Game (10 page)

“One! Two! Three!” We broke and the game was on.

They copped the tap, and their two guard brought the ball down. We stopped the ball high and they forced it inside to their center, then threw it outside to Boogie. Boogie started his dribble outside the three-point line, and I came out to get him. I saw their big man come out to set a high pick. Boogie pointed to a spot on the floor and made a move toward him. I slid right and straightened up slightly to slide past him. Boogie made a quick move, I reached with my elbow to make contact on the pick, and Boogie made a crossover move to my left, which caught me leaning the wrong way.

Boogie's first step was outside my foot and his next step was down the lane with me trailing him. Tomas came over and went up with Boogie. No contest. Boogie slammed over Tomas and the Bryant crowd went wild. They were up by two.

Ernie brought the ball down for us and Boogie was on me tight. I went inside and cut across the baseline and then out looking for their forwards. I found one, leaned into him hard for a moment, then shot out toward the three-point line. The forward took a step after me, stopped, and turned toward his own man, but it was too late. Sky had slipped deep, taken Ernie's pass, and made the deuce.

I was tight. I kept my hands on Boogie when he didn't have the ball, and pushed him whenever he tried to go by me. Boogie was strong, but mostly he relied on his speed, and I wanted to make him use his strength. Our guys were more active than Bryant's, and if any of them tried to muscle his way to the hoop, we could double-team him and force the ball out.

We exchanged baskets again and everyone was feeling that the game was going well. The sneakers were squeaking on the newly polished floor as guys made good cuts. Bryant was trying to run plays, trying to establish an inside game against Ruffy, Tomas, and Sky, but it wasn't working, so the guards were controlling the ball more and more. Boogie was probing, looking for something weak
he could work on. The crowd was calling his name, for him to do something spectacular, but he was concentrating on setting up patterns. He had his game face on, and I knew he was showing us respect, but he was digging for the win.

Their center could sky, but he had bad hands. He was getting to the bounds but he wasn't pulling them down cleanly. Plus whenever he had the ball, he would bring it down low and away from his body. Ernie tied him up twice and Sky stole the ball from him twice.

Boogie kept going to his left and I kept pushing him. Once he put a move on me and turned me around but drove into Tomas, and they called a charging foul on him. He grinned.

At the end of the first quarter it was Baldwin 18 and Bryant 15. Boogie had six points, and I had four. It was only a three-point lead, but I was feeling all right.

“You're playing good,” House said to the team. “Keep the pressure on. You're switching well. Keep the pressure on.”

Bryant decided to up the pressure, too, and came out with a full-court press. We didn't dig the press
soon enough, and when Boogie stopped me, Ernie wasn't looking and everybody else was downcourt. When Ruffy saw I was tied up, he came out and I tried a jump pass, but Boogie knocked it away to their other guard. He scooped it up and broke to the basket ahead of Ernie. I cut him off at the foul line, but he hit Boogie with a bounce pass for the deuce.

A press is good if you can stop the ball most of the time. Bryant couldn't. Sky and Tomas helped out bringing the ball down, and their men couldn't stay with them as they got passes just inside the half-court line and dished off to either me or Ernie crisscrossing through the backcourt.

Tomas's man was big and was hacking him to death, but the ref wasn't calling it. I kept thinking about how Tomas was playing and kept telling myself to worry about what
I
was doing. I got the ball in to Tomas low twice, and the first time he threw up a ball that bounced off the rim, only he got his own bound and pushed it up again—it looked goofy but it went in. The second time I threw it in to Tomas on a low roll, his man bumped him and we got the foul call.

What that did was get Boogie's attention to their
inside game. He was running the team from the floor. He started pushing his defense deeper into the paint, but that opened up the outside. I hit a three-pointer from the side. We threw up a surprise full-court press, but Ruffy blew his coverage and left their center wide open under their basket. Their two guard got excited and threw the ball all the way downcourt, over their center's head and out-of-bounds.

“That's the way I planned it,” Ruffy said.

I looked over to where House was standing with his hands on his hips wondering what was going on.

A few minutes later, when Sky was on the foul line, House put Colin in for me. Boogie switched to Ernie on defense, and the game suddenly got sloppy. Colin tried to put a move on his man and walked. They brought the ball down and their man stepped on the sideline.

Colin was trying to get into the game but couldn't pick up the rhythm. Ruffy threw up a hook that bounced off the rim. Sky grabbed the bound, almost got tied up in the paint, and then dribbled out. He handed the ball off to Colin, who went straight up for the jumper. Sky's man switched, went up, and caught Colin's shot in the air. It was
a sweet move. They got the ball downcourt in a hurry and made an easy deuce.

House put me back in, and I brought the ball down against Boogie. Boogie kept putting his hand on my waist and was squeezing hard, but it didn't look like he was doing anything. The referee started a close-guarding count on me, and Ernie's man came over to double-team me—a mistake—and I hit Ernie at the top of the key. He buried the trey and they called time-out. I saw their coach yelling at the two guard. The game started again, and we exchanged turnovers. Then Ruffy went to the line when he was fouled on a shot at the buzzer. He made the two shots, and I saw we had outscored Bryant 17–12 in the quarter to bring the halftime score to 35–27.

Everybody in the locker room was saying the same thing—that the game wasn't over and we had to stay focused. We were looking good and feeling good. House said that we could take the game away from them in the first few minutes of the second half.

“They have to find their fire,” he said. “If they want to win, they have to come out and show it right away. If we come out the way we can, playing
solid, aggressive ball, it's our game.”

Mr. Barker came to the locker room and said he was proud of us.

I got some alone time and thought about the situation. If we got into the regionals, showed the world what we could do against top competition, I had a chance to cop all my dreams. Sixteen minutes to go and I was pushing onto some heavy reality.

We hit the floor for the second half and I looked around the gym. Jocelyn was there, waving and holding up my number on a large piece of oak tag. Pop was sitting next to her, which surprised me. He pointed at me with both index fingers and grinned.

A tall white woman stopped me on the sideline and asked my name. She was carrying a pad on a clipboard.

“Lawson,” I said. “Andrew Lawson.”

She looked me up and down as if she was thinking about buying me. “Six-five,” she announced, and wrote something down on her pad.

We ran some layups, and House told us not to forget to hustle. We were about to go onto the floor when Fletch asked what the lady had said to me.

“Nothing, really,” I said. “She just told me I was
six-five, as if I didn't know it, and wrote something down.”

“She's a freelance college scout,” Fletch said. “She goes around and makes reports and sells them to the colleges. Don't worry about who's watching you. Just keep your head in the game.”

Bryant brought in a new guard, and he was holding me while Boogie was holding Ernie. They were playing a box and one with the one on me, which I didn't understand because our team scoring was spread pretty good over all the starters. Then I found out they were really using a box and beat down. The sucker was hitting me every time I moved.

One time I picked up a loose ball from under their basket and flew downcourt on a two-on-one with Sky. I came down on the beater, did a semispin move in the lane, and fed Sky a soft alley-oop. I put the ball up, then watched Sky fly through the air and slam it down with one hand just as I felt an elbow hit my ribs. I doubled over in pain, but I didn't get a call.

What I did get was pissed. I looked at the referee and he looked back, daring me to open my mouth. I cooled off and smiled.

The next time I got the ball, I hit a three from the corner; then, when Ruffy slapped a pass away, I got the ball, did a give-and-go with Needham, who had just come in the game, and hit a reverse layup a half step in front of Boogie. They called time out and we sat. The cold water and lemon felt good going down.

Both teams were playing team ball, giving everybody on both squads a touch, but we were doing it better. The game was exciting, and at the end of the third quarter the count was 54–41.

We scored the first six points of the fourth quarter to go up 60–41. They called another time-out, and I saw some of the kids from Bryant headed for the doors. That made me feel good.

After the time-out, Boogie brought the ball down. He spread the team out to go one-on-one with me. I was ready for him. He came in hard to my left side and put a spin move back to the center of the court, then a shoulder fake that got me flat on my feet as he went up for a short jumper. The ball didn't touch anything but net. I looked at Boogie to see if he was smiling. He wasn't.

We got the ball, moved up the floor, and got it inside, but Bryant took the ball from Tomas under
our hoop. He was fouled but the refs didn't call it. Bryant came down and Boogie buried a three. On our possession we got the ball in to Ruffy, and their center blocked his little jump hook. Boogie grabbed the ball and Ernie chased him, but it didn't do any good. We turned it over on the inbounds play and they scored another deuce and got the foul shot.

Boogie was all over me. He was taking me out of the game, and I felt like crap when Sky turned the ball over on a hesitation walk and their center threw up a shot from the paint that rolled in.

We had started the half comfortable and soon we were looking at the clock, wondering why the quarter was taking so long. They were down by seven. Then they were down by four with a minute and three seconds left. House called a time-out.

“Just hold on to the freaking ball!” he said. “It's a two-possession lead. You hold on to the ball for twenty seconds and they'll have to start fouling.”

I passed the ball in to Ernie, who took it across the midcourt line.

Ernie normally loves to handle the ball, but he saw that Sky was open along the baseline and tried to hit him with it. Their whole team saw the pass
coming and fought each other to snatch it. They were downcourt in a heartbeat, with Boogie blowing the short jumper but their center putting it back in over Ruffy.

There were thirty-one seconds to go. Ernie picked the ball up to inbound it. He looked for me, saw Boogie coming over, and started to pass the ball to Sky just as he turned away, thinking the ball was coming to me. Ernie held on to the ball but stepped inbounds for a violation and they had the ball back with the same thirty-one seconds.

We tightened our defense, and Boogie had to run out past the top of the key to get the inbounds pass. The moment he touched the ball, he had it on the floor and was driving to his right, running me into a pick set by Sky's man. Sky switched off nicely and went after Boogie. Boogie went up and held the ball until Sky passed him, then threw it softly against the backboard. Meanwhile Ruffy came over and laid a big forearm on Boogie.

The ball rolled in for the deuce and the ref blew the whistle. The score was tied and Boogie was on the line.

There was a commotion near the door, and
I looked and saw that all the Bryant people were coming back. When Boogie sank the free throw, the place went crazy. Bryant was up by a point. I looked up at the clock. There were twenty-six seconds left. House called a time-out.

“We need two! We need two!” he called as we got over to the bench. He was dripping sweat. “Drew brings the ball up quick. When Drew gets to the three-point line, Ruffy comes out to the middle of the lane and Sky comes out to the foul line. Drew, you make a move left and then try to run somebody into a pick. If the pick doesn't work, then Sky, you break out for the short jumper and Tomas and Ruffy get in position for the rebound. Ernie, if we miss and they get the rebound, you foul right away. Got it? Everybody knows what they're supposed to do? It's the three play with Ernie laying back. Everybody got that?”

When we got back on the court, Boogie was in but they had switched the other guard to this tall skinny dude I had seen down at the projects. He was thin but he could leap. Ernie inbounded to me, and Boogie and the tall guy came after me. I passed the ball back to Ernie, and the tall guy went after him while Boogie stayed on my case.

We got the ball downcourt and nobody moved into the right position. Tomas was standing on the right side with his mouth open and Sky had drifted out to the side of the foul line. Ernie saw the play wasn't going to work so he threw the ball in to Ruffy, who shuffled his feet—he could have been called for walking—and then passed out to one side to Sky. Sky dribbled toward me, and Boogie faked as if he was going to double-team him and he passed the ball high to me. Boogie just missed picking it off. I didn't know what the time was but I knew it was going to be close. Boogie had his arms up and I tried a stutter step left, then a full step, and then made a big move as close to his body as I could. I got the half step I wanted and saw their center coming. I went up as hard as I could and all I saw was Boogie's uniform rising with me and Tomas getting some separation behind him. I pumped the ball, and Boogie was reaching for it when I brought it down and behind my back. I could feel Boogie's body against mine, twisting in midair to stop the ball.