Break for the Basket Read online

  “Tell the scorekeeper you’re going in for Mickey Dunbar,” said Coach Long.

  Emmett reported to the scorekeeper. When the whistle blew for a ball that had gone off the court, Emmett went in. He tapped Mickey on the shoulder. Mickey stared at him. “Hi, Emmett!” he said, and trotted off the floor.

  Robin Hood passed the ball from out of bounds to Rusty Kane. Rusty dribbled across the middle line and passed to Glenn Long, a slender, dark-haired boy who was the coach’s son. A guard crowded him as he tried to take a set shot. He passed to Emmett.

  The pass surprised Emmett. He stood there, holding the ball nervously in his hands. He felt as if a thousand eyes were watching him.

  “Shoot, Emmett!” a voice shouted across the din. “Shoot!”

  He looked up. There was the rim, a bright orange ring with the white nylon net clinging underneath.

  A guard sprang in front of him. Emmett dribbled to the right, stopped, then dribbled again.

  Shreeek!

  Double dribble!

  Eskimos’ out. They passed the ball in. A man dribbled across the center line and shot an overhand pass. Emmett raced hard downcourt, wondering why he had double dribbled, for he knew better.

  A try for a layup. Missed! Rusty Kane took the rebound and passed to Robin Hood. The Penguins moved the ball down the court. Glenn passed to Emmett. Emmett pivoted, gripped with that scared feeling again. He looked up at the basket, lifted his arms to shoot. A hand whacked his wrist. Shreeek! The whistle!

  The referee lifted two fingers. Two shots!

  7

  EMMETT STOOD at the foul line, the ball held in both his hands. The referee was standing in front of him, waiting for the players to line up on both sides of the free-throw lane.

  Emmett grew more nervous by the second. Beads of sweat shone on his brow. Everybody was watching him. He had never been the focus of attention before.

  At last the referee moved out of the way, signaling for Emmett to shoot. Emmett looked at the basket, took a deep breath, and shot.

  The ball struck high on the backboard, and bounced off. It barely hit the rim.

  One more shot. The ball was now in play. Emmett heard soft words of encouragement from Rusty and Robin Hood, but he was so nervous he wanted to get rid of the ball as quickly as he could. He aimed, and threw. The ball hardly arched. It struck the rim and glanced off. Both teams leaped for the rebound. An Eskimo player’s long arms pulled the ball down. There was a wild scramble.

  The whistle shrilled. Jump ball.

  The tall Eskimo player outjumped Robin. Another Eskimo took the tap, dribbled away, then heaved a pass to a teammate running across the center line. Emmett saw that it was his man. He raced downcourt, knowing that he should have kept his eyes open. He should have looked for his man immediately after he had missed his second foul shot.

  The Eskimo player caught the pass, dribbled up to his basket, and laid the ball up against the boards. It banked into the net as clean as could be.

  The fans screamed. Emmett looked at the scoreboard. No wonder. The Eskimos had tied it up, 29 to 29! If he had made only one of those foul shots, the Penguins would still have remained ahead.

  The Penguins took out the ball and moved it downcourt. Rusty faked a shot to the basket, then passed to Robin. Robin pivoted and tried a two-handed overhand shot. The ball rolled around the rim and fell off. A quick roar rose and fell almost instantly. That was so close!

  An Eskimo player took the rebound. Emmett started to reach for the ball, to try to pull it out of the other player’s hand, but drew back. He was afraid he might foul.

  He leaped away, then quickly followed his man toward the Eskimos’ basket. A quick pass, a dribble, and then a pivot shot. In!

  The whistle shrieked. Mickey came back in. “Okay, Emmett,” he said. “Good game.”

  Emmett trotted off the court, not daring to look up. He hadn’t done a thing right all those minutes he had been in the game.

  “Cheer up,” said Coach Long. “You’ll make out all right.”

  The game ended with the Eskimos winning, 31 to 29.

  There was a lot of chatter among the players in the shower room, but Emmett hardly said a word. He was anxious to get dressed and leave.

  Mickey Dunbar walked home with him. Mickey looked so much like Robin Hood, yet he acted so differently. Of the two, Emmett liked Mickey better.

  “I guess I stunk,” said Emmett.

  “You weren’t so bad,” ’said Mickey. “You’ll get used to it. It takes time. There’s a non-league game at the Community Hall Tuesday night. Can you be there?”

  “I’ll try,” said Emmett. “What time?”

  “Six-thirty.”

  “Okay. Will you stop by? We’ll walk over together.”

  “Okay.”

  Emmett arrived home in time to sit at the table and have dinner with his Mom, Dad, and his sisters. His Dad asked him how the basketball game had gone, and Emmett told him.

  “How did you do?” asked his father.

  “Rotten,” replied Emmett.

  Emmett felt better Tuesday night against the Arrows. The Arrows were in a different league. Rules did not permit teams in the same league to play exhibition games. There were only a handful of people there. Most of them were kids of Emmett’s age.

  When the game started, Emmett and Wayne Reese were on the bench. Johnny Clark, Glenn Long, Rusty Kane, Mickey and Robin Hood Dunbar were in the starting lineup. The Arrows took the tap from center and passed swiftly downcourt. Traveling was called, and the Penguins took out the ball. Back upcourt it came. Mickey passed to Johnny, Johnny to Robin Hood. Robin dribbled in fast for a drive-in shot, laid the ball up against the boards, and sank it for the Penguins’ first basket.

  Seconds later Mickey sank a long set shot. Then the Arrows scored on a pivot shot. And on a drive-in an Arrow forward got his wrist whacked by Robin Hood for a two-shot foul. The Arrow player made the first shot and missed the second. At the next whistle Coach Long took out Johnny and put in Emmett.

  Emmett thought he was over that nervousness. But almost at once it was back, like a bad dream. He fumbled a pass, and Rusty yelled at him.

  “Come on, Emmett! Hang on to ’em!”

  At a mad scramble for the ball, Emmett stood back, afraid to join in. He found, as the game went along, that the boys were hardly throwing the ball to him. They were ignoring him, as if he were not there.

  Once again the Penguins had the ball on their backcourt. But each man was well guarded. The Arrows were pressing. Mickey had the ball. He dribbled, stopped, and looked for a man in the clear. There wasn’t any — except Emmett. The Arrow man guarding him had probably realized, too, that Emmett wasn’t much of a player. Nobody was throwing him the ball.

  Then Mickey shot him a swift pass. The throw caught Emmett by surprise. But he glued his hands on the ball. For a quick second he looked for someone else to pass to. The Arrows’ pressing play was like a heavy curtain. There wasn’t a Penguin player in the clear.

  Emmett faced the basket. Without aiming, he shot. The ball arched high. The next moment it sank through the hoop with a soft swish!

  8

  THE PENGUINS CHEERED. Robin Hood cheered loudest of all. He slapped Emmett on the back.

  “A beauty!”

  In the second quarter the Penguins piled up eight points, held the Arrows down to three. Emmett tried three times to duplicate the shot he had made in the first quarter, but failed each time. He played a couple of minutes in the third quarter, and didn’t hit then, either.

  He knew that shot had been a lucky one. He couldn’t repeat it if he tried a hundred times.

  Twice in the last quarter he missed a layup. He knew he was going to miss even before he tried. Coach Long took him out and said that he was trying too hard.

  Emmett didn’t know what to think. How could he not try hard and still expect to play? What was he supposed to do to score points? Was this basket different from the one in his yard?

  Som
ehow, playing basketball didn’t seem like so much fun any more.

  On Saturday the Penguins played the Seals, and edged them out by a one-point margin, 34 to 33. The following Saturday the Icebergs lagged in the game against the Penguins throughout the first half, then came back like wildfire and won, 39 to 24.

  In both games Emmett played very little. There were two others besides himself who sat through most of the games more than they played, Johnny Clark and Wayne Reese. But warming the bench was better than nothing. And sometimes he did get in to play.

  What hurt him most was knowing that he could do better. He was sure he could play as well as Rusty Kane, or even the Dunbars. Didn’t he hit the basket at home most of the times that he tried layups? Didn’t he hit those set shots more often, too?

  Why couldn’t he do it here?

  In his heart, Emmett knew. He was scared, that was why. Scared and shy. He was scared he might miss, or foul, or not do something right. He was shy of the crowd. Yes, he knew, all right. He knew, too, that he would never get over that terrible, terrible feeling.

  Snow covered the ground and the trees like a heavy white blanket as Christmas drew near. Mr. Torrance bought a Christmas tree, and Emmett helped decorate it with bulbs and tinsel. Gift packages in beautiful red, green, and white wrappings were piled underneath the tree. On Christmas morning they were unwrapped. Other gifts which Santa had brought had no wrappings. All that Christmas Day Charlene, Georgianne, and Emmett played with their brand-new toys and sang Christmas carols while their mother played the piano. And at supper they prayed to God and thanked Him for giving them a happy Christmas.

  Mr. G. came over in the afternoon. He brought small gifts for each of the children, and then recited poems from memory. Most of them were funny, and the children laughed. Mrs. Torrance asked him to stay for supper. He did, but left immediately afterwards.

  “He must be a lonely man,” said Mrs. Torrance. “I wonder why he doesn’t find himself a girl and get married.”

  Mr. Torrance chuckled. “Guess he’s just a bachelor at heart.”

  “He likes to paint,” said Emmett. “Maybe he thinks that if he gets married he’ll have to work a lot harder and won’t have time to paint.”

  His Mom laughed. “That could be exactly the reason,” she said.

  In early January the weather turned warm, and the snow melted. It filled the curbs with gushing water and made Crandall Lake swell and the ice break into pieces. Once again the yard was dry and clean. Emmett brought out his basketball and began playing by himself.

  One Saturday afternoon, after the Penguins had taken a game from the Polar Bears, Mr. Torrance came out and watched Emmett dribble on the “court” and take shots at the basket. Presently Mr. G. came over, too, and Emmett got an idea.

  “Will you two play with me?” he asked hopefully. “Will you pretend you’re the defense?”

  “Why, of course,” said Mr. G. “Just try to get by us!”

  Mr. G. and Mr. Torrance placed themselves between Emmett and the basket. Emmett began to dribble. He started to cut between his father and Mr. G. His father swiped at the ball. Emmett broke fast around him and went for the backcourt. Mr. G. followed closely and flung up his arms to stop Emmett from shooting. Emmett leaped, lifted the ball high, and banked it against the boards. Swish! A basket!

  “Beautiful play!” exclaimed Mr. G. “Let’s try that again.”

  Emmett caught the ball as it floated down through the net. He dribbled it back to about where the foul line should be. He repeated the play. Again the layup was perfect.

  “Good play!” cried Mr. G. “You hit like a pro.”

  “But I can’t in a game,” confessed Emmett. “I can’t hit at all.”

  “There’s something wrong, then,” his father said. “You’re doing all right here.”

  “Let me have that ball,” said Mr. G. “See if you ever tried this shot.”

  Emmett tossed Mr. G. the ball. “All right. Guard me.”

  Emmett played Mr. G. close and smiled to himself. He felt sure that he could steal the ball away from Mr. G. without difficulty if he wanted to, for he was certain that Mr. G. had never played basketball.

  But Mr. G. pulled a surprising thing. He started off dribbling slowly in front of Emmett. Then he shot past Emmett. Before Emmett could get close to him again, Mr. G. was driving in. He jumped, and lifted the ball underhand. The ball rose over the rim of the hoop, banked sharply, and riffled through the net.

  “Hey! Nice shot!” cried Emmett. “Wow!”

  Mr. G. chuckled. “It’s been a long time,” he said. “But that underhand drive-in shot used to be a favorite of mine. Might pay you to learn it.”

  “I will!” said Emmett.

  He tried it and tried it until he did it almost as well as Mr. G. But to think that Mr. G. had played basketball! Emmett would never have guessed that!

  Mr. Torrance tried some set shots and then some layups. He looked rusty, but Emmett watched him proudly. Anybody could tell that his Dad had played a lot of basketball in his younger years.

  Mrs. Torrance called her husband in to get groceries. Mr. G. and Emmett played together until Mr. G. grew so tired he had to quit.

  “I’m not in shape for this sort of thing,” he said. “But you do all right, Emmett. You should be playing regularly.”

  “I don’t,” said Emmett. “I warm the bench most of the time.”

  “When do you play again?” asked Mr. G.

  “Tuesday night, at Northside,” said Emmett. “It’s a non-league game.”

  “I’ll try to be there,” said Mr. G.

  Emmett didn’t really think that Mr. G. would go to the game. But at game time Mr. G. was sitting in the bleachers. As usual, Emmett started the game warming the bench. He finally took Wayne Reese’s place and had several chances with the ball.

  As usual, he became tense and worried. He hardly dared to shoot for fear he might miss the basket. He didn’t try any layups, only set shots, hoping that luck would be with him again. But it wasn’t.

  He felt terrible. He looked terrible. He wished that Mr. G. hadn’t come to see the game. Mr. G. would see now how poor a player he really was.

  9

  WHEN THE FIRST QUARTER ENDED, the Penguins trailed the Bucs 8 to 3. Mr. G. motioned to Emmett. Emmett toweled his face and neck, tossed the towel to Robin Hood, and went to see what Mr. G. wanted.

  “How long have you played with these boys?” Mr. G. asked.

  “Since before Christmas,” Emmett said.

  “How well do you know them? Do you play with them or talk with them any time between games?”

  Emmett thought a while. “No. I hardly see them.”

  “Don’t you see them in school?”

  “Yes, but — we don’t talk much.”

  Mr. G. nodded, as if he understood.

  “If your coach lets you in there this second quarter,” he said, “loosen up a bit. You’re too tense. Do more running. And do more shooting. You had some chances that first quarter.”

  “I’ll try,” said Emmett.

  The second quarter started with Emmett on the bench. This time Johnny Clark was playing forward. He dumped in two points, then was fouled as he tried to sink another. Two shots. He missed the first free throw, but sank the second. A minute before the quarter ended, Mr. Long had Emmett go in for Rusty Kane.

  Emmett tried to keep Mr. G.’s suggestion firmly in the front of his mind. He ran more. Twice he was in the open, but neither time was the ball thrown to him.

  At last he got a break. He intercepted a pass from the Bucs, pivoted, shot the ball to Robin Hood, and streaked for the basket. Robin dribbled toward the right baseline, then leaped as if to try a long shot. Instead, he snapped an overhand pass to Emmett. Emmett caught the ball, made a fast break toward the basket, and leaped up. With his right hand he gently laid the ball up against the backboard. Swish! The ball banked into the net for two points.

  “Thatago, Em!” shouted Robin Hood.

&nbs
p; The Bucs took out the ball. They moved it down-court and across the center line. Emmett’s man caught a pass and started to drive in. Anxiously, Emmett bolted in front of him. He hit the man’s shoulder. Shreeek! A foul! The referee held up one finger for the scorekeeper to note, and then five fingers to show who had committed the foul. Emmett raised his hand and shook his head glumly. He hadn’t meant to guard his man that close. He had to be more careful.

  The Bucs’ player scored the shot. Then the horn blew, announcing the end of the first half.

  The boys filed into the locker room. Coach Long followed them in. “Good game so far,” he said. “Nice shot, Emmett. You surprised me. You should do that more often.”

  Emmett blushed. “Thanks,” he said.

  Mr. Long didn’t say any more. Then the door opened again, and in came Mr. G. The whole team stared as the little man with the thick mop of red hair stood smiling in front of the door. He was smaller than Mr. Long, and only a couple of inches taller than Rusty Kane, the Penguins’ center.

  “Hi,” he said. “Mind if I come in?”

  None of the boys answered for a moment, as if stunned at seeing him in the room.

  “Not at all.” Mr. Long broke the awkward silence. “Come in. Aren’t you Mr. Garfield, the painter?”

  “Yes, I am,” replied Mr. G. “At least, I’m Mr. Garfield.” He smiled. “Most people know me as Mr. G. I suppose that’s easier to remember.”

  Mr. Long put out his hand, and Mr. G. took it. “I’m glad to know you, Mr. G. I’m Ed Long. These are my boys. I guess you know your neighbor, Emmett Torrance.” Then he went on introducing the rest of the team. “Frankly, I know very little about basketball,” Mr. Long admitted. “The boys had to have a coach, so I volunteered.”

  Mr. G. smiled. “I don’t like to interfere,” he said, “but I think I could point out a few things to the boys that might improve their playing.”

  “I’ll go along with that one hundred per cent,” said Mr. Long.