By Pat Harty

IOWA CITY, Iowa – Tavion Banks knew the subject would come up at Iowa’s media day event on Wednesday, and it did right away.

Iowa’s senior forward, who is one of six transfers from Drake on the current Hawkeye roster, was allegedly involved in an altercation with staff at a downtown Iowa City bar early Sunday morning.

Banks was charged with public intoxication and disorderly contact, fighting or violent behavior.

“I’m not going into details about it,” Banks said. “Just basically learning off the mistake that I made and be better off from it, and think about the decision that I made.”

First-year Iowa head coach Ben McCollum met with the media before the players did on Wednesday and the fourth question asked to him was if Banks would face a suspension.

“So initially we’ll follow the school code of conduct, and then after that, we’ll have some team rules,” McCollum. “In regards to whether or not there will be a suspension, haven’t necessarily made a decision in regards to that until I completely get the information.

“With discipline issues, kind of for future reference, the way we’ve always done it is — the way I’ve always done it is I’ve always tried to take each case a little bit differently than the last because there’s so many circumstances surrounding each thing.

“Oftentimes coaches have, if he does this, then this happens to that kid, but all circumstances are different. Maybe if somebody else does this, it’s worse, or maybe it’s less or whatever that may be.”

Banks acknowledging that he made a mistake, and that he wants to learn from it is certainly a step in the right direction.

From a timing standpoint, his incident couldn’t have come at much of a worse time since it happened just a few days before media day.

But Banks made his statement and then the media was asked to move on to basketball-related topics.

He was obviously uncomfortable talking about something that he now seems to regret.

It would be easy to judge Banks from this one incident.

But maybe it would help if you knew a little bit more about Tavion Banks and didn’t judge him solely on what happened this past weekend.

Because even good people make mistakes and have poor judgment at times.

And Tavion Banks certainly qualifies as a good person if being good means giving back to those who have helped him along the way.

Banks grew up in Kansas City, Missouri with a single mother who worked long hours to support her family.

It would have been easy for Banks to have drifted down the wrong path with so little supervision at home because his mother was working all the time.

But Banks was fortunate to have other people around him that have helped to steer him down the right path.

There have certainly been some potholes along the way, but for Banks to have made it this far in life shows just how much he has overcome with help from his community.

So after transferring to Iowa, Banks chose to donate a significant amount of his NIL money to the local youth organization in Kansas City that helped to shape his life.

The money has been used to purchase athletic apparel such as football cleats for kids that normally couldn’t afford them.

“I grew up in the Boys and Girls Club and I went to school there,” Banks said. “And I was in the after-school program with them because my mother had to work. I was there from like seven in the morning to eight at night.

“I have people that supported me that are still there. And I was just like, I need to go back there because they helped me out through the sports situation and just watching over me. And just to go back and go to the spot where I grew up in and learned, I feel like I wanted to give the young men and women some hope and let them know that they have support.

“My money is most definitely going back to my community because I have a lot of younger guys and women that look up to me.”

Banks said he also has mentor in Kansas City that took him under his wing as a young child and taught him about life and how to be man.

Life in the inner city can be tough and challenging, and sadly, some kids succumb to the temptations.

So much of the focus is on what’s bad about growing up in an inner city, but there are also positive stories such as Banks who relied on his inner-city community to steer him clear of trouble.

The people around Banks knew that he was vulnerable and they have gone out of their way to protect him and nurture him.

And for that he will forever be grateful and now he wants to say thanks by sharing some of his success.

As a player, the 6-foot-7 Banks gives Iowa an athletic scorer and defender.

He was named the Missouri Valley Conference Sixth Man of the Year this past season, helping Drake to a 31-4 record in McCollum’s only season as the Drake head coach,. Banks averaged 10.1 points and five rebounds while playing mostly off the bench for the Bulldogs.

Banks said Ben McCollum has been one of his biggest supporters, and that’s even more reason to think that this was just an isolated incident since McCollum seems to be a pretty good judge of character.

And though he made a mistake that he now regrets, the good in Tavion Banks seems to far outweigh the bad.

There’s a bunch of kids in Kansas City who share that same opinion, and rightfully so.