"He was a giant of a man in every single way possible," Scot said.
When Scot was 12, the family moved from Utah to San Diego, where he first noticed his father's health begin to decline. Three years later, Pearl was diagnosed with cardiomyopathy, at the age of 53. He was put on the heart transplant list but needed an organ donor similar in size.
Given his towering height, finding one would be nearly impossible.
"We knew it was a death sentence," Scot, who was the youngest of six children, said. "I was just thinking, 'God, I'm going to grow up without a dad.'"
One morning in October 1991, Scot was making his way up from the beach after surfing in gym class. Pearl happened to drive by in his white, city-issued pickup truck and stopped for a quick chat with his son.
A few hours later, Scot received a phone call from a friend. He said Pearl's truck had crashed into a country club parking lot and paramedics were on the scene.
Pearl had suffered a heart attack behind the wheel.
He died on the transplant list.
Scot was 16. He was the last of his family to see his father alive.
In January 2021, he visited the doctor for an annual physical. This appointment, like all the others before it, went without concern.
One month later, though, Scot received a flu shot, and he says doctors believe it released a "genetic anomaly" that triggered his heart failure.
"A couple days later, I got the flu," Scot said, "and it attacked my heart. I couldn't walk across the room."
"We're never going to know for sure what happened," Menachem said, "but he clearly was predisposed to having a heart that was not going to function well for his entire life."
What came next was an increasingly frightening three-year stretch of appointments and treatments and hospital visits, culminating in the realization that he would need a heart transplant to survive.
Doubt that he'd find one, and guilt that he deserved one, overwhelmed him.
Scot had experienced and lived more than most, he thought: a meaningful college basketball career that had led to an admirable NBA career, which had helped him build his beloved family and pursue their dreams. Surely there were stronger candidates for this chance at life-saving surgery.
Of the former, Dawn, too, was skeptical. But she needed to convince her husband of the fallacy of the latter, reminding him of his responsibilities as a husband and father, of how much they still had to live.
He listened -- and eventually agreed.
"How dare I even think about doing the same thing to my kids that my dad unintentionally did to me?" Scot thought.
"He didn't want me to grow up without a dad to be there and teach [me]," Ozzy said. "And I love him for that."
The next step was finding a heart strong enough to support his body.
"You can't put a Ford Festiva engine in an F-150 and think it's going to work well," Menachem said.
While Pearl died waiting for a same-sized donor, Scot had hope. Medical technology had advanced to allow for greater variation in size.
On Scot's 49th birthday, his sixth day in the Vanderbilt Intensive Care Unit, he received word of a potential donor. He called family members to the hospital. He shaved his head and beard in preparation for the surgery.
But doctors determined the prospective heart wouldn't be viable.
Another option arose soon after.
That, too, was declined.
PAMELA ANGELL AND Megan Tyra were sitting in a hospital in East Texas when they were told they had 14 days to make the most devastating decision of their lives.
Pamela's husband, Casey, had been intubated, no longer able to breathe on his own.
Casey and Pamela had met in 2009 while working at Walmart. He was someone who could "talk a stranger's ear off," she says, and he often did.
When Pamela was pregnant with their son, William, Casey found a new position as a forklift operator. But exposure to elements on the job -- in addition to a history of smoking -- had taken a toll. In February 2024, a bout of pneumonia had sent the 45-year-old to the hospital, where he drifted in and out of consciousness.
Days went by. Then a week. Then more. Angell had failed to show any signs of improvement -- or life. On day 11, Pamela and Megan, Casey's sister, made the decision to let him go.
Shortly after, the hospital's organ donation liaison approached them.
"He said, 'Look, guys, Casey had a really big heart,'" Megan said.
"Yeah, we know," Megan's husband, Clint, responded.
"He said, 'No, man, you don't understand. He physically had a big heart.'" Megan said. "And I'm like, 'Is that important?'
He's like, 'Oh yeah, that's important.'"
Angell was a hearty 5-foot-11. In 1991, that would not have been large enough to save Pearl Pollard. But in 2024, it would be large enough to save Scot.
Pamela and Megan agreed to the anonymous process of organ donation -- and watched Angell's heart leave the hospital.
"You're losing your best friend," Pamela said, "but somebody else is gaining your best friend, in a way."
On the morning of February 16, as Angell's heart traveled from Texas to Tennessee, Vanderbilt staff began to prepare Scot for transplant surgery.
Physicians gathered the endless tubes and wires tethering him to his hospital room, and rearranged them for the short journey to the operating room.
Amid the steady heart-monitor beeps, Scot began his goodbyes.
"Who's my favorite fourth kid?" Scot said, hugging his youngest child, Icean.
"Me?" Icean said.
Scot leaned in. "That's right," he said, putting the pair forehead to forehead. "You."
Then Dawn took her husband's head in her hands and bent over the bed for a kiss. "I love you," she said, smiling through her tears.
"I love you forever," Scot said, running his fingers through her long, dark hair. "I love you forever," she told him.
Scot was pushed through the halls of the hospital, Dawn following as far as she was allowed. She squeezed her husband's hand before he passed through a set of double doors, beyond her grasp.
"I was thinking, 'OK, what if he doesn't wake up?' she said later. "That's when it finally hit me."
"I was thinking what life would possibly be like ... without him."
Just after 11 a.m., Scot was taken into surgery.
At 1:08 p.m., a black SUV pulled into the Adult Emergency Entrance at the hospital. In the trunk, doctors pulled out a white cooler and raced inside. Inside a smaller plastic container was Angell's heart.
At 1:16, doctors removed Scot's heart from his body.
"Now, there's no heart in there," said Dr. Ashish Shah, one of the heart surgeons who performed the operation. "There's a giant, gaping hole, and when that old heart came out, you see an enormous, unhappy organ."
Thirteen minutes later, his new heart was sewn in and blood was restored to it.
By 5 p.m., the procedure was complete.
"In some respects," Shah said, "it was just the right heart for him."
ONE MID-OCTOBER EVENING last year, Scot and Dawn stood on the sideline of the Carmel High School football field. It was senior night. As the sun set behind the stands, they waited to hear Ozzy's name called.
It was just two weeks after his knee operation, so he couldn't play, but Ozzy walked across the field in celebration, his dad by his side.
"It's like I have my dad back from when I was younger," Ozzy said.
Yet the Pollards are keenly aware that their relief, their joy, had come at an enormous expense.
On the day of Ozzy's surgery, inside the hospital room, Scot checked his email. And there it was, the response he so hoped he'd get.
As soon as Pamela received Scot's letter, she called Megan and they decided to write back, interested in learning more about the man carrying Casey's heart -- and sharing more about the man from whom it came.
Scot read the letter aloud.
Dear Scot, thank you so much for reaching out to us.
Scot, you warmed our hearts with your kind words concerning your donor, who was loved beyond measure. February 16, 2024, was an incredibly hard day for those of us that loved your donor, Casey.
When we knew that we were going to have to let him go, and were approached about organ donation, there was never a pause or a doubt that Casey would have wanted to help.
So the answer was simple, and it was a yes.
Scot's voice began to break.
He continued to read.
Casey was a loving husband, dad, uncle, and the best baby brother anyone could ask for. Even though he was the baby, he towered over us all.
Thank you for caring for that big heart of his. And we are grateful to know he is loved and will continue to give love. It means the world to us. He has inspired people in his own family to donate and be a hero like him.
And we, as his family, though small, would love to meet you whenever you are ready to do so.
Megan wrote that Angell was a "gentle giant" who was always happy to help those in need. "We are blessed to know that even in our greatest tragedy we stayed true to who he was," she wrote, "and we are so glad that because of our hero, you can continue to be a blessing to your family and others."
The families first spoke on the phone on November 9, on what would have been Angell's 46th birthday. After exchanging texts, they decided to meet in person.
On March 17, 2025, Scot and Dawn were in Lindale, Texas, a small town about 90 miles east of Dallas.
As the pair stepped out of their hotel room, Dawn took her husband's hand.
"Ready?" she asked softly, smiling up at him. "Ready," he responded.
Hand-in-hand, they walked down the hall toward the room where Angell's family was waiting.
As they turned the final corner, they spotted the family through an open door, breaking into nervous laughter before exchanging hugs with Pamela, William, Megan and Clint.
"Hi, gang," Scot said, before he and Dawn extended their arms.
Scot learned William was 12 when his father died, and that he was "the love of [his father's] life."
"We're grateful that Scot's here, with Casey's heart," Pamela said. "And William has another person to look up to, as a father figure."
William told stories of their afternoons together fishing, or watching horror movies, describing his dad as gentle and a giant, too. Casey and Scot both had dragon tattoos, William's Japanese zodiac sign.
"There was a connection there that I felt," Scot said. "I know how that feels as a child, to lose your father."
"You look like your dad," Dawn told William.
"Copy and pasted, that's how we put it," Megan replied.
Pamela showed Dawn and Scot Casey's wedding ring, which she wears on a chain around her neck, and shared the story of how they met. Megan explained that while she and Casey had other siblings, the two of them were the closest.
"He was my bubba," she said.
Before leaving for lunch together, Pamela took out a stethoscope she'd brought.
Scot stood and unbuttoned his shirt while Pamela positioned it right on his chest.
As she listened to the beating heart inside of him, her eyes filled with tears.
Megan went next. "My turn," she said.
She softly placed the stethoscope just to the right of a lengthy, vertical scar, a lasting reminder of what was given -- and what was lost.
With Scot looking down at her, she bowed her head and listened.
"Hey, Bubba," she said, weeping.
ON MEMORIAL DAY weekend, under sunny skies, the Pollards, Angells, and Tyras sailed through the streets of downtown Indianapolis, waving to an enthusiastic crowd.
A year after Scot's transplant, he had been named grand marshal of the Indy 500 Festival Parade and invited his heart donor's family to join him on the float.
It had been only a few months since their first in-person meeting, but Megan says getting to know the Pollards has helped her family heal. Today, at 50, Scot is doing well, but his future is fraught with unpredictability.
He's the tallest transplant recipient in the history of Vanderbilt's Medical Center, and doctors aren't sure how his life will progress. Still, whatever doubt had coursed through Scot prior to the surgery has now diminished entirely.
"The fact that I get to be Dad for as long as I can was completely worth it," he said.
While Scot says his doctors do not think the new heart will be affected by the genetic disorder, they do believe his children are at risk of heart disease.
But in the meantime, he will be there to support them on their own journeys. Ozzy, 17, will soon begin his freshman year at Marian University, a school just 30 minutes from home. Icean, 9, will enter fourth grade in the fall.
And in Texas, William, 13, plans to play for the junior high football team, just like his dad.
Fate fused the paths of the Pollards and the Angells -- each, in their own way, helping the other mend.
"What we hope for moving forward," Scot said, "is just that I can keep living a good life because of their gift."
As Megan looked out at the cheering crowd, she thought of Casey.
"It's an honor to let everyone know how proud we are of him, and who he was, and what a good man he was," she said of her brother. "We miss him every day, but Scot helps with that."
ESPN E60's Jeremy Schaap, Dan Lindberg, and John Minton contributed to this story.
