With Division 1 skills, grades and SAT scores, the former Newark Central standout seemed to be going places until it all fell apart
Keywon Savage was supposed to be at basketball practice the night his life began to disintegrate.
A chiseled, 6-foot-3 guard, Savage had the three things so many college recruiters coveted: Division 1 skills, grades and SAT scores. He was a 1,000-point scorer at Newark Central High School, an all-state selection and the type of player who seemed to get better every time he stepped on the court.
Keywon Savage was going places.
“I used to tease him,” said Alif Muhammad, an educator in Newark who watched Savage blossom on the court, “‘You ain’t no thug. You’re the only thug I know that gets an A in chemistry.’”
Savage was the one his coaches, teachers and friends were betting on to beat the streets, the one who would “make it out,” as they often said. Until the relentless violence that surrounded Savage growing up finally derailed everything.
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On Feb. 19, 2014, a fight at Central High escalated to a brawl. School officials, fearing it might turn even worse, canceled after-school activities, including basketball practice. Savage had nowhere to go; no cheering crowd, no watchful coach.
Later that same night, police say three men, including Savage, attacked a Union Township man shoveling snow in his driveway and stole his money and car keys. The men then led police on a chase down Route 22 before crashing near Newark’s Weequahic Park. All three were charged with robbery and resisting arrest.
Keywon Savage was in trouble.
He maintained over and over that he never got out of the car that night or attacked anybody, and he was confident he would be cleared and get back to basketball.
But as the case dragged, there would be more trouble. He was arrested for drugs and guns and spent eight months in and out of jail. He would be banned from his high school, kicked out of the gym where he had once been serenaded by adoring fans. Recruiters who spent months courting Savage now wanted nothing to do with him.
The final chapter came last Tuesday when Savage died at University Hospital in Newark. He had been shot two nights earlier. City police found Savage wounded — apparently the victim of an ambush — on the same 200 block of South 11th Street where he had been connected to a November 2015 shooting and where his close friend was shot and killed in December of 2015.
Keywon Savage was dead at 20.
“He should have been on somebody’s college campus playing basketball,” said Shawn McCray, his coach at Central. “That’s where he’s supposed to be. It’s just like you get caught up and you don’t know how to get out of it.”
McCray is among the coaches, friends and family who were floored by news of Savage’s death. He had been released from prison Aug. 17, records show, and loved ones hoped he was ready to turn his life around. Savage even was talking about trying to play competitive basketball again and hooking on with a college team once his journey through the court system was complete.
For parts of the past six months, Savage also had been cooperating with a story NJ Advance Media was pursuing. The story would detail Savage’s transition from prized recruit to someone who dominated pick-up games on the courts of the Essex County jail and then, perhaps, found his way to college.
Instead this is the story of how Keywon Savage went from can’t-miss Division 1 prospect to the 89th homicide victim this year in Newark — all in the span of 1,014 days that began innocently enough when basketball practice was cancelled.
‘A REALLY GOOD STUDENT’
Entering his senior year at Central, Savage’s life seemed to be in order, coaches say. It was no small feat. His childhood had been chaotic as his family bounced all over Newark, and his father, William Harris, was mostly in jail, leaving his mother to raise four boys alone. His oldest brother, Taquan Harris, ran with a tough crowd and would be indicted in October 2016 in the slaying of a 23-year-old New Jersey Institute of Technology student.
“I’m not going to say I had many role models because I really didn’t,” Savage said in a phone interview earlier this year from Essex County jail.
When he was 8, his mother moved the family to Atlanta, thinking the change of pace would help her boys. But inner-city Atlanta was a lot like Newark, and the family moved back to New Jersey four years later, earning Savage the nickname that would stick: Country.
Shawanna Savage tried keeping her boys on track, and Keywon seemed to listen.
“I always talked to them about, ‘It’s so, so easy to get in trouble, so, so hard to get out of it,’” Shawanna Savage said in an interview earlier this year.
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Keywon Savage started taking sports seriously at Central, playing four years on the varsity basketball team. By junior year, he was going to all three Central practices — freshman, junior varsity and varsity — and averaging 17 points and 6 rebounds on the way to third-team all-state honors.
He also excelled in school, making mostly As and Bs, teachers and coaches say.
“The astounding thing was he was really a good student,” said Muhammad, who ran a postgrad team for which Savage occasionally played.
College recruiters started paying attention the summer before his senior year, when Savage played AAU with the New York Panthers, a top regional program. North Carolina-Wilmington, Rider, Wagner, Central Connecticut State and others began recruiting Savage, his coaches say.
“He’s rare — that he had his SATs and the GPA,” McCray said. “There’s always kids that have one and not the other, and he had both and he was a Division 1 player.”
His senior season, Savage averaged nearly 19 points and led Central to nine of 10 wins down the stretch. On a freezing night in February of 2014, Savage dazzled for the Blue Devils in a packed gym, netting 20 of his team’s 41 points. Late in the game, he drained a pair of crucial free throws to lift Central to a three-point victory over Verona and surpass 1,000 points for his career.
Eight days later, practice was cancelled for the brawl at school.
‘THE DAMAGE WAS DONE’
Savage spoke vaguely about what happened Feb. 19, 2014, saying he was hanging with friends and “one thing led to the next.”
According to Union Township police, Savage and two others jumped the 57-year-old man shoveling snow in his driveway and made off with his money and car keys. Savage and the other suspects were indicted on charges of conspiracy, robbery, eluding an officer, aggravated assault and resisting arrest.
Michael Simon, Savage’s attorney, said Thursday, “There was no evidence he ever got out of the car. There was no evidence he took part in any agreement to rob this individual. We were ready to go trial on these charges.”
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Savage had turned 18 less than two months before the incident, and the alleged robbery was the first time he had ever been in serious trouble. He said he wasn’t sure what to do.
“Nobody was stepping to the plate and everything was falling on me and other guys that was innocent,” Savage said. “I’m thinking, ‘I’m not telling on nobody because that ain’t in my blood, so I guess I’ll have to take what they give me and go along with it.’”
With no prior record and a reputation as a strong athlete and student, Savage figured the charges would be dropped. But with co-defendants involved, the case “kept prolonging on, prolonging on, prolonging on,” Savage said.
“Some cases take longer than others,” Simon added. “Certainly I wished for it to go faster than it did.”
After his arrest, Savage was bailed out of jail, finished his senior season at Central and graduated that year. He played AAU over the summer, plotting his next move. But with pending charges, recruiters stopped showing interest. After all, when they Googled his name, the Union charges popped up.
What’s more, Savage said he could not leave New Jersey as a condition of his release, keeping him from playing for a local junior college, which would have required out-of-state travel.
“The whole world tuned out,” Muhammad said. “Nobody was touching him.”
Savage tried to keep structure in his life, getting a job on a food delivery truck and practicing at Central and sometimes even sitting on the bench like an assistant coach. Then in January of 2015, McCray says Savage exchanged words with a Central player on the bench during a game, and afterward Savage punched the player in the locker room. Savage was banned from the school, and McCray was suspended for the incident, the coach said.
“He apologized,” McCray said. “But the damage was done.”
Cut loose from the structure, Savage started hanging in the streets more. He was arrested in December of 2015 and indicted this year for possession and distribution of 104 vials of cocaine and 106 envelopes of heroin, according to the Essex County Prosecutor’s Office.
The case was ongoing, and he had been scheduled to appear before Judge Siobhan Teare on Nov. 28, the day after he was shot.
Savage also had faced aggravated assault and weapons charges in connection with a November 2015 report of gunfire on the 200 block of South 11th Street, according to authorities. A grand jury later declined to indict him on those offenses, officials said.
Savage was in jail from Feb. 15 until he was released for the last time Aug. 17, records show.
‘HE GOT AMBUSHED OUT THERE’
Shortly before his release, Savage learned the Union Township charges that held up his life for more than two years were dismissed and a misdemeanor disorderly persons offense was remanded to the municipal level.
As of November, the Newark drug charges remained the only felony case standing between Savage and a fresh start.
During an Oct. 26 phone interview from his mother’s home, Savage talked about looking for a job, trying to get back in shape, maybe going to community college and trying to play basketball. The plans were flimsy.
“Before I do anything I got to try to make sure I don’t have to go back to jail,” Savage said.
When asked if he was worried about falling back to the streets, he became defensive.
“I don’t have to worry about nothing,” Savage said. “Now that I’m here, I don’t have no worries about what I’m going to do. Whatever I’m going to do, I’m going to do.”
PHOTOS: Keywon Savage through the years
Savage was shot last Sunday in virtually the same spot where he had previously found trouble. The November 2015 shooting that once was pinned on Savage happened in the identical 200 block of South 11th Street. It also was the same place where Tyquan Rogers, one of Savage’s best friends, was shot to death in December 2015.
“He was back on the corner and he got ambushed out there,” said a Newark police officer who declined to be identified because they are not authorized to speak publicly. “We don’t have any good witnesses. We don’t have any good information why. He definitely got caught with his guard down out there. A guy coming up, he never saw it coming, basically.”
Simon, Savage’s attorney in Union County, said he was struck by how young Savage was when he died.
“Just meeting with him I could tell he had the build and the drive to be a great basketball player,” Simon said. “It’s a shame this is how he met his fate. My hope was that I could get him out from under this Union case and then I would read an article about him and say, ‘There he goes. That’s where he belongs. Scoring 20 points in some college game.’
“This is not the article that I ever expected to read about Keywon.”
When McCray learned of Savage’s death, he was overcome. He said he had warned Savage over and over to stick to sports and school. They had traveled across the East Coast for tournaments, talking about the future and basketball. McCray’s cell phone is filled with pictures of Savage holding championship trophies from various tournaments, smiling wide over the accomplishment.
Himself a reformed gang member, McCray of all people figured his message about the perils of the streets would resonate with Savage.
“He was around me for four years and I would bring it up in practice, ‘You kids aren’t built for this, you’re going to die out there,’” McCray said. “All this stuff I pumped into him, it didn’t register. I feel bad for the family, but that’s what you get when you go out there. It’s part of the game.
“I gave you four years of instruction, of guidance,” McCray continued. “I almost lost my job because of you. If you’re not going to change your ways, this is what happens. This is what comes from standing out here on the streets.”
Matthew Stanmyre may be reached at mstanmyre@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @MattStanmyre. Find NJ.com on Facebook.
Tikeemah J. Lassiter (Photo: Dept. of Public Safety)
