The Little Basketball Game (Younger Days)

“Oh, good, no one is here yet,” said Dan to Jowy as they came to the park early in the morning.  Dan wanted to show Jowy more about playing basketball, but he preferred no one to be around as he knew Jowy was a great shot even though he hardly knew how to play the game.   It’s embarrassing when someone you’re teaching shoots better than you do!  

“Did you know that Kareem Abdul-Jabbar scored 38,387 career points?” asked Jowy.  

And who knows the stats barely knowing what they mean!  

Dan proceeded to show Jowy how to dribble and pass—the former being a bit difficult for Jowy’s size, as he needed 2 hands on the ball to control it.  With a little practice, Jowy could dribble at least a few steps and he did reasonably well passing, both direct and bounce passes.  (But Jowy’s legs were not long enough to bounce the ball between his legs.)  Then Dan tried to teach Jowy some defense—LEGAL defense, no tripping and stealing the ball!  

Just as this was going on, they got company.  Dan looked up and saw Bill, whom he didn’t get along with well, with his best friend, now known to Dan as Mark, but he didn’t know much more about him other than that he was good friends with Max, which seemed odd since Bill had been mean to Max in the months before.  

They had overheard Dan teaching Jowy, and Mark spoke first.  “Maybe we can help, too,” he said.  

Then Bill said, “Yeah!  We can play a game—you two against the two of us!”  

Dan shot back, “That’s not fair!  You two are both taller than I am and much taller than Jowy!  And he’s just learning!”  

Mark offered to team up with Jowy, but then Bill and Dan started arguing, making the point that they didn’t want to be on the same team, and Bill didn’t really want to take Jowy on his team.  But the height and experience difference was too uneven.  Dan suggested it might not even be fair if he and Jowy had a third player on their team.  

That’s when Bill said, “Okay!  The next kid who walks into this park can be on your team!”  Dan reluctantly agreed, but he knew it could be anyone.  

Just then, Mark looked up and called out “Hi Max!”  

Max called back, “H-Hi Mark!  Hi Bill!  Hi Guys!”  

Bill sneered, “It’s the Toddler!  You guys are going to lose big!”  

Yes, Max wasn’t much taller than Jowy, and he wasn’t good at basketball.  He could throw, but he tired quickly in running.  And he wasn’t much at shooting baskets.  

Dan sighed—this wouldn’t be much of a game, he was afraid.  At least he’d have two of his best friends as teammates, such as they were as basketball players.   Mark and Bill allowed him, Jowy, and Max to practice a little, both shooting, dribbling, and passing, but not much.  

Mark said, “You can have the ball first,” giving the ball to Max to start it.  He threw it to Dan who drove to the basket with Bill all over him.  He passed it to Jowy who was unguarded.  Jowy shot and hit!  2-0. “Good shot, Jowy,” said Mark, which surprised Jowy, who hadn’t even heard Dan congratulate him on making a basket.  

Mark grabbed the rebound, took it out and threw it to Bill, who ran down the whole empty court and shot and made a basket.  

“Hey!” cried Dan.  “What are you doing?”  

“Playing full court!” laughed Bill.  “There’s no one else here, so we can do that.”  

“No fair!  We weren’t expecting that!  That basket doesn’t count!”  yelled Dan.  

“Yes it does,” replied Bill.  

But then Mark intervened and said, “It’s not fair if they didn’t know.  Let’s do it again.  2-0 your favor, our ball.”  So he took the ball back and threw it to Bill, who ran down the court dribbling the ball.  Dan was after him, but not close enough.  And Jowy and Max were even further behind.  Bill made the shot again, so it was 2-2.  

Max took the rebound, and threw it to Jowy as Dan was crowded by Bill.  Jowy took the ball and tried to dribble, but didn’t do it right.  

“DOUBLE DRIBBLE!” yelled Bill.  “Our ball.”  He took the ball out, tossed it to Mark, who went down the court not too fast, so the small defenders could keep up.  At the 3-point line he took a shot.  Even though Jowy was defending in front of him, he had no problem shooting over him.  It bounced off the rim and Bill rebounded, took the ball away a little and shot.  Good!  Now it was 4-2.  

The next time Max and Jowy passed the ball back and forth between them, trying to avoiding the double dribble.  Max had to stay in one place each time he got the ball.  Dan tried to keep Bill far from them so it would be 2 on 1 against Mark, who wasn’t playing so serious.  Max got off a shot but it wasn’t close.  Bill ran in and caught the ball in the air, and laughed, “Air Ball!  The Toddler can’t shoot!”  He passed to Mark, who passed back to him.  To let it be fair, he let the other team players catch up, then he tossed the ball to Mark at the 3 point line.  He shot.  Good!  “7 to 2” called Bill.  

“Wait a minute!” called Max, who was breathing heavy from the running.  “A basket is 2 points.  You counted wrong!”

“That was 3 points, Toddler!” said Bill.  And Mark showed him the 3-point line, explaining the rule.  

“Does that mean a half-court shot is 4 points?” asked Max.  

“If you can throw it that far, it will be 4 points!  In fact, you can have 5 if you shoot from there (foul line on the other half-court) and 6 if you shoot whole court!” said Bill, confident that could never happen.  

“Sounds fair to me,” added Mark.  

The next time Jowy shot, but Mark was guarding and just reached up to block it.  Mark took the ball down the court, but missed the shot, and Dan rebounded.  It so surprised Bill that he didn’t catch up before Dan made it down court and made a shot.  7-4.  

The next time Jowy took a shot, Mark stepped to the side and the shot was good.  

“WHY DID YOU LET HIM MAKE THAT!?” Bill yelled at Mark.  

“I thought he would fake left, but he didn’t,” Mark said grinning.  He just wanted a fair and fun game here.  The next time he stepped the other way, saying, “I thought he would fake right!”  

The game went on and eventually the score was 18-14 with Bill and Mark ahead.  By this time the other team was all winded and sweaty.  Max especially was tired and he was ready to collapse under the basket on his defense side.  Jowy stayed in the offense court and had made most of the shots.  With 18 points, Bill was saying they needed only 1 more basket to win the game (they had agreed to play to 20).  Dan took the ball out and passed to Max and ran down the court without looking back.  

Max was just too tired to dribble the ball down the court, and all he could do stand and dribble.  “Come on, Max, dribble the ball down or pass it to Jowy!” yelled Dan.  Mark also told him he could do it.  

But Bill was taunting him.  “The Toddler is too weak to throw the ball!”  

This caused something to, well, not quite snap, but click, in Max, and he hurled the ball.  Not just low down the court, but high up in the air.  Not just high, but REALLY high.  So high that Bill said, “Where’d the ball go?”  In fact no one could tell where it was.  

Then Jowy pointed up and said, “There it is!”  It was so high it looked tiny in the sky, looking too small to be a basketball.  “That’s just a baseball!” shouted Bill.  

It gradually got a little bigger, then bigger, as it came almost straight down.  After what seemed like forever, it came down and SWISH—nothing but net!  And while maybe it could have been argued that it hit net only below the rim, that was impossible at the angle it came down.  Six points!  That meant Max, Dan, and Jowy won 20-18.  Dan and Jowy ran down to Max to celebrate his unbelievable shot, jumping up and down.  Mark also went over smiling to congratulate Max.  Bill for some time just stared up at the basket, not believing what had just happened, but unable to deny it either.