Paddy Clarke Snippet

I loved to play pick-up basketball games on the court outside of the park. Every Monday and Wednesday kids from my neighborhood would go there to play basketball and test their skills. We played three-on-three most of the time and I would always pretend to be Dwyane Wade. I spent hours practicing and mimicking his moves. His slight fade on his jump shot I practiced. His misleading crossover moves I practiced. His ability to effortlessly glide through the air I practiced. The first team to reach twenty-one points would win the game. Instead of two pointers and three pointers, we played with one pointers and two pointers to make the games last longer. Any shots made past the three point line counted as two points while any shot made inside of the line only counted as one. The two-point shot always caused a lot of controversy. “Your foot was on the line that shot only counts as one point” someone would say to me. I would scream “It was not are you blind?! You’re just mad because you’re losing!” They would always say “I’m never playing ball with you again you cheater!” Yet we always forgot about it and ended up playing again. The score was 0-0. The ball was in my team’s possession for the first play after we won the decisive rock-paper-scissors ritual. I started with the ball in my hands as I took a few dribbles with my right hand as my left hand protected it from the ravenous defenders trying to steal the ball from me. From the corner of my peripherals, I saw a glimpse of my teammate Matt cutting to the basket. Instinctually I whipped a low bounce pass that weaved through the legs of the opposing team and ended up in Matt’s hands who scored the easy basket. Matt was the tallest out of all of us. Though he wasn’t the most skilled, this made him perfect for scoring anywhere close to the hoop. 1-0 now. The rule was always “make-it, take-it.” If you scored, you still had possession of the ball on the next play. This made you have to play tough defense to gain possession of the ball. I let Steve pass the ball in this time. Steve was the smallest out of all of us but he was the quickest. Though he couldn’t power his way through people, his speed allowed him to still be effective. His agility allowed him to set up Matt and me for scoring. He used a head-fake to confuse the defense about the direction he was going in which is when he cut right through the middle of the opponent’s defense and kicked out a pass to me. I was standing directly behind the three point line when I caught the pass. The whole motion flowed fluidly like one graceful sweep. I caught the ball in rhythm with a slight bend to my knees. Without hesitation, I rose up with the ball and with a flick of my wrist the ball traveled through the air and through the hoop. SWISH! 3-0 now. This was going to be easy. This No words can describe the satisfaction received from hearing that beautiful sound. The only way you can get that sound is with a Spalding basketball. Albert Spalding was a famous baseball player who ended up creating the chain that manufactures sport balls. The feeling of a Spalding basketball is second to none. The thousands of tiny dots allowed for the best grip on your hand while the indents perfectly fit your hands. It makes sense why Spalding is the official basketball used by the NBA. Wilson basketballs were too leathery and picked up dirt easily. Nike basketballs didn’t have very good grip and weren’t as durable Spalding. The score was now 17-20 and we were losing. Me and my teammates were too complacent. It was their possession. Matt, Steve and I weren’t going to go out like this. It was crunch time. The defense we played was tenacious and nasty from that point. We weren’t going to let them win this game. We got the ball back after the other team missed a well-defended shot. Steve was handling the ball and made a quick drive to the hoop. After drawing the attention of the defense, Steve dished the ball to the cutting Matt as he scored an easy lay-up. 18-20 was the score and we had possession of the ball. I dribbled the ball in this time. After analyzing how they were guarding me, I noticed that my defender guarding me up close after learning that I was skilled at shooting the outside shot. The other two were double-teaming Matt as they knew Steve wasn’t a good scorer. Right there, I made the decision to drive hard to the hoop and then pull back at the last moment to pull up for the mid-range jumper. My body elevated as I lifted the ball above my head and let the ball fly. I cringed as I saw the ball miss the rim completely. “No!” I thought to myself as the other team rebounded the ball. They immediately took the ball in for a lay-up and won the game. The final score was 18-21. My dad once said “You can’t accept in victory what you can’t accept in defeat.” The loss was a tough pill to swallow.

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