

COLUMBIA — Eric Franklin emerged from the boys locker room downstairs, slowly striding up the steps leading to the foyer of Hickman High School’s gymnasium. Dressed in black Jordans, black jeans and a black Jimi Hendrix T-shirt. the Kewpies’ junior point guard played with his cell phone, ignoring the noise that accompanies a typical day after school at Hickman. Other students shouted, laughed, joked and talked on their way to their various activities, but Franklin was silent. He seemed to subconsciously join a group of his teammates huddled by the stairs, and his calm, controlled off-court demeanor made it hard to believe that this was Hickman’s floor general. If the after-school scene at Hickman was a movie set, Franklin would be an extra, he blended in easily despite his all-black outfit.