By day she's a 5th grade teacher. By night all-time leading scorer at Anderson University

LAPEL, Ind. -- The kids at Lapel Elementary School say Miss Dellinger is different. Not in a bad way, but in a good, strange, really cool way. She is the only teacher they've ever had who actually plays with them at recess and who can beat -- OK who are they kidding -- annihilate the best fifth-grade boys in a game of one-on-one.

The kids in Miss Dellinger's class say she is fun, strict, nice, creative, kind and pretty. And they love how she keeps mini candy bars and tiny stuffed animals in a corner bin as rewards when they figure out common denominators or where Nevada is located on a U.S. map.

Miss Dellinger is someone who claps really loud when they get too noisy, someone they can tell their deepest thoughts to, someone who almost always has a Gatorade on her desk and someone who, on certain nights, turns into a basketball superstar.

Her students have been there. They have witnessed it, sitting high in the stands at Anderson University's O.C. Lewis Gym. The kids in Lexi Dellinger's class have watched as their teacher -- their teacher -- shoots a basketball better than any player who has ever taken the Lady Ravens court.

"It's kind of weird shouting 'Go Miss Dellinger' when everyone else is yelling 'Go Lexi," said Claire Beamer, who found out her teacher was also an Anderson University basketball star when her mom saw it on Facebook. "It's kind of weird to think that is our teacher out there."

Last month, Miss Dellinger, a 5-5 shooting guard, swished a 3-pointer and became Anderson's all-time leading scorer, breaking the previous 1,832-point record held by Angel Hall.

The announcer's voice boomed of the historic moment. Her teammates cheered. Dellinger smiled, a tiny smile, and bolted back down the court.

Dellinger broke the record on a Wednesday night, her 30th point of that game, after spending all day inside a classroom in Lapel teaching 28 kids math, science and English, molding their minds and being there for them.

Just like Dellinger's teachers were there for her in fourth grade. When her mom unexpectedly died.

'I play for her'

It was supposed to be a routine surgery for Nacole Dellinger, a 36-year-old bank teller, wife of Steve and loving mother to Dustin and Lexi. But something went wrong with that surgery in December 2009. Dellinger calls it a "mistake."

"She passed away ... it was so unexpected," says Dellinger, 23, as tears fill her eyes and it's clear she doesn't want to say, or can't say, much more about that winter day 13 years ago.

Her dad, who managed restaurants, was there for his daughter, but he was grieving, too. Dellinger's teachers stepped up, helping her get through the pain and the loss -- and then she found basketball.

As a little girl growing up, Dellinger loved softball. After her mom died, she picked up a basketball and started playing. There was something about the game, the fast pace, the focus, that helped her get through the tragedy in her life, helped the sadness of not having a mother seem just a little less sad.

Dellinger became a star at South Adams High in Berne, Ind., playing varsity as a freshman. By January 2018 of her senior season, she became the all-time leading girls basketball scorer with 1,126 points, beating the previous record held by Athena Sherwood in 1997.

"Everyone at the top of a scoring list has obviously put time into their game and worked hard to reach such a great accomplishment. Lexi has gone above and beyond to reach this level," Dellinger's South Adams coach, Brett Freeman, said at the time. "She’s small in stature, but big in heart and effort. She fears no one on the court."

The fearless superstar named Dellinger came to play at Anderson and became a force to be reckoned with.

"Their entire defense is around Lexi -- always," Anderson coach Jon Gin said of opposing teams. "Always they try to take her away, but Lex perseveres through it all."

She perseveres because in her mind and heart, her mom is still with her on that court.

"I play for her," Dellinger said as she sat inside her fifth-grade classroom earlier this month. "That has gotten me through every situation in my life. When I have a problem what do I do? Go run and play basketball."

So when Dellinger had a chance to play college basketball and be a teacher at the same time -- a tough, sometimes 15-hour-a-day grind, she decided to do both. To honor her mom.

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'It just kind of fell into place'

Dellinger hadn't planned on coming back for her final basketball season after graduating in 2022, which she was eligible for due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

"After my season ended, I was like, 'I'm OK with that,'" she said. "But then once I got closer to it, I was like, 'I don't know if I can live with knowing that I have one more year to play the game that has gotten me through everything in my life and to have that opportunity and not take it.'"

Then the Lapel job opened up. It was perfect, a fifth-grade teaching job at a school just 13 miles from Anderson University's gym. As Dellinger puts it, "It just kind of fell into place."

And so Dellinger began one of the hardest, yet most rewarding, things she has ever done.

Her mornings begin at 6:30 inside her home just minutes from Anderson University's campus and 25 minutes from Lapel Elementary. She is sitting in her classroom by 7:30 a.m.

"She's really fun and literally the first teacher I've ever had that's really athletic," said Kayliana Whitehouse.

Darby Baute, who plays travel basketball, found out Miss Dellinger was a player, too, the first day of school when everyone introduced themselves. "I thought it was pretty cool," said Darby. "My mom always says, 'How can she teach and play basketball at the same time?'"

Dellinger sometimes wonders that herself.

"Being a first-year teacher is challenging and I just added a lot more stress to myself by playing basketball," said Dellinger, who is also working toward a master's in business. "But I love how I can build relationships with my kids and know that I am having an impact on their life."

When E.J. Andryuk, who is a basketball guru, found out his teacher played, "we clicked as soon as we saw each other," he said. E.J. goes to Miss Dellinger's games and she comes to his games, too.

"The minute he found out she played basketball, he was locked in," said E.J.'s mom, Ashley Andryuk, a first-grade teacher at Lapel. "He's been really engaged this year. I don't know how she's doing it, playing basketball and teaching."

'On the court, she is a beast'

It's 3:20 p.m. on a Wednesday and Dellinger walks to her SUV in the Lapel Elementary School parking lot. She has a game this night against conference rival Hanover. As she does every day, she drives her SUV from school to the O.C. Lewis gym.

On nights she doesn't have games, Dellinger goes straight to practice from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m. then stays around for another hour or so to shoot. She heads home to grade, lesson plan and get ready to do it all again the next day.

"My day is pretty packed," she said. "Sometimes, I'm not sure how I do it myself."

On game days, like today, Dellinger is at the gym by 4 p.m., on an empty court shooting.

"Lex is an all-star," Anderson assistant coach Morgan Douglass says as she rebounds for Dellinger. "She is probably one of the most selfless players I've ever had the privilege of coaching. But that doesn't take away from her ability to be a superstar."

In addition to being Anderson's all-time scorer, Dellinger leads the team in assists and leads the conference in scoring and 3-point percentage.

Before the game against Hanover, Dellinger rarely misses as she takes nearly 250 shots. Maybe 20 or so don't go in. And on each of those shots, before the ball even nears the rim, Dellinger says quietly, "Nope." She can feel when the ball leaves her hand.

"What makes her stand out as a player? Her jump shot, obviously," said coach Gin. "She can shoot the crap out of the ball, but she puts in the work to be able to do that."

Dellinger shoots until she says she "feels comfortable," then takes a break for a dinner of chicken and rice and a slice of pizza before heading to the training room to get a knot rubbed out of her calf and her ankle wrapped.

By then, teammates are in the gym shooting and talking about Dellinger, wondering how she manages to do it all.

"On the court, she is a beast. You would not even notice that she's been teaching all day," said Emily Reed, a freshman shooting guard for Anderson. "She puts in all the extra work when you know that she's got all these things to grade, too. It's just amazing to see how much better she gets even though she has all these other things going on in her life."

For freshman Lauren Smith, Dellinger is a role model. "She is really inspiring. No matter if it's an early morning, no matter if it's a late night, she shows up and she works."

And that is why no one was happier than Dellinger's teammates when she hit the shot that made Anderson University women's basketball history.

"We all celebrated. We all wanted it just as bad as she did," said Smith. "We wanted it for her."

Because, said Reed, "she deserves it more than anybody."

'She wanted to be a star. She wanted to teach'

Coach Gin tried to get Dellinger to play at another program for her final season "because I think she's a scholarship-worthy player." Anderson is a Division III school and does not offer athletic scholarships.

"But she wanted to come back here. She wanted to be a star. She wanted to teach," said Gin. "I said, 'Hey, whatever we can do to make this work.' I know Lexi is good enough and a hard enough worker that she'll make everything work."

On Jan. 11, the Wednesday night after she taught all day inside her classroom, Dellinger showed up at the gym for Anderson's game against Defiance.

She needed to score 30 points to break the record. People were reminding her of that, people like Dellinger's brother and her boyfriend, Tyler Smitherman, an Anderson first baseman.

"They were both telling me, 'Hey, you only need 30 points to get it.' And I've scored 30 points before," she said. "So I knew I could get it, but also I don't want to hurt my team while doing that."

Dellinger kept the idea in the back of her mind, shot like she always does before the game and felt good. When the game tipped off, her teammates kept feeding her the ball. "They wanted me to get it," she said.

When Dellinger made history, the Anderson bench went crazy. The announcer boomed "Lexi Dellinger, the new all-time leading scorer for the Lady Ravens."

"That night was pretty cool," Dellinger said.

But, perhaps, not as cool as the next day at school inside her fifth-grade classroom at Lapel Elementary. Miss Dellinger's students had heard what their teacher had done.

And as happens in fifth grade circles, they started wondering. Could Miss Dellinger make it to the WNBA?

"Oh yeah, we knew she would be in the WNBA," said Claire Beamer. "She is so good."

Dellinger has received a couple of letters from teams overseas, but she's not really interested. She has a career to carry on, teaching fifth grade, a career she hopes leads her to a different side of basketball.

"I would love to one day be a coach," she said. "I just love every part of the game. It has gotten me through so much in my life."

Follow IndyStar sports reporter Dana Benbow on Twitter: @DanaBenbow. Reach her via email: dbenbow@indystar.com.

This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: 5th grade teacher just broke all-time scoring at Anderson University