Pounding the Rock

by Marc Skelton

  He had moved often when he was younger. He even left the city because of family issues for a while and lived in places as far away as Kentucky. Such things clearly shaped, changed, and inspired him. Everywhere we went everyone knew Shamar. Not because he had lived all over the city, but because he had played in playgrounds and leagues all over the city. He was at home at every court in New York City. If they didn’t know Shamar, they knew his twin brother, Zaire, who played basketball at Lehman High School.

  It is common for high school boys to be absentminded, and Shamar was no exception. He was blessed with amazing speed and a smooth jump shot, but they came with teenage forgetfulness. Still, he was quick to apologize when he committed a turnover, and even quicker to correct the mistake on defense; a steal, a deflection, or a rebound usually followed. Shamar said, “Every time I made a bad pass I would try to get a steal on the next possession.” It was an honorable exchange. I love to coach kids like Shamar.

  Beyond the trees and between a large high-rise apartment, we could see the mammoth DeWitt Clinton High School looming in the distance. We descended the Mosholu Parkway Station stairs. The sun set over the acres the Dewitt Clinton High School campus occupies.

  “Yo, look at this place,” I heard someone say.

  “It’s like a hundred times bigger than our school.”

  The entrance was protected by a barrier of steel scaffolding. We entered the ziggurat and lined up to go through the school’s scanning devices. Then we were instructed to take off our belts and remove any loose change and cell phones from our pockets. Next we were told to empty our change into a white plastic basket. I felt an ecclesiastical pregame ritual unfolding.

  “I feel like I’m already guilty when I walk through these,” Frankie said.

  “I’m glad Fannie Lou doesn’t have them,” Shamar confessed.

  Clinton High School is the high church of the Public Schools Athletic League, with eighteen players in the NBA and two in the Hall of Fame: Tiny Archibald and Dolph Schayes. We were in a veritable armory of basketball luminaries. This city has produced some of the world’s most talented shooters, dunkers, passers, and dribbling maestros, and Clinton was the cradle for some of the city’s best. Johnny Most, the voice of the Boston Celtics, graduated from here. New Hampshire had only one guy, Mark Bonner, ever make it to the NBA; New York City has had more than three hundred. Everywhere I went, greatness had been: Stevenson High School, home of Ed Pinckney; Rice High School, home of Kemba Walker, Dean Meminger, and Felipe Lopez; La Salle, home of Ron Artest; Boys High, home of Connie Hawkins; Xaverian, home of Chris Mullin; Archbishop Molloy, home of Kenny Anderson and Kenny Smith; Andrew Jackson High School, home of the legendary Bob Cousy. Starting out, I wasn’t as truly awestruck by the significance of New York City basketball as I should have been. The idol worship meant little to me. I wanted to get up to the gym and start the season off with a win.

  This was also Gaby’s first time in the cathedral where the ancient running track sat above the court like a dimmed halo. He predicted, “This game is going to be just like the Morris game last year.”

  As we waited for the rest of the team and their items to be X-rayed, a young school safety officer asked if we were playing the JV or the varsity team tonight. We said the varsity.

  “I hope you’re ready,” he said, smiling, as if he already knew the results based on our inability to get through the scanning process quickly.

  I bit my lip. “I hope so too.”

  A Clinton player appeared in the lobby, a little upset that his girlfriend wouldn’t be allowed to go to the game. We were invisible to him. He seemed more concerned with how many people were there to see him than with the opposing team waiting in the lobby.

  I whispered to Gaby, “Is everyone in here not expecting us to win?”

  “The players are worried about getting their fan club in.”

  “How much did they beat Lab Museum High School by?” Gaby asked.

  “Thirteen,” I said.

  “They just activated some football players too.”

  Inside the belly of the leviathan, the monastic blue walls were unadorned. We must have been so busy talking about how big the school was that we got lost in the labyrinth. We were given directions to the gym after a long walk down a hallway. We took a left and were now deep inside the Clinton catacombs. We kept walking until we came to a passageway, where we repeated the directions aloud. We were now really lost in this cavernous underbelly. “Imagine if you get caught lacking?” Mack wondered aloud what might happen if they ran into the wrong dudes at the wrong time.

  “Even Jackson couldn’t find us here,” Josh Emanuel, the scorekeeper, said, referring to our own school safety agent, the intrepid Ms. Jackson. It was funny that she was on their minds as we walked down the hall of another school. It was also a sign of how meaningful she is to our school and how safe they feel at Fannie Lou, even without metal detectors. So the feeling of going through a metal detector at each away game usually brings up new emotions for the guys on the team.

  We took another set of stairs and entered what we thought was the gym. Instead of a basketball court, we walked into a gymnastics practice.

  “Upstairs,” a kid on the uneven bars instructed us.

  “They have two gyms? Get outta here,” Charles said in disbelief.

  “Not gonna lie, this place is huge,” Frankie exclaimed.

  We eventually found the gym.

  The Clinton Governors were warming up. Their players mirrored the school in size: they were bigger, stronger, and older. Even the music was louder than ours. I glanced up at the scoreboard. It looked as if it had seen better days. Lightbulbs were missing, and it was impossible to decipher fives from ones or sevens from eights. And for the encore, I see the referee, Mike Napolitano, who played on Clinton’s championship team in 1977. The other ref could have still been a student at Clinton for all I knew.

  We changed, as we always do, in a classroom. Jerseys and shorts flew in the air to their respected owner.

  Walfri held number 33 in his hand and looked at me. “Where’s Brandon?”

  “He quit this morning.”

  “Why?”

  “No idea.”

  Walfri shrugged and shoved the jersey back into the bag. Brandon told me he wanted to concentrate on school, and basketball was taking up a lot of his time. It was the first time I have had someone quit the day of our first game. I scanned the room and watched Jaelen, the other promising freshman, remove his basketball medallion on a thin silver chain. His black hair looked soft like an onyx sponge.

  We head out to the gym. I can’t get cozy with the opposing coach before games. I am seeking to destroy his team, and he’s spent hours preparing to beat mine. It is a little disingenuous to feign the pregame buddy charade. Chris Ballerini is the exception. He has coached and taught in the Bronx for as many years as I have. We are part of the same tribe of coaches who love the game and demand a lot from our players. Still, he wants to beat me and I want to beat him.

  “You have some big guys,” I said.

  “Yeah, just activated some football players. This guy is a Division One lineman. He’s probably going to go to Fordham. He’s a great athlete and good kid.”

  I might be able to activate Josh, my five-seven scorekeeper, in February, if he improves his grades, I thought to myself.

  Two former players, Timmy Hariston and Travis Peterson, home from college on Thanksgiving break, walked into the gym.

  “Travis, can you do the scorebook?”

  “Of course. What’s wrong with Josh?”

  “Too green, and look at the scoreboard!”

  “Yo, moe, what is that?” The illuminated zetas, lambdas, and deltas appeared like Ptolemy’s table of chords.

  “Just make sure everyone at the table is keeping the correct running score,” I pleaded.

&n
bsp; I scribbled instructions on the white clipboard with a pink dry-erase marker. Then the buzzer sounded, announcing the start of the 2016–17 season.

  I outlined our defensive strategy against the flex offense. “When they run flex, switch and stay in the paint right in front of the rim.” The flex offense is a series of predictable cuts and screens that can generate a lot of layups and open jump shots.

  “Watch when they run the Celtics out-of-bounds switch on all screens.” Clinton’s “Celtics” baseline out-of-bounds play looked like this: the four and five screen for the guards to take either an open three or a layup.

  “Talk on defense.” I took a deep breath.

  “Let’s make it a great season.”

  I probably unpacked a few more coaching clichés. I tried to fold them nicely and put them away before the game. We stretched our arms together to form a human temple of arms.

  “One, two, three, Panthers, four, five, six, together!”

  Walfri, Charles, and Frankie were returning starters. Shamar and Tyree, a sophomore, had been catapulted from the end of the bench into the starting lineup. Tyree was a natural runner, a Puerto Rican Prefontaine. At tryouts last year he effortlessly passed the older players on the track, lap after lap, drill after drill. He had outworked Latrell in the last few practices, and today he looked comfortable in the starting lineup. Charles won the tip on the first possession of the 2016–17 season. The ball moved from player to player with acuity, they made beautiful precise cuts to the basket, and for thirty-five seconds of the season we played quintessential team basketball. Until the horn sounded. On our first possession of the season, we forgot to shoot and received a thirty-five-second shot-clock violation.

  A few possessions later, Frankie clawed a rebound, spotted Tyree running on his left, and floated a perfect outlet pass. Tyree with one dribble whipped the ball across his body to a wide-open Shamar on the right wing, swish. It was a beautiful catch-and-shoot for the first basket of the season. Tyree with the assist. Frankie with the hockey assist. They made it look effortless.

  Later, Shamar said that shot was the most important shot of the season for him. “It gave me confidence,” he confessed.

  Our next and only other field goal of the first quarter came off of a patterned press-break. The Clinton defenders attempted to trap Charles in the corner, so he quickly pivoted and found a speeding Shamar. Shamar’s speed, like Tyree’s, was legendary. He dribbled toward the basket, and as a few white jerseys moved toward him Shamar made a no-look pass to Frankie in the paint for an easy layup. The first quarter ended with the score tied at 5–5. It was more like a baseball game going into extra innings than a New York City high school basketball game.

  At some point in the first quarter, after another mindless turnover, tired of stomping my feet, I turned and kicked the wooden bench in frustration. I could see the Clinton principal, all six feet six inches of him, looming across the court. He was wearing a white shirt with a red tie, looking almost presidential. I imagined an unpleasant conversation with Jeff Palladino, the principal of Fannie Lou, the next day. The call never came.

  The game was marred by horrendously bad shooting, and by kids taking too many steps with the ball. Walfri cut early and Frankie threw the ball into the stands. It was another ordinary chilly Monday evening in November, and Frankie looked at the scorer’s table after his error and then at the bench with a look of disbelief. No substitutions. His head disappeared, his chin resting on his chest. This is not what he had worked all summer for, this moment is not why he traveled to Atlanta for a week of basketball camp, this moment he needed a substitution. I wasn’t giving him one. “Get your damn head in the game. You are not coming out.” More disbelief. “Of course they’re making us turn it over. This is Clinton!” Usually you can see when a kid is trying hard not to be afraid; his eyes are dilated like an owl, he stops sweating. Frankie was beyond nervous. Frankie once told me that he scans the crowd and can always find his mom. “If she is not there, I don’t play well. When she’s there, I always feel fine. You know, it’s like the one person in the world who loves me like no other.” Most of my players are made in their mother’s shade. If the father isn’t around, the mothers try their best to provide for their sons.

  I looked in the stands and couldn’t find his mom. She would usually rush to every game after work. I had another irritant besides the mindless turnovers. On this hallowed court, my blue and black gingham button-up was having a hard time staying tucked in. I too was nervous and couldn’t sit down, my sleeves were rolled up, I was pacing up and down. I looked over at Chris, who had removed his heather-gray sweater.

  We started the second quarter with back-to-back-to-back unforced turnovers. I raked my face. Can jellyfish drown? The first half of the game was an invitation to play Twister in a tar pit. The halftime score was 13–12. Neither team could find any rhythm. A typical first game of the season.

  I was hoping to swing the pendulum after halftime, but in the third quarter our guys looked winded and Clinton took control. Frankie was still shaky. Tyree was scoreless. Charles kept tap-dancing with his pivot foot: shuffle step, heel, spank, double cramp roll, travel. It was as impressive as it was illegal. So I went to the bench. After Brandon’s departure I didn’t want to frighten another freshman, so Jaelen remained on the bench. Could the juniors Jaquan and Latrell, who had been with me since they were freshmen, give us a spark? They entered to give Frankie and Tyree a break.

  Clinton’s size and the large crowd all seemed to wear us down. The score was 31–27, I think (the worn-out byzantine scoreboard was difficult to read), at the end of the third quarter. Clinton had hit four three-pointers to push the lead up to four.

  * * *

  —

  To start the fourth, Charles wrestled on the floor for a loose ball like a kitten with a ball of yarn. Jaquan corralled the ball. He zigzagged his way to initiate the offense. Latrell caught the ball on the right wing. He looked unsure of what to do, the way you hesitate for a second before you guess which line at the supermarket will be quicker. He decided to attack the basket, one dribble with his right hand and then a between-the-leg dribble. His muscular shoulders leaned forward, but the ball missed his left hand and ended up in the hands of a Clinton guard, who raced down the court for a layup.

  “He’s giving them points,” I murmured to Gaby on my right and Travis on my left.

  “Get him out of there,” Gaby responded.

  “Tyree, get in for Latrell,” I yelled.

  I’d hoped the bench could give us direction. Instead it was more of the same nervousness and disoriented basketball. The corollary to missing a lot of practices is missing a lot of opportunities in a game. I had this feeling Latrell wasn’t going to help us tonight. And it didn’t make a difference if Tyree was playing well or not; he hadn’t missed a practice, and at least he wasn’t giving Clinton any buckets. My neck was in a death match with the starchy collar; the razor burn was starting another red trail around my neck.

  * * *

  —

  Midway through the fourth quarter, we were actually down by only five points, 35–30. Down by five, on the road with a young team, so I thought, Well, I hope this game helps us later on in the season and we can win a road game at Maspeth or Morrisania if we are ever down in the fourth. I am convinced the only way to win a game down in the fourth quarter is to be madly in love with this sport. In the crowd I now spotted Caridad, Frankie’s mom. At work she doesn’t take lunch breaks so she can accumulate those hours and leave a little early to catch the games. Now, with his mom here, would Frankie deliver? He looked refreshed and confident. His confidence seemed to spread throughout the team. We looked more poised. A shot of confidence was what we needed. Every time a Clinton player drove into the paint, Charles, who has a peculiar silent intensity, was there to block his shot. He was redirecting shots. Anytime a Governor got close to the basket, he was able to defl
ect it or change the direction of the shot. Coach Ballerini would later say, “Charles is one of the best shot-blockers I have ever coached against.”

  The blend of Charles’s intimidating defense and a few timely baskets by Walfri and Frankie helped us finally take the lead. With two minutes remaining in the game, Walfri, brimming with confidence, grabbed a rebound and gained momentum with each dribble down the court. He scampered like an overfed bear. At this point in the game, we want to remove some seconds from the clock before we shoot, but Walfri had another plan. He dribbled into a wall of defenders and lost the ball out of bounds.

  Walfri thought he was fouled and was about to pursue the referee, when Charles and Tyree headlocked and bear-hugged him, respectively. If they hadn’t grabbed Walfri, he might have received a technical foul and changed the course of the game.

  We were up 43–35 with about thirty-five seconds left.

  Clinton missed. There was a lot of holding and grabbing. This time Charles got the ball and was fouled immediately. He missed the front end of the one-and-one. We were not going to escape this game (or this season) if we didn’t hit our free throws.

  Without hesitating, the tall, lanky Clinton guard grabbed the rebound and dribbled up the court and calmly hit a fifteen-footer. Time-out Clinton. Up 43–37, I decided it was time to throw a touchdown pass. I have this favorite out-of-bounds play where we throw the ball the length of the court; it usually gets us a layup every three years. This time the ball was intercepted. Someone should have grabbed me before I decided on that play. Too much coaching. Sometimes we poke holes in our own life preservers.

  Twenty seconds had elapsed, and the score remained 43–37, I hoped.

  I checked with Travis. “What’s the score?”

  “Forty-three to thirty-seven,” he said reassuringly.