Justin Ahrens thrived growing up in Versailles
VERSAILLES — The remnants of a basketball life can be found throughout the Ahrens house.
The cozy home nestled into five acres of trees featuring a historical basketball hoop in the driveway opens to reveal a warm living room with an expansive dining room table. It’s as much inviting as it is practical for a family that counts eight immediate members. Lofted above the kitchen is the master bedroom, complete with a nook featuring wooden spindles that meet a waist-high railing.
Two of the spindles don’t quite match the others. That’s where, roughly 10 feet above the main floor, a Nerf basketball hoop used to be. And as you look upward, where a glass chandelier once hung before it was struck by a basketball a few times too many, a permanent reminder of the sport lies under your feet.
As Kevin Ahrens was at work one day, his wife, Susan, taped a 3-point line on the wood floor so she could play with her fourth child, Kyle. The black electrical tape has long been removed, but its remnants persist.
“It pulled up the varnish,” she said with a laugh.
It was in this household, amid a rural town that is fiercely protective of its own, that Ohio State senior forward Justin Ahrens fell in love with the game, came of age and became the second child in his family to play Division I basketball.
“It was crazy,” Justin said of his upbringing. “It was awesome, though. I love it. Being a sports family, we were always competing in everything.”
Justin Ahrens: Enjoying a small-town upbringing
Kevin and Susan Ahrens come from large families. He counts five siblings and she has six brothers, so after having four children of their own (Bryant, Bethany, Jacob and Kyle), they were undecided on whether to have one or two more when fate gave them a surprise: twin boys. On Nov. 24, 1999, Alec and Justin were born, rounding out the eight-member family with six kids spread across 10 years.
With a fraternal twin, Justin had a built-in best friend who would eventually help push him to reach new heights in his athletic career. From a young age, basketball was part of that equation. He was about kindergarten age, Susan said, when, while playing at the Darke County YMCA, he showed a unique appreciation for the sport.
“I remember him saying, ‘Mommy, it’s like magic. I just know where the ball’s going when I shoot,’ ” she said.
In addition to the in-house battles that frequently broke household decorations — an angel statue with a busted wing was turned to face the wall, for example — the family inherited the old high school backboards when the gym was being renovated. As Kevin tells it, while he was a member of the basketball coaching staff, the athletic director asked him to “make them disappear.” It took three guys and the use of a backhoe and forklift to move them to the Ahrens home, where one is in a driveway that looks straight out of “Hoosiers.” Another is in the barn.
It’s a fitting testament to the town of fewer than 3,000 residents situated slightly northwest of Piqua, where Main Street runs east-to-west and features front porches bearing ceramic tiger statues as a nod to the school mascot. The football stadium, dedicated Sept. 19, 1930, is set just below street level and adjacent to a bowling alley. Not far away sits the Versailles Inn, currently being renovated after a devastating fire, and Gus’s Café, open for business through lunch.
When you enter the town from multiple directions, you’re greeted by statues of a woman holding a basket of eggs with a rooster nearby. The town is home to the annual Poultry Days festival that last year set a record with 30,000 chicken dinners sold.
“It’s country life on steroids,” Susan said. “I don’t think (Justin) liked doing his homework, but I can’t say I blame him. In that way, he might be a little ornery. He pretty much followed the rules. All our kids did. It’s a town that makes it pretty easy to do.”
“You’ve got your honor,” her husband said with a nod.
And, in Justin’s case, you’ve got your built-in friends. Four of them shared a bedroom while the two oldest occupied the basement, and the siblings still play video games with each other as they’re spread throughout the real world. AJ, Bryant and Kyle recently completed a Spartan Race, an endurance course featuring multiple obstacles spread across several miles, and Kevin said he hopes Justin will join them once his playing career is over.
“I wouldn’t trade it for the world, growing up in a big household like that, always knowing you have someone in the house to hang out with,” Justin said. “That’s how it was growing up.”
Ohio State allows Ahrens to make the most of his talents
Now in his fourth year at Ohio State, Ahrens remains a rotation player on a team chasing a Big Ten title and hoping for a deep NCAA Tournament run. Voted a team captain and consistently praised by coach Chris Holtmann for his unflinching work ethic and daily example of being a great teammate, Ahrens’ production has waned following a COVID-19 layoff that forced him to watch the family’s Christmas from his Columbus apartment via FaceTime.
He is 12 made 3-pointers shy of finishing among the 10 most prolific shooters in Ohio State history.
Although his mom preferred her kids to be multi-sport athletes, Justin opted to focus solely on basketball by the time he reached high school. As he watched his older brother play his way through the AAU circuit and into a Michigan State commitment, Justin wanted the same for himself. After his eighth-grade year, he told his parents he wanted to play AAU ball. Although he knew his son was talented, Kevin said he privately wasn’t sure his 5-foot-9 son was on pace to follow his older brother.
Then he came out of his room one day and announced he had found his own team thanks to a friendship with Dwayne Cohill, a Cleveland-area prospect in his class. It was a starting point, and it led to friendships with Robby Carmody (now at Notre Dame) and Darius Bazley, a one-time Ohio State commitment who skipped college basketball and is now with the Oklahoma City Thunder.
Ahrens and Bazley were particularly close, leading to an awkward parental exchange between mother and son shortly after his 16th birthday. Roughly four months after getting his driver’s license, Justin called his mom to ask if he could drive to Cincinnati to pick up Bazley and bring him to Versailles. She demurred, saying she wasn’t comfortable with him driving there on his own so soon. Could she pick his friend up later?
“Well actually, mom, I’m getting off on the Finneytown exit right now,” he told her.
“Very independent,” Kevin said with a laugh. “I trust him. He was one of the responsible ones, (but) he’s got a little heavy foot.”
Entering his senior season of football, AJ went to a summer camp at the University of Toledo, but about five minutes in he suffered a leg injury that would significantly impact his final season at Versailles. As AJ rehabbed to get back in action, Justin led the student section from the stands. In the yearbook, he’s captured looming over his classmates with his chest painted with the letter “E” to help spell out the school’s mascot. When AJ went out for shot put as a senior, Justin cheered him onto the state finals, where he achieved a goal of reaching the podium with a sixth-place Division II finish.
AJ looks more like Kevin’s side of the family while Justin takes after mom’s side, both parents said.
“He was my best friend growing up,” Justin said of his twin, who is finishing a degree at Wright State University’s Lake Campus in Celina. “Obviously when we were younger, we had our arguments and bickered just because we were probably tired of being around each other, but when we got to high school and middle school and were playing sports, it was awesome.”
In his senior yearbook, Justin was listed as one of the school’s “heartthrobs” and was voted “most likely to like their own post” on social media.
Digital life aside, he’s got a sweet side. He’ll often ask his parents for photos of their two dogs, Anna and Elsa, whom he affectionally refers to as his “girlies.” When they go to church, Justin is the one holding the door for his mom and generally sitting next to her.
And if she wanted to go shopping, whether it was to Walmart or the grocery store, Justin was always game — especially if it involved looking for shoes.
“Justin’s the one I would take if I wanted to have fun at the store,” she said.
Dad will tell you fishing stories. An adept fisherman, Justin was about 10 years old when he went to the bait store with his dad and Susan’s brother, John Wampler, to pick out rubber worms.
Kevin protested: Son, you’re wasting your money. Justin countered: It’s my money, isn’t it? Dad relented, Justin bought the rubber worms and had the last laugh.
“He had the first four fish in the boat that day, and neither of us had a bite,” Kevin said. “John’s like, ‘This damn kid.’…