LeBron James High School FULL-Ticket (PSA) 8 NM-MINT / Junior Year State Championship "32 Points for LBJ".

LeBron James at the time was a high school phenomenon, and guaranteed a victory the night before, but surprisingly lost, In what turns out to be the biggest upset in High-school sports history!

Roger Bacon baseball coach Tim McCoy overhears wide-eyed freshmen every year discuss the fact that he played basketball against LeBron James.

“It’s funny how it trickles down because the kids that I coach now were babies then,” said McCoy, who was a senior on Roger Bacon's 2002 state championship basketball team.

“It’s like folklore here. People talk about it constantly."

Roger Bacon's 71-63 win over James and Akron St. Vincent-St. Mary in the 2002 Division II state final is one of the most well-known state championship games in Ohio High School Athletic Association history.

"Even to this day, pretty much some kind of memory pops up at least weekly, if not daily,” said Dave Bidwell, a longtime Roger Bacon unofficial assistant coach.

The folklore has grown over the years as James -- a three-time NBA champion and four-time most valuable player -- continues to ascend the record books in his 17th pro season.

"What's really fun is just watching LeBron on TV," said 2002 Roger Bacon player Matt Reed. "It really helps us with the memories of what we did just stay relevant. He's arguably the best player the game has ever seen. And when he does this triple-double or this 40-point night at the age of 36 or 35 -- it's like, 'Did you see LeBron last night?'

"It's pretty nuts. It's still kind of a shock that we beat a team that he was on."

James had 32 points in his team's loss in the state final; he had guaranteed a victory the day before the game.

But Roger Bacon's Spartans led at halftime and led the overall rebounding advantage, 32-18, for the game. Even as James soared down the stretch, the Spartans kept responding.

"Honestly, I tell people this all the time that ever ask me this," McCoy said. "We were the better team. LeBron was the best player in the world. But we were the better team."

The March 23, 2002, state final at Value City Arena in Columbus is the third highest-attended OHSAA boys basketball state final (18,375) in history -- and perhaps the most discussed in the past two decades.

“It's probably been six, seven years since I watched it, but I can watch it in my head all the time,” said Roger Bacon head coach Brian Neal, who was an assistant coach on the ‘02 team.

The Spartans gave James his only Ohio loss on the court during his high school career. The Fighting Irish were 79-2 against Ohio opponents during James' high school career including a forfeit to Akron Buchtel his senior season.

James was selected as the No. 1 pick in the 2003 NBA Draft and the rest of his story in the league is certainly well-documented.