The birth of Crystal Fielder’s twin boys was supposed to be natural. She was due to deliver them — her third and fourth children — in May of 2005. “All the way up until 34 weeks,” she said. But one of her twins flipped.
In the hospital, doctors tried turning the boys. After 10 hours of the flipped twin’s refusal to rotate, Fielder had a C-section.
On April 7, Elijah Mobley was born. Two minutes later, Elliot Mobley followed.
If space and time are the same, Elijah and Elliot haven’t been further than two minutes apart: the gap between their togetherness in the womb and their re-acquaintance at birth.
Every basketball game — the ones in their grandparents’ backyard to the AAU and high school. The ones in community college. Every clutch moment. Every heart-wrenching loss and exalting win. Every feat and every failure.
Every move, the changes in address. All the losses. The funerals. Every sacrifice. Even the reasons they ended up here, at Las Positas.
Elliot and Elijah Mobley were together.
Their next step, transferring, isn’t unique in and of itself. According to district data, 11,572 students attended LPC during the 2023-24 academic year. The school’s own figures indicate that 46% of its students transfer to a university.
That means the exposure of more than 5,000 young adults to the anxiety of a life-altering decision. Of transferring, separating. Going someplace new — without the immediate presence of friends, siblings or parents.
“I’m concerned about them being apart,” Fielder said. “They have never been apart for more than a day, probably.”
That’s what makes their transferrals unique. It would be — depending on how things work out as they decide their next steps — the first time they’re tangibly unlinked. Not just in terms of separation by mileage, but by differentiation. By being granted the ability to individually find and express themselves.
“People sometimes group us together,” Elliot said. “So I feel like (being apart) will also help — he can be him and I can be me.”
It’s the rite of passage of being 20 years old and graduating from the grind of community college. It’s a bridge that, at some point, every aspiring adult must cross. Even twins.
“It’ll help us get away from each other,” Elijah said. “Meeting new people — it’ll make our bond grow stronger.”
LAST HURRAH? Elijah and Elliot Mobley are rarely seen apart from each other. They’ve been through everything together. But if they do decide to transfer to different schools, that means this postseason could be their last time as teammates. (Photo by Ian Kapsalis/The Express)
Born in Chicago, the twins moved to California’s Central Valley when they were in third grade. Fielder, a teacher at a K-8 school, took a job in Tracy, where Elliot and Elijah did the fourth grade. They started fifth in Modesto.
Before finishing that academic year, Elijah and Elliot were back in Chicago — living with their grandparents Michael and Cynthia Fielder. Without their mom. She was going through something. That was all they knew.
“Chicago, it’s kind of like, a tougher environment,” Elijah said.
His and Elliot’s dad, Kenneth Brame, lives in Texas. Brame works in the courts as a bailiff and on the side as a security guard. When the twins were in Chicago, he called or texted them daily.
Even now, he texts them every day, Elliot said. “He texts us before every game, like, ‘good luck’ and everything. I don’t think he’s missed a game yet.”
In the Windy City, time was passed playing NBA 2K. Or Madden NFL, sometimes with their grandpa. Mostly though, it was backyard basketball. Always until it got dark.
Elijah was a quarterback then. Going to the NFL was his dream, and the only sport he and Elliot shared was neighborhood hoops.
Basketball wasn’t more than a pastime, a game, until they were in eighth grade. By that point, Elliot and Elijah were back in the Valley. That’s when they met Anthony and Michelle Bell. The couple runs the Stockton Soldiers, an AAU basketball team representing the titular city.
“They just opened their arms to us,” Elijah said. “Like, we have no family out here, so they’re very close to us. We could talk to them about anything, no matter what.”
“My mom was going through stuff,” Elliott added, “and like, my older brother — I don’t even think he was out here when we first moved here. So it was just me and my mom.”
The Mobleys were sophomores at Weston Ranch in Tracy when COVID-19 hit. But they were back in Chicago at a funeral when they heard about a freshman who’d filled in their minutes. His name was Richard Banks.
“Richard had joined the team,” Elliot said, “and (their teammates) said, like, ‘Oh, this kid’s killing.’ Like, he came in and started killing. And then me and Elijah were like, ‘Who is this kid?’”
When they got back, Elliot played in an All-Star showcase with Banks. They clicked immediately. On the court — and shortly after, off of it.
“They’re like my brothers,” Banks said.
Banks has become one of the many things Elijah and Elliot have in common. Like their hair, both with short, dyed locks. And their build: both listed at 6 foot 1. The same broad shoulders. Same biceps. Even their Hawks jerseys both have the No. 3.
They’ve each cultivated an affinity for bowling. And Fortnite.
“We’re probably gonna get on after this (basketball) game—as soon as we get home,” Banks said. It was Valentine’s day, an evening in which LPC beat Ohlone. “We play until like 3 in the morning. Every day.”
“I played before I came here,” Elliot said.
Elijah and Elliot both play guard. Being twins makes synchronous their playing with and off of each other. They’re still distinct. Elijah drives. Elliot play-makes. But they share an aggression, a toughness. They thrive with pace and energy.
When the twins were juniors at Weston Ranch, Hawks coach James Giacomazzi started showing up to practices. He’d worked with the head coach at Weston Ranch and went to watch his former coworker’s team. He saw Elijah and Elliot.
“I knew we were going to recruit them,” Giacomazzi said. “Even though they were recruited by four-year schools at the time. We didn’t know.”
Cal Poly Humboldt and Fresno Pacific University were the principal offers. Then, the notion held by Elliot and Elijah was that they’d stay together — go to the same school.
Two months before they graduated, on March 28, 2023, Fielder was diagnosed with breast cancer.
“They love hard,” Giacomazzi said. “They love their mom, without reservation. They’ll do anything for her.”
In March 2023, anything meant staying local for school. At least for the first two years.
San Joaquin Delta College was closest to home. But the connection they’d built with Giacomazzi pulled them farther west: to Livermore. To Las Positas.
A perk of their pairing is permanent companionship. Having a twin means coexisting with a kindred spirit — meeting them at birth. An actual twin flame. Born with protection against loneliness, against isolation. It’s a security they’ve enjoyed as they’ve weathered their life’s storms. A sick mother. A father thousands of miles away. The culture shock of moving across the country. Of a fresh start at a new school a world away from what they know.
They’ve had each other. Always. Commuting from Stockton to classes and practice, every day.
When Fielder was physically strong enough, her mom — who lived with the family for four months in 2023 — drove them to the twins’ freshman-year home games. It meant everything to Elliot and Elijah to see their mom and grandma in the stands with the big cut-outs of their faces.
Since September 2024 — when she finished chemo and immunotherapy, radiation and the last of the surgeries — Fielder’s come to every home game.
“It means a lot. That I can look in the crowd,” Elliot said, “like, glance over and I could see my mom and my brother there.”
YIN AND YANG: Elijah (left) plays an aggressive offensive style, attacking the basket downhill. He leads the Hawks with 18.7 points per game. Elliot (right) takes on the role of defender, playmaker and leader. (Photo by Ian Kapsalis/The Express)
A hall of the 2500 building, adjacent to the locker room, buzzed on Jan. 15 after a 79-73 win over visiting Chabot, LPC’s sister school.
The hall echoed with excited conversations of passing coaches and waiting friends, family or girlfriends. Post-win players were spilling out slowly. Some in groups of two or three, some alone.
Elliot walked out wearing sweats and a hoodie, headphones hanging around his neck. “I love listening to music,” he said. “I’m kinda out the way — I love being in my own world.” His locks are dyed turquoise. Elijah, who came out in sweats, and just that, wears red dye.
Besides talking at the same time, sounding the same, and occasionally saying the same things — “those little twin things” — Banks thinks their commonalities are limited.
“Off the court,” he said, “I don’t think they’re similar, to be honest.”
He thinks what Elliot and Elijah already know to be true of themselves. That Elliot’s the type to stay in and watch game film, where Elijah would rather go out with friends and watch movies.
Their individual identities are established. In the same way any 20 year old’s are. But like other young people, there’s more of it to be gained — to be found. That’s what this period of life is about. It just looks different for twins. Hits harder.
Fielder felt their personalities immediately, even presciently. Elijah had introduced himself prior to being born, during those 10 hours of attempted turning. It proved his steadfast will.
“He has a very strong personality since before he came here,” Fielder said.
“Elliot, from birth, he was very laid back, calm,” she said. “He would just sit there. Suck his thumb, no problem.”
With Elliot, Banks has deep talks about anything to do with living — “Elliot knows I’m gonna keep it real with him,” he said. With Elijah, Banks refrains from telling him things like, “‘I hope you go this far.’”
“I’m just gonna tell him, like, ‘if you wanna get there, you have to do this. And I’m gonna help you.’” He has to push Elijah harder.
Banks said he hopes both of them make it far. Coach Giacomazzi expressed similar sentiments. And Fielder — she’ll be praying for her youngest sons. Especially if making it far means being far apart. Tangibly unlinked.
Fielder has been talking to college-graduated twins. A set of men and a set of women, both older than Elliot and Elijah. The guys both attended Sacramento State and are “still very close,” she said.
Even though the sisters split up for school, the two of them still talk almost every day, Fielder said.
This season at Las Positas, the twins have helped lead the Hawks to a 24-4 record — thus far. The team made a first-round spot in the 3C2A NorCal Regionals this March. Their goal is to keep playing at the next level, wherever that is.
The exact plan is awaiting solidification. The product is understood: they’ll transfer next fall. It’s the means that are unknown: where they’ll go, and who they’ll play for.
Elijah wants to go out of state. “See what’s out there,” he said. And Elliot, who for a time preferred the idea of staying closer to home, isn’t opposed to attending the same school as Elijah.
Fielder’s ideal situation would look like Elijah and Elliot at the same four-year school.
If it goes anything like their birth — the way Elijah moved, Elliot stayed in place and a natural birth turned into a C-section — Fielder’s plan might not turn out.
Even twins have their own timing.
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TOP PHOTO: They hail from Chicago. They relocated to Stockton. They landed at Las Positas College. But the question now for twin basketball stars Elijah (left) and Eliot Mobley is whether they’ll stay together at the next level. (Photo by Ian Kapsalis/ The Express)
Olivia Fitts is the News Editor and Features Editor for The Express. Follow her on X, formerly Twitter @OLIVIAFITTS2.
