High-school basketball player gets absolutely cleaned out by backboard while going for block

High schoolers have always been susceptible to dangerous trends. From drugs to eraser burns to whatever the hell it is kids are doing these days, 14-18 year olds are regularly led like lemmings to the cliff, all too often by older role models who they look up to. Take Zion Williamson for example. By most accounts, the moon-booted Duke freshman has been a model citizen since he began jumping out of Cameron Indoor this fall. A few weeks ago, however, he launched an alarming craze when, in the middle of a game versus Princeton, he leaped so high for a block, that he hit head on the backboard. The internet, including us, celebrated this as an athletic achievement:

What we could not foresee then, however, was that soon every high school basketball player in America would seen be trying to bounce their dome piece off the glass in order to [air quotes] "Be Like Zion." Take Iowa jump man Blaise Meredith, for instance, who took the Zion worship too far on Wednesday evening, nearly decapitating himself with a block attempt gone horribly wrong (and ridiculously viral). Grab the Tylenol, gather your children 'round, and remind them to ALWAYS look before they leap:

Thankfully for everyone involved, Meredith was able to shake off the haymaker and re-enter the game, aided in large part by Iowa high school basketball's lack of concussion protocol. Zion, however, owes this impressionable young man a call and the nation at large a Nick At Night PSA. If we don't put a stop to this now, who knows how far it could go or how many bright young minds might be permanently, irrevocably extinguished.