ONCE THE AWARDS CEREMONY WAS OVER, Alan and Chip Graber had to attend the postgame press conference. And, exciting as the game and the win had been, it was impossible to get around the fact that the president of Minnesota State had been taken off the court in handcuffs by an FBI agent in the midst of the postgame victory celebration.
“I’m not a hundred percent certain what happened or why it happened,” Alan Graber said. “I’m told it will all come out tomorrow. For right now, I’d like to stick to questions about the game, about us winning the national championship, and about what our team and my son just accomplished.”
Chip wore the net into which his final shot had dropped around his neck. He explained his lackluster play in the first thirty minutes as a combination of nerves and good defense played by Duke. Stevie and Susan Carol were standing in the back of the interview room with Steve Jurgensen and Bobby Kelleher, listening. Dick Weiss and Bill Brill walked over to join them.
“You guys know about this,” Weiss said. “You tried to tell us before …”
Kelleher answered for them. “They do, Hoops,” he said. “But they can’t tell you what’s going on tonight. Tomorrow, like Alan just said, it will all come out.”
Weiss and Brill looked at each other. “You guys promise you’ll fill us in tomorrow?” Brill said.
“Absolutely,” Stevie said.
“Everything we know,” said Susan Carol.
When the press conference was over, they went around to the curtained-off area of the hallway that was used to transport the players and coaches to and from the interview room. Again, no one stopped them when they walked behind the curtain. The All Access passes seemed to make the security people magically disappear when they approached. Roger Valdiserri was sitting there in his golf cart, waiting for the Grabers, who had stopped to talk to a couple of NCAA types as they left the podium. As soon as Chip saw Stevie and Susan Carol, he broke into a run. When he got to them, he gathered them both into a hug.
“We did it! You did it!” he said. Stevie could see he had tears in his eyes.
“That was a hell of a last shot,” Stevie said.
“What happened? How’d you get here?” asked Chip.
“It was Mr. Jurgensen—it’s all thanks to him,” said Susan Carol.
“Not true,” Jurgensen said. “Your e-mail to Kelleher saved the day.”
Chip shook hands with Jurgensen. “Dad told me a little about what you did,” he said. “I’m glad to meet you.”
“So, do I finally get to meet these two young heroes?”
It was Alan Graber, walking up behind his son. Chip introduced them. “You know, it all turned out okay in the end,” Alan Graber said. “But if you’d come to me right away, Chipper—”
“It turned out better than fine in the end,” Jurgensen broke in. “All those people wouldn’t be going to jail if Chip hadn’t handled it the way he did.”
“Or if Stevie and Susan Carol hadn’t overheard me on Friday,” Chip said.
“But Chip,” Stevie said, “you made your first three-pointer and then you basically stopped shooting. What was going on?”
Chip smiled. “I told myself Kelleher would get your message and get to you. But as soon as I made that shot, a chill went through me. What if I’m wrong? I kept trying to convince myself you’d be okay, but I couldn’t shake the vision of you tied to those chairs.…”
“So you weren’t actually throwing the game.”
“Not really. I just couldn’t concentrate. Once I saw you, I was okay. And then I got really mad. I decided that, one way or the other, we had to win.”
“And you did,” Susan Carol said, her eyes sparkling.
Chip put an arm around Susan Carol. “We did,” he said. “But I’m sorry about your Dukies.”
She smiled. “I was rooting for you all the way, Chip. But don’t tell Coach K.” She grinned at Stevie. “They’ll be back next year, right, Stevie?”
Stevie nodded. “They probably will,” he said. “And if they don’t play someone from Philly, I might root for them.”
She leaned over and kissed him on the cheek. “Then again, you might not.”
The one thing Stevie and Susan Carol had left to do that night was explain to their fathers what had been going on. They sat in a corner of the all-night coffee shop at the hotel and laid the whole thing out as their dads sat with their mouths agape. Both of them insisted that they should have come to them and told them what was going on, but it was pretty clear they were both relieved their kids were okay and also quite proud of them.
“Do me one favor,” Bill Thomas said to Stevie. “Tell your mother that I knew exactly where you were at all times.”
Reverend Anderson laughed. “Ditto that for your mother, Susan Carol,” he said.
The newspapers the next morning reported the arrests of four men in connection with a conspiracy to blackmail a player. There were few details other than the names of the four men arrested and a quote from Rick Applebaum saying that another conspirator was still at large. Which meant they hadn’t found Dean Wojenski.
Stevie heard a report on CNN saying that the Washington Herald—Kelleher’s paper—was reporting that the blackmail conspiracy involved Chip Graber and that two teenaged reporters had helped break the case open for the FBI. Stevie liked hearing that. And Kelleher deserved to be ahead on the story, that was for sure.
Their dads took them to the FBI field office at nine o’clock the next morning, where they gave their statements. It was almost lunchtime by the time they were finished. Chip and Alan Graber were still there, too. Agent Applebaum explained that there had been no sign of Dean Wojenski in Bay St. Louis. His wife had told the agents that as soon as Chip’s shot went through the hoop, he had snapped off the television, gone upstairs, packed a bag, and told her he had to leave town for a while. She kept asking the agents to tell her what was going on. Stevie felt bad for her.
“We’ll find him,” Applebaum said. “Sooner or later.”
“How strong is the case?” Bill Thomas asked. “If it comes down to Chip and the kids against the president of a university and the chairman of the board of trustees at Duke …”
Applebaum waved a hand. “It won’t. Please don’t say this publicly but Feeley has already confessed. He gave it all up last night, said he should never have gotten involved.”
“Why’d he do it, then?” asked Stevie.
“He said it seemed like easy money and his school would be guaranteed a national championship as a bonus. And I think he was looking forward to having Duke’s new president in his pocket. But anyway, he’s talking. Plus, Whiting has made it pretty clear he’ll do anything to stay out of jail. So if he testifies against Koheen, we’ll probably cut him a deal.”
“But shouldn’t he go to jail?” Stevie asked.
“They should all do time,” Applebaum said. “But we have the least firsthand evidence against Koheen. We probably need Whiting’s testimony.”
They were all led to a room that had been set up for a press conference. Before they went in, Stevie asked if Agent Applebaum could send someone to find out if Bill Brill and Dick Weiss were there, and if so, could they see them before they had to go inside. When Brill and Weiss were brought back, Stevie and Susan Carol told them that they would tell them everything after the press conference was over.
“Bill and I have talked,” Weiss said. “We have a better idea. Why don’t you two guys write your own story and we’ll run it in our newspapers under your byline.”
Stevie and Susan Carol looked at their dads. “I’ve already changed our flight to tomorrow morning,” Bill Thomas said.
“Same with me,” Reverend Anderson said.
“Then let’s do it,” Susan Carol said.
Stevie turned to Chip. “So are we on the record now, Chip?”
Chip laughed. “Completely on the record. The whole story. You guys are the only ones who know it all.”
Alan Graber looked at Chip. “You ready to go in there?” he said.
“Ready if you are,” Chip said.
“You two kids ready?” Applebaum asked.
“Reporters aren’t supposed to be part of the story,” Susan Carol said.
Stevie laughed. “At least they won’t call us student-athletes,” he said.
“You know what?” Alan Graber said. “You guys shouldn’t just write a story about all this,” he said. “You should write a book.”
Susan Carol nodded, grinning. “What do you think, Stevie, should we do a book together?”
“I think we should probably get good at writing newspaper stories first,” he said.
She leaned down and said softly, “But you’re already good at that.”
“Don’t start with me, Scarlett,” he said.
She gave him the smile. “Let’s go get this over with so we can write.”
That sounded good to Stevie. Just about perfect, in fact. They followed Applebaum and the Grabers onto the podium and into the glare of the TV lights.
Stevie knew he had been right about one thing from the beginning: this would not be his last Final Four. And now he knew one other thing for sure: there would never be another one quite like this one.
At least he hoped not.