Don't Fake The Funk

Last Game Of The Season

“It’s 7:20, man. Where’s your cousin?”

“I dunno. I’ll call him.” I trotted over to my backpack and pulled out my cell phone. Then I left a semi-nasty message for Chris for not telling the rest of the team that he wasn’t showing up. Earlier in the day, Josh and Renato both called to let me know that they wouldn’t be playing, so I knew we were going to be short, but I didn’t think we were going to have trouble fielding a full squad.

The referees decided to go ahead and start the game even though our team was short a man. But before tip off, the head ref informed both teams that in the unlikely even that we won, the other team could send an appeal to the league and demand a forfeit. In other words, there was no chance in hell we were going to get a ‘W’ for the game. But the four of us decided to run anyway. We had nothing to lose.

The game started off badly. The opposing team got an easy lay up, and then a three-pointer. All of us were pretty much resigned to the prospect of a forfeit and it showed. I don’t really know about the other guys, but I was already hanging my head in disgust.

And then something happened.

I got the ball at the top of the key and I was up against a wide 1-2-2 zone, apparently so they could keep pressure on the ball. So the top guy was right up on my grill like he was trying to kiss me. But behind him I saw daylight – an open lane. And you know what happens when G sees an open lane. He gets all Barkley and shit.

So I stuck my rear end in the defender’s gut, lowered my shoulder and drove right in like a semi with no brakes. Now I don’t know if it’s because I shaved my head but I felt fast. Real fast. And I was. So fast that the defense did not react and I finger-rolled it over the head of their big man.

(Now before I go any further I have to say this. Their “big man” was soft and didn’t really play team defense all that well. This was a fact that I decided to exploit the entire game. And I’m not going to even mention how Orlando ate him up all night. Well maybe I will mention it.)

So our first two points lit a fire under Orlando and he started playing like a demon, or a rebounding god. I don’t have the exact stats but I am sure O out-rebounded everyone else on the other team.

Even though O got fired up, and even though Ben and Ace were hitting from the outside we were still down the whole game, but we were taking it to ‘em, man. We caused turnovers, cleaned up the boards, and we kept it fairly close.

And we never gave up, not like the rest of our sorry-ass team that decided to say, “Fuck it” to the rest of the season.

We were down ten at one point and Ace hits a three. Then I drive and dish to a cutting O for a lay-up. Then Ben hits a jumper. Suddenly we’re within three points and the other team is running scared. They played hard all game, but now they were worried.

In the second half they ran away with it again, up by ten. Ben jacked up a shot and it was way off, but Orlando grabbed the offensive rebound and put it in. Then the other team’s point guard – who, by the way, is a dead ringer for Dilbert except without glasses – tries to drive the lane on me. ON ME. I wasn’t having it. I knocked the ball out of his hands; he gets it back and tries to body me up for a turn-around. HE TRIED TO BODY ME UP, KID. Uh-uh. I kept knocking it out of his hands. Finally he gathers himself enough to put up a shot and the ref blows a whistle.

Three second violation on Dilbert. Boo ya.

At this point all four of us are out of gas. We really have nothing left, but Orlando refuses to let us give up. He gets another offsensive rebound and gives me the ball on the wing and I’m wide open. I release from beyond the arc and call out, “bank!” It hits the glass and goes in. We’re down seven. The ref starts yelling, “He called it! He called ‘bank.’ Give that man four points!” We didn’t really get that extra point, but still, it’s nice to be recognized.

Like I said, though, we had no energy, so with three minutes left we called our last time out. In the huddle I said, “Not much time left, fellas. Let’s leave it all out there on the floor.” We did, but our fatigue got the better of us. The other team, sensing their impending win, decided to start showing off, making the extra, fancy pass. At one point they even tried to get one of their guys to dunk off a rebound. It got me angry, but I couldn’t really do anything about it. I was too tired.

After the game the ref said to me, “Man you can beat me, and beat me by 100 points. But if you’re gonna embarrass me like they embarrassed you with that hot-dogging – I’m just glad you were tired cuz you looked like you were about to throw down.”

We wound up losing 75-68, but we gained the other team’s respect, and our own. I’ve seen Ace and Orlando play hard but tonight they gave one hundred-fifty percent. And I think I did pretty well, too. We may have won a championship last season, and we went .500 this season, but this was the first game we played like a team.

Sometimes you win even when you lose.

Posted by glenn at May 25, 2004 11:20 PM