Inter-High Preliminaries

On the day of the Tournament Seirin demolished Kyoritsu 86 to 50. Long Story Short, Hideki, Teppei and Hyuga scored the same amount of points as Kyoritsu had.

And the long story (well just the gist of it) was that at the opening tip, Kiyoshi beat their Center and the ball was tipped into Hideki's hands and shouted "Rush A!" and quickly made a beeline to the basket for a wicked dunk that made the small audience rise from their seat, which in Seirin's side, consists mostly of the Sports Admirers Club. And Hideki quickly scored Seirin's 2 points, he was Seirin's first points recorded in a formal organized setting.

In the next 40 minutes, they just didn't slip the lead and continued to balloon it. Hideki was beeting his defender with his quickness and long frame, which made it impossible to block him. Teppei either scores or dishes out assists to open teammates or to those who has a better look at scoring than him. And Hyuga was the recipient of the outlet passes coming from Hideki and Kiyoshi.

In this game, they just played to their positions. At Center was Teppei, Mitobe at Power Forward Hideki at Small Forward, HHyuga at Shooting Guard and Izuki at Point Guard. 

Hideki was the team's Small Forward due to his adaptability and his playstyle suited more for a Small Forward, just trapped in a 201cm heighed body, and unlike Mitobe whose only better trait then Hideki was strength, Hideki could also shoot, pass and dribble the ball like a guard.

During the game, the Kyoritsu High players were shocked to see that their opponents' level were more than what they could chew, and those players who knew Hideki or Teppei were shocked to see them as their opponents, two Uncrowned Kings in one team spelled disaster for them.

So as Hyuga shot the last basket, the Kyorin team were gasping for breath having no answer for Seirin's 3 guns, said "We won't lose to you next time Shorin High!" Hyuga was ticked by this and said "Wrong!" and the whole Seirin team faced them and Hyuga said "It's Seirin High Basketball Team!"

Afterwards they shook hands and exchanged formalities.

As they exited the tunnel to the changing room, Hideki noticed a small detail while Teppei was walking, he looked at his left knee as if he was feeling something, so Hideki tapped his shoulder and asked "Is something wrong Teppei?" Teppei smiled and said "No, there's nothing wrong Hideki. Just happy that we won the game"

---

As the tournament progressed, Seirin steamrolled their opponents and luckily for them their opponents are not that so good either, the only team they will worry in their bracket is Torimura High and Kirisiki Daiichi High, and those team are not on par with Tokyo's Three Kings, they are not on their bracket. But that didn't mean that they should be complacent and take it one game at a time, as a single loss here would result them in losing their chance at Inter High and more embarrassingly, confess to someone butt naked.

Up until the semifinals of their bracket they outscoredtheir opponents as much as 20 points but that gap was getting smaller the nearer they got to the Semi-Finals, and their opponents at the Semi-Finals are Torimura High.

Torimura High is an offensive team like Seirin, but unlike Seirin, they are more polished in a sense that their team are more experienced and their team have played in the previous Preliminaries too.

---

So Torimura and Seirin High was a banger after banger after banger from the Tip-off. After the mythical Rush B strategy, Torimura were still poised and were able to get a bucket after that possession. 

Until the fourth quarter the game was still a one possession game with Seirin always in the lead, they could not get off this team metaphorically. And at the last 10 seconds with Seirin's ball, the score was 96 to 93 and it was after a Torimura shot so they have to do an out of bounds play, the play they designed was to pass the ball to Hyuga in case they tried to foul him, which Torimura did and in the free throw Hyuga split his free throws, sinking the first one and the second one was little off to the right, where Hideki was at, battling against the Torimura Power Forward and Small Forward, but the basketball gods favoured Seirin and the bounce got to Hideki who tipped the shot in so Seirin have a 99 to 93 lead and Torimura only managed to get 2 more points after that before the game ended.

Seirin won against Torimujra at 99 to 95. 

After that, everybody was celebrating and everybody were hugging and they have made it to the Preliminary Bracket Finals to determine if they would go and advance to the Final League or go home. Of course they'll exert effort into going to the Inter-High.

---

After that game, the players were going home to take a rest and study for the Midterm Exams and coincidentally, Hideki, Teppei and Hyuga were walking when Hideki suddenly said to both of them, "One more win and we're in the Final League boys" Teppei affirmed this and said "Yeah"

Hyuga was happy and then scratched the back of his said and said "Uhm, you see Kiyoshi, I hate you." To which Teppei said "Yeah I know." Hyuga then said "But after joining the team, and training hard and winning. Basketball is really fun. So I sort of grateful. Kind of. Maybe not." Teppei was confused so he asked "Sorry, which one?" Hyuga got angry and shouted at him "Of course not!"

Teppei then told the boys his story that when he solicited Riko, Hyuga and Teppei were looking at Teppei weirdly with his address towards her, he didn't see them reacting slightly to this. Teppei said that he was a bit guilty when she said that everybody gave up on winning because ot the Generation of Miracles and that made her dislike the sport, she hated quitters. At Shoei, not everyone believed that they can defeat Teiko, and Teppei was one of them.

But unlike Shoei, at Seirin, everybody believed that they could reach the top so he thanked God that he met the guys at the team.

Hyuga was also sentimental for a moment and then his face did a complete 180 and said "How can you say that with a straight face you dumbass?" Then he walked off leaving Teppei and Hideki to go home first.

Hideki and Teppei was dumbfounded by that so Hideki broke the ice and said "Well, me too Teppei, I also thank God we pledged in front of the school. That means a lot to me" Teppei smiled at Hideki's comment so they walked again, but after two steps, Hideki asked "How is it that you're addressing Riko as Riko? Are you two dating" Teppei shuddered and was shocked by that random question, he neither confirmed nor deny it but his body's actions said the whole story.

Hideki facepalmed literally and thought to himself 'Man, I thought Hyuga got first dibs on Riko, well guess not', then he stopped and told Teppei, "Don't make her cry or I'll tear you from limb to limb" Then Hideki walked off saying he still has to do stuff at home, leaving Teppei dumbfounded too and just replied "Okay, captain?"