On the other side of the Benjamin Franklin Bridge, the boys’ team didn’t have any pregame locker room fights or anyone screaming at one another. Even the two team captains managed to remain civil to each other.
The trouble began after they left the locker room. It came in the form of their opponent.
Jeff was hardly surprised by this. His father had briefed him on some of Camden’s history before the bus trip across the Delaware River. Camden High School, which Camden Middle fed into, had been known for its athletics for years. In the 1980s, University of Louisville basketball coach Denny Crum had recruited so many Camden players that other coaches talked about his “Camden connection.” The high school had won numerous state championships and had produced players who had gone on to the NBA—most notably Milt Wagner, a star on Louisville’s 1986 national championship team. More recently, his son Dajuan had starred at Camden before going on to play at Memphis, where—by sheer coincidence—his father had been an assistant coach.
It was clear pretty quickly that the Camden Middle School team was on a different level than the kids from Merion. On the first play of the game, one of Camden’s players, who looked to be about five-seven, stepped in front of a pass Jeff was attempting to throw to Camden James and took off down the court with no one between him and the basket.
Jeff, racing back to try to get into position, was two steps behind when the kid leaped, seemed to hang in the air—and dunked. The tiny gym, which might have seated two hundred people, exploded. With good reason, Jeff thought. He knew there were little guys in the NBA who could dunk, but this was a sixth grader.
As soon as Arlow inbounded the ball to him, he was double-teamed. He tried to dribble through it, lost the ball, and watched as another Camden kid went in for an uncontested layup. It was uncontested because Arlow, standing right there, had zero interest in trying to take a charge.
Before Arlow even picked the ball up to inbound it again, Coach C called time-out. The game had started thirty-nine seconds earlier. Jeff had only one thought walking to the bench: This is going to be a long afternoon.
Coach C’s message during the time-out was simple: Calm down. He looked at Jeff and added, “Don’t try to dribble through double-teams. You have to ball-fake and then pass.”
It was a simple concept: Pretend to pass the ball in one direction, hold onto the ball, and then throw it someplace else. They had worked on the art of ball-faking and shot-faking in practice. Coach C had actually quoted the famous basketball coach Bob Knight at one point: “Knight liked to say, ‘Is there anything better in life than a good shot-fake?’ The answer is there are lots of things better, but when playing basketball, a good ball-fake or shot-fake is a very good thing.”
Jeff and the rest of the Mustangs did calm down after the time-out and did better against the pressure defense. Jeff even found Arlow streaking to the basket behind the defense at one point for an open layup.
That was the good news. The bad news was the basket made the score 14–4.
It was 18–6 after one quarter and 32–14 at halftime. It wasn’t so much that Merion was playing badly; Camden was just better. The Little Wildcats—the high school was the Wildcats—were bigger, faster, and better shooters.
“Other than that,” as Jeff said to Danny Diskin after the game, “we were pretty evenly matched.”
Danny shook his head. “They were smarter than us, too.”
He was right.
Everyone from both teams got to play. Coach C took Jeff out of the game when he put Arlow at the point and then rested Arlow when Jeff went back in to run the offense. They didn’t play together at all after the first quarter. Jeff wasn’t exactly sure why, but he didn’t mind. He understood Coach C wanting to see as many guys as possible in a game that couldn’t possibly be won.
The final score was 57–33. Camden didn’t press at all in the second half, which was a relief. For all the ball-faking Jeff did when double-teamed, his pass-completion percentage wasn’t much higher than 50 percent. That wasn’t great for a football quarterback and it certainly wasn’t good for a point guard.
When they got back to the locker room, Coach C was direct.
“That’s almost certainly the best team we’ll play this season,” he said. He smiled. “If it’s not, then we’re in a lot of trouble. I’ll be honest with you, I don’t think I’ve ever seen a sixth grader dunk before. I doubt if we’ll see that again.
“If nothing else, we learned a lot about ourselves and what we need to work on today. Okay, let’s get into sweats and get back on the bus.” There was one shower in the locker room, so they’d known beforehand they wouldn’t be showering at Camden. “Michaels, Arlow, get ’em in.”
Jeff moved to the center of the room. Arlow took his time getting there even though he was about four steps away. It was clear to Jeff he was sulking—not so much because the team had lost but because he’d only scored four points. Jeff knew him well enough to know his first concern was almost always his statistics.
So, when Arlow was slow joining him, he didn’t wait. He put up his hand and said, “Get better, on three.”
The others came to the center of the room—Arlow, too—finally. The hands went up. “One, two, three,” Jeff said.
They all said, “Get better!”
Everyone turned to take their things from their lockers and put on their sweats. All except for Arlow, who was glaring at Jeff.
“Did someone make you captain?” he asked. “Did I miss something?”
Jeff shook his head.
“Can we get through one day without an argument, Arlow?” he said. “We are teammates. You were sulking. Our job is to show life and lead the team, win or lose, regardless of how many points we score.”
For once, Arlow didn’t come back at him. He’d noticed, no doubt, that everyone in the room was staring at the two of them. Jeff’s comment made too much sense to fire back. He just shook his head and walked to his locker.
Diskin leaned into Jeff and said softly, “Well, pal, you won that round.”
“That’s about all we won today,” Jeff said.
He hoped Coach C was right about Camden being the best team they would play. He wondered how the girls were doing playing the Camden girls back at school.
The answer was: not very well. Sadly for Andi, that wasn’t close to being her biggest problem as the afternoon wore on.
She knew she was in trouble as soon as they walked onto the court after the locker room fight had been broken up.
Right away, she noticed the camera crew set up at the far end of the court. She saw the NBC Sports–Philadephia logo on the camera and she instantly recognized Michael Barkann, usually a studio host but someone who had said on-air during soccer season, “This might be the best story in our town this fall,” as Andi had progressed from being cut to benchwarmer to starter to star.
“What in the world are they doing here?” she whispered to Lisa Carmichael.
Lisa smiled. “Following up on the best story of the fall?”
Andi groaned. She was almost certainly right. There was absolutely no reason for a TV crew to be at a sixth-grade basketball game. Maybe Camden had a star they were there to see? Not likely. How could anyone possibly know if a sixth grader was a future star before a single game had been played?
Then, as she went through the pregame layup line with everyone else, Andi spotted another familiar face: Stevie Thomas, the star kid reporter who was now a freshman at Penn. He had also followed her story during soccer season. He did most of his work for the Washington Herald and had brought a lot of attention to Andi’s story outside of Philadelphia. He certainly wasn’t here to check on anyone playing for Camden.
He was here for Andi.
The media had played an important role in getting Andi on the team and on the field during soccer season. Now, though, the last thing she needed was any attention at all from the media.
A basketball whizzed past Andi’s head.
“Hey, Carillo, get your head up,” Jamie Bronson barked.
She’d thrown a pass to Andi in the layup line and it had gone right past Andi because she wasn’t paying attention. She’d been lucky not to get hit in the face by the ball.
“What’re you doing, Carillo, posing for the camera?”
It was Alayne Jolie, right behind her in the layup line.
Andi didn’t answer. She had no answer.
Things didn’t get any better when the game started. The Camden girls, Andi would learn later, were every bit as good as the Camden boys. About the only Merion player who was able to score with any consistency was Eleanor Dove. When she got the ball around the basket, she was almost impossible to stop.
Even though Camden had two players who were taller than she was, she was quicker and a better leaper. There were two problems: first, it wasn’t easy to get the ball to her since she was frequently double-teamed. Second, none of the other Merion players could score—at all.
Even Maria Medley, who was so much quicker than the rest of her teammates, struggled because it seemed as if all of Camden’s guards were as quick as she was. At the end of the first quarter, the score was Camden 14, Eleanor Dove 6. No one else had scored for Merion.
Coach Josephson hadn’t subbed at all in the first six minutes. At the start of the second quarter she sent five new players into the game. Andi wasn’t one of them. She found herself sitting on the end of the bench next to Lisa Carmichael.
“I know she can’t stand me,” she whispered to Lisa. “But what in the world did you do?”
Lisa smiled. “Became friends with you?”
She was joking, or at least half joking, but there was a ring of truth to it. Andi guessed the only reason Eleanor and Maria had started was because they were the team’s two best players. Or, at least two of the three best. Andi honestly believed she was the best shooting guard the team had. It was tough to prove that sitting on the bench.
Three minutes into the second quarter, Andi heard Coach Axelson say to Coach Josephson, “Amy, we’ve got to call time and get some subs in.”
Coach Josephson shot her a withering look but stood up and put her hands together in a T-signal to get a time-out.
The score was now 22–6. Debbie Lee, subbing for Eleanor, was a little taller but not nearly as quick or agile. With Eleanor out, Merion was struggling to get a shot off, much less score.
“Dove, Medley, go for Lee and Eisen,” she said.
Coach Axelson was pointing at Andi and Lisa. “Coach, we need to get them in,” she said.
Andi could see Coach Josephson scowl. Then, finally, she said, “Okay, fine. Carillo, Carmichael, get in.”
“For who?” Andi asked.
Coach Josephson looked at her as if she were too stupid to live. Then she looked at Coach Axelson. “Go for Allison and Mearns,” she said.
Andi and Lisa raced to the scorer’s table to report in to the game. The horn blew. There had been no discussion of tactics at all.
Still, walking onto the court, Andi felt better. She was playing—finally—and that, she decided, was a start.