15 Practice

You can support me and read advanced chapters at https://www.patréon.com/Udaywrites

[Note: type the link with a normal e]

____________________________________________________________________________________________________

Practice

The time was 7:30 in the morning, I was standing near the indoor basketball gym of Midtown High.

There is a very good chance that this entire thing fails and I end up being a laughing stock but I don't know what else to do.

I've exhausted all the other quick ways I could legally earn money for Uncle Ben's treatment plan.

It may be comical but I live in a comic world so there's no reason it shouldn't work.

Sneaker's were squeaking and I could smell the seat in the air from afar!

The player's tired breaths and the referee's whistles, I could hear it all.

While Midtown High didn't have the best sports programme in New York City (Not by a longshot) it wasn't a slouch either! They were contenders in many high school tournaments from what I last heard.

Once I entered the facility, I could see the basketball players off to the side. It's pretty hard to miss them.

'Woah I forgot just how tall ball players were!' I knew that they were big humans but goddamn!

The gym was mostly empty, there was the basketball team and a couple of cleaning staff.

What really caught my eye was the traditional wooden court!

I've never played basketball on anything other than concrete. So the opportunity to play on a wooden court got me excited.

There was a small huddle near the end. That must be the team!

'The coach must be there somewhere!'

I actually felt a little bit nervous approaching them, they were all quite tall.

Some of them were even 7 feet tall.

'Damn what do they feed these kids?'

I walked up to the bench, trying to spot the coach but I couldn't make out who it was.

There was a brown haired boy with a clipboard standing near the Team bench. I walked up to him.

"Um excuse me?"

He looked at me for a second and then completely ignored me.

"Hey Will, tell him we're practicing." One of the player's said to the boy with the clipboard.

'Oh wait a minute, they're practicing. You're disturbing them of course you idiot!'

I was so amped up that I forgot an actual practice session was going on.

'Dumbass' I wanted to hit myself.

I didn't want to make an even bigger fool of myself so, I immediately moved away from their peripheral. Found myself a place to sit in the empty bleacher seats and waited for practice to end.

Sports was very similar to the military in a sense. There was a chain of command and a strict hierarchy that you followed and never disrespected. So I could relate to how they felt about me barging in and disturbing them!

In the military, basketball was a popular sport among the cadets. One of my fellow recruits at the Basic Phase 3, Sushant, introduced me to the game.

I was hooked ever since then. Sushant died in a recon mission in 2008 and was awarded the Param Vir Chakra Posthumously.

I'll still remember those late evening games in the military base.

We never played using the official rules of the NBA or anything like that. So I won't lie, I was a bit intimidated.

Still it wasn't like I was going into this completely blind. Uncle Ben took me to enough Knicks games that I learned all the official rules through osmosis.

'I'll be alright, I hope! Just wait till this game is finished and then I'll properly introduce myself to the coach.'

There were two teams, one in the blue vest while the other orange.

The scoreboard read 67 - 76 in favor of the orange team. It was the fourth quarter with 3 minutes left.

Watching the game, one thing became very clear.

'Both of these teams sucked!'

Neither team had ball movement and the defense was atrocious. No hustle or a real will to win the game! It was extremely jarring to see young players play so robotically.

Their passing was horrendous, every player was in it for themselves.

No sense of unity or teamwork.

One of the worst at playing team ball was #95, a black player with a braid.

He just kept hoarding the ball and shooting it without looking for the open man.

'Damn that's an incredibly selfish way of playing the game. I expected much more from a high school situated in New York.'

New York was after all the mecca of basketball! It was actually Los Angeles but my uncle would disown me if I ever said that.

"That's right Pierre penetrate to the left...that's right…"

It was a middle aged man with a pot belly in a red track suit yelling.

'That guy must be the Coach!' A fat basketball coach, some things never change no matter where you are!

The ball rimmed out again, he missed!

'Pierre.' I looked at #95, he must be the team's ace. He looked to be around 6'6, almost as tall as the Kingpin but he had none of the baldy's muscles. Tall and Thin.

A dangerous combination for a basketball player health wise.

He was talented but it seemed like he wasn't being used efficiently. Honestly it looked like he really hated playing basketball.

A timeout was called just as the clock got down to 60 seconds.

"Alright, good job boys. We got a comfortable lead, focus on the defense and don't exert yourself too much on the offensive side of things. Get the win." The coach said confidently.

'What, that's it? No defensive schemes or player changes. Besides, being 6 points up wasn't an assured victory. I've seen multiple games where an overconfident team lost a much bigger lead in less time.'

The Coach's relaxed posture gave me some worry!

'Is this Okay? Do I want to play for this team? Maybe I can ask Harry for a job at Oscorp? That might be more plausible than-'

"Water!" Pierre shouted.

He was panting, the water boy came up running with some water and a towel. He took the bottle rather forcefully.

The Timeout buzzer rang again.

The Blue team in-bounded the ball to its shortest player #10. He was about 5'4 so he must be the point guard.

From there he slowly stalked the opposition's side of the court with careful dribbles.

The Orange team had lazy perimeter defense and the short player took advantage of it.

He hovered around the three point line and shot it suddenly out of nowhere. The ball arched out and went inside the hoop barely touching the net with a Swish.

It went in.

'A three pointer.' My blood started pumping again.

Three points more to go and the blue team ties the game.

'If they make one more three! C'mon dude you can do it!!'

Pierre brought up the ball from the other side and did what I never expected him to do.

He passed the ball to the open man #33, who looked like he was gonna shoot it.

'Okay this game is getting exciting!!!' I couldn't restrain myself from standing up to get a better view of things.

"NOOO! PIERRE Drive inside. DRIVE!" The coach damn near burst a vein when he saw his star player making the correct play.

#33 looked pissed but he did what his coach told him to do and passed it back to Pierre.

Pierre looked hesitant but not wasting anymore time he went deep inside the paint. Making his way to the rim for a two point layup.

The same short player #10, the one who made the crazy three pointer jumped in front of Pierre blocking his path.

'That dude has balls. He's gonna get run over but he's got balls!'

Pierre charged into the smaller dude by leaning into him using his shoulder and made his way to the rim.

The referee's whistle blew.

"That's a charge." I said a bit louder than I intended.

"Blocking Foul." The young player referee yelled out!

"WHAT!" this time I damn near shouted.

I could see the entire team looking at me, the coach especially looking really pissed.

'That's clearly an offensive charge. I'm pretty damn sure his feet were in position. Any idiot can see that was a clear charge.'

The boy with a clipboard came up to me.

'Uh-Oh.'

"Don't disturb our practice! If you yell out again, I'll have you removed."

"My bad. It won't happen again!" I said with a blank face.

The game resumed with Pierre shooting two free throws from the free throw line.

'He wasn't fouled, in fact I'm pretty damn sure he fouled the other player intentionally. #10 should be shooting free throws right now, not him!'

Pierre made both of his free throws. So that's two points added to the existing three point lead.

'This game is over!' I resigned.

It would take a miracle for the blue team to come back from a five point lead at the 40 second mark.

#10 brought up the ball and crossed over three other guys in the orange team.

'What!'

He took a three point again,

'The arc looks good! This guy might really make it. He really might hit two consecutive three pointers '

The ball hit the rim and spun around the hoop. The game might be back to a two point lead if this goes in. It kept spinning and spinning. It felt like it was never gonna stop.

'GO INSIDE! GO INSIDE!' I wanted the underdog to win.

Then the ball stopped, right when I thought it was going to go in! It went in the opposite direction and fell onto the floor.

'DAMMIT!'

The orange team played catch with the ball and ran the timeout.

FINAL SCORE: 81 - 76

The Orange team wins.

The players all did their ritual custom handshakes and went back to where the rest of the team were.

"Good job boys" the coach said to the orange team, completely neglecting the others.

'They must be the A stringers.'

"Alright everyone huddle up." The Coach said with authority

"Next Tuesday, we're facing the green horns again. I want every single one of you to be prepared. We're gonna kick their asses this time. Alright.Okay. RedHawks in three. One. Two. Three."

"RED HAWKS" they all shouted.

The entire team splintered and went out, presumably to shower. One by one they left, talking to each other while they were walking.

The boy with the clipboard and the coach were talking.

"Umm Excuse me, Coach!" I spoke to the duo.

"What is it?" The coach was clearly annoyed at me.

'God will anything ever go my way.'

"I want to join the basketball team, sir."