Super Sports Story
In honor of yesterday’s big game, I thought I would post this sport story, emailed to me by a friend. I know, I know, wrong sport, but…
This story began 30 years ago almost to the day. I was a sophomore in high school on the JV basketball team. We had a game that evening in Verdigre Nebraska . We were winless and this was the one team we were expected to defeat. Go Crusaders!
Anyway, the game was close and went down to literally the last second. Pope John (my team) was down by one point and I was fouled on the last play as time ran out. The officials blew the whistle and made all the players leave the court and sit on the bench. Everyone except me of course. They called me out to the court to shoot two free throws. My coach caught up with me before I went out and told me “Relax Boes, we just need one to tie it”. I get halfway to the line and the opposing coach calls a timeout. Trying to ice me. I huddle with the coach again. I hear some mumbling from my teammates on the bench, “You better make one of these Boes”. I am pretty concerned about the situation at this point. It would be better if we were down by two and I had to make both of them. Anyone can make one out of two free throws, right? I mean Greg Tharnish, a friend of mine, used to routinely make 18-19 out of 21 free throws in the Knights of Columbus derby and that was in the 5th grade! Why couldn’t Greg have been fouled?
I step up to the line with all these thoughts in my head and whatta ya know… I miss the first throw. It wasn’t a terrible throw as it did hit the rim, but it definitely did not look good. I stepped away from the line wondering if they might ice me again. I am not sure if you can even call a timeout at that point but after seeing my first throw I am sure the Verdigre coach can’t wait for me to shoot another one. The second throw goes up and does not look good. A gasp from the crowd. We lose.
No one looks at me or talks to me as I walk from the free throw line to the locker room. Now to my credit, I sucked at free throws and I always have, so in a sort of way, I really didn’t choke. Right? I am the last one to get on the bus. The team is quiet for the first three nanoseconds and then from the back I hear this guttural sound..”meh heh eh heh heh”. Is that a sheep? No, not a sheep. That’s a goat sound. No, I’m a goat! The sound builds from back to front until the entire bus is bleating a goat tune. It was like the movie “Carrie” except with words (or bleats) instead of blood. Nowadays, kids know how to handle these things and come to school the next day with an AK47. I just sucked it up and felt bad for 4 or 5 years then pretty much got over it. I didn’t even need therapy. Kids were tough back then I guess.
Back to the present day… my 4th grader Kevin is playing in a basketball tournament in Choteau Montana . He gets fouled with four seconds left in the game and his team down by one point. Kevin knows my goat story very well as I have told it to him many times at bedtime. He always seems to get a chuckle out of this story in particular. He steps up to the free throw line. I am mortified. I wonder if he is thinking of the goat story. I am tempted to reassure him that “he only needs one” but I stay quiet. The end of the story is on the following video:
I asked Kevin what he was thinking about at the free throw line and he said “nothing”. Creating a blank slate and just living in the moment. I think Kevin taught me today how to shoot free throws and a few other things.
I used to play a lot of ball and was a decent shooter, but always had trouble with free throws for some reason. That kid has real good form for a 4th grader, nice follow through. Sounds like proud Dad finally feels like he has the monkey off his back, to some degree.
Or the goat!