Last Monday night I picked up my friend Jeff down the street before our first game of a ten-game season organized by the city's Parks and Recreation department. I talked to his wife and mother-in-law and 18-month-old son for several minutes in the kitchen while he put on his gear, which included his blindingly white, freshly purchased high tops. His wife asked if we wanted anything to eat before we left, and we said No thank you. They said Have fun and Be safe and then we ran through the rain to my idling car. The youth-restoring properties of Grecian Formula or Rogaine cannot compete with the potency of such moments.
We arrived at the Dove Springs Recreation center at 6:45. In the front lobby kids played Ping-Pong, watched television, and chased each other near the vending machines, and from the back echoed the telltale booming and squeaking of a gymnasium. That noise quickens the pulse. Gotta get out there, gotta gotta do some figure eights, gotta touch my toes.
Our team was in force. Everybody greeted each other as if we hadn't just all played together the previous morning. "Tim! What's happening!" "That's what I'm saying Gil!" "Let's do this!" "Joey, how ya doing!" Naturally spirits run high before competitive action; add to this the Uniform Effect (like the Tux Effect or the middle-school-kid Tie Effect) and watch your head-bobbing, manic grinning, and positive mutual appraisal triple in magnitude.
One referee was running late, so we had sufficient time to acquaint ourselves with the forgiving, single rims and the dynamics of the swept polyurethane floor. Eventually it was determined that the other official would not be coming, so the clock counted down from three minutes to tipoff. I spent them feeding White Kobe, who was draining from around the arc. In fact, he went around the world and back without a miss, and some kids on the risers were exclaiming their wonder. He sunk no less than 12 shots in a row, concluding with a corner three as the buzzer sounded.
White Kobe's warm-up clinic seemed to betoken good things to come, as he drained his first two shots of the game, including a signature deep three. (By the way, we were playing a team of UT seniors, one of whom was a former high school student of mine. Incidentally, he appeared skinnier and less imposing than he did when he was 17, when he could dunk.) Quickly, however, we fell behind by 10, and after the first twenty-minute half, we were down 20-10.
The college seniors looked and played rather ordinarily, and featured no superior figure. No lightning quick dude. No lights out shooter. No real driver. We stole the ball from them three times in the first half, but converted on few possessions, obviously. As for White Kobe, he didn't hit another three for the reminder of the game, but not for lack of trying. Seriously, I'm going to refer to him as Daniel now; I cannot in good conscience use the Kobe comparison after the brick house he built on Monday. (We played this morning when of course he was on fire, and Mando was the one to say it: "Hey, Daniel, where was that on Monday?") I'll gladly bring his moniker back once he's made me forget this debacle.
So we lost 50-30. Outplayed in every respect. Jeff and I were spelling each other every 3 minutes, which was fun. Work as hard as you can for 180 seconds, then sit for 180. During one of my stints, I scored twice and got a few rebounds, and I heard Jeff say "Stay out there!" but I was too spent and yelled at him to get in for me. So much for youthful surges. The next time out there I airballed an 8 footer.
After the game the consensus sentiment was that we were merely tired from our Sunday morning game, and we'd adjust, surely. Not that we'd temporarily cancel our Sunday morning game. No, we couldn't have that. That's when we play well. That's our time to shine. If anything, we need Sunday so that the magic might carry over into League Play.
Out in the dark parking lot we were already talking about the next game.
Next game, we'll have Brian back.
Hey, we played a lot better once we went to man-to-man.
Everybody had an off night, man.
We can totally compete with those guys.
We hopped in our cars and drove off. Bring on Monday.
(Well, first Sunday. Then Monday.)
