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| Abby guarding Emma - Grade 8 Provincial Final |
Grade 8 league play started, and the Handsworth team proved to be too much of a match for everybody. Coach Steve had devised sinister full court presses, sideline traps, and smothering double team maneuvers that had point guards from opposing teams quitting the sport forever to take up spray tanning.
The team could go on and on and on without getting scored on, and of course had the firepower to score tons of points of their own. Abby was sharing point guard duties with Elisa, but as Elisa had developed more as a shooter, it was not uncommon to see Abby taking the point guard position with Elisa at the wing with Lizzy. And now there was the Delaney factor. Approaching six feet she was a physical presence no other teams in our league had. Like Abby, her strength as a recent immigrant to the sport was defense. She knew how to position herself and spread out her long limbs to create chaos for teams who tried to pass the ball around her. With that height she was an effective rebounder, but she was also developing confidence as a post player. Teagan was never so proud as to draw a charge, which she did often, and as a result her courage was well known. Alannah had experience on Summer Games teams and had streaks of scoring points in bushels. Lizzy, by far, could make the meanest battle faces on the team which had opposing players giving her a wide berth. As a result she would dip her shoulder and drive through the key no matter how many defenders seemed to be in the way, scoring points and drawing lots of fouls.
It was all coming together. All that was left to do was for Steve to distribute liberal doses of hand sanitizer to stave off infections of any kind.
Their first threat to an undefeated season came at the CG Howe Tournament. In the semi final, the CG Howe team proved to be very aggressive, and were shooting well. Abby seemed to be among the first to detect potential trouble. She started doing something rarely seen to this point. If she was open, she would shoot. Teams were pegging her as a passer already, so in this game she starting shooting jumpers, and they were going in. The score remained closer than normal, Handsworth maintaining a four point lead. On one occasion Abby saw daylight and drove to the hoop. She looked like a skinnier version of Jaime as she did it, taught by the best she went full speed to the bucket. The layup went in, but the CG Howe defender pushed her hard in the back and she went down hard and awkwardly into the end wall padding.
I was on the phone with Caroline at the time, "Oh my god, Abby's just been knocked down hard!" She got up slowly, and looked around for the player who hit her. She took a couple of steps in her direction, and shot her a look I had never seen before. That look in her eye, that only basketball could bring out. She held her opponent's gaze and in silence said all she needed to say, "Ok. You want to play like that? Perfect. Well I would like you to stand there quietly and watch while I sink the foul shot that you awarded me. And after that, we are going to beat you."
And she did, and they did.
Next up was the CG Howe Tournament final against a pesky team from Kamloops. Largely the same pesky team 3D had met in the Grade 7 Provincial Club Final the previous summer.
I noted a familiar face on the opposition, the taller player from the Club Finals who was rebounding everything. But now we had heard she had added new skills and athleticism, accepting lob passes from a guard and gently laying the ball off the glass for several points a game. She was a clear stand out in all their games so far this season. This was Emma. All 6 feet one inches of her, she was the tallest grade 8 player in BC. And while tall doesn't necessarily mean good, she was good and getting better.
Emma's team had as easy a time in their league play as Handsworth had in theirs to this point. Both had undefeated records.
The game started and each team was trading baskets. Emma was scoring from the post, and Handsworth was scoring from the perimeter. Abby fed the ball into the key for a few successful Lizzy drives, a couple of which resulted in Emma being assigned fouls which affected her aggressiveness on defense. In addition Emma had not been fronted yet by a defender with Delaney's size and as she learned how to better position herself the ball was not getting to Emma as much as it should. Abby continued to surprise with pull up jumpers that continued to fall. Handsworth won the game and the tournament, and remained undefeated.
In fact, for the first time ever, Abby was recognized as the most valuable player in a tournament. Clearly she had no idea her name was about to be called, and she walked up sheepishly to accept her trophy and shake hands awkwardly with the tournament organizer. Abby had developed an ability not just to contribute, but to actually lead a team. As she dozed in the seat beside me on the drive home with the trophy on her lap, I felt enormous pride. She had dug more deeply to win than she had ever done before.
The Handsworth squad went unchallenged through the league and North Shore playoffs. But in the Vancouver and District final against McMath a significant scare was underway. McMath was scoring, even from forced poor shooting positions. Handsworth was not scoring, the ball would simply not go through the hoop. For the first time ever the Handsworth grade 8's entered half time down in a game, by 6 points. We speculated as parents that this would be a significant mental hurdle to overcome and could become the blemish on the undefeated record. But in the second half the Handsworth defense continued to force bad shots that stopped falling, while they scored their own share of baskets. Going into the Provincials Handsworth remained undefeated and were seeded first in the tournament.
Coach Steve was obsessed with his own personal showdown against the flu. As the Provincials started he was handing out hand sanitizer in unprecedented amounts. Johnson and Johnson stock appreciated by 4% that week which baffled Wall Street analysts but they would later learn it was due to a spike in sales in their hand sanitizer division. He supervised each player as she applied her ration. Short of the flu, there was little to stop this team and Coach Steve needed to resolve the cosmic injustice that had been denied his team the last time they got to this point. If one of his players was to merely sniffle he could hear it immediately, even from blocks away, and would turn up to a player's doorstep to personally bathe her exposed limbs thoroughly in sanitizer.
The Handsworth grade 8's did not have a close game leading to the Grade 8 Provincial Final. It seemed all preliminary, leading to the final game. The team looked strong, and not a single player showed any signs of sickness, Coach Steve looked happy.
The opponents would be Emma, and the pesky team from Kamloops.
Handsworth v Kamloops. Emma v. Abby. Their third meeting it was starting to feel a bit like Agassiz v. Sampras.
The morning of the game Coach Steve called a "shoot around" to keep the players loose and of course issue a final dose of sanitizer. They posted Kris, Elisa's dad who is taller than Emma, under the hoop. Abby practiced passing around her, Elisa shooting over her, Lizzy driving at her, and Delaney defending her. Outward appearances were loose, the players were smiling, and of course given their past two meetings versus Kamloops the odds were in Handsworth's favour. But I was tense. The fact was, everyone was tense.
The game started with the tip off, which Delaney had timed perfectly against Emma, putting the ball in Abby's hands. She charged down the court at a higher speed than normal, and just short of the three point line she stopped and took a jump shot. Swish. Handsworth 3, Kamloops zero. The assembling crowd applauded.
As I stood courtside with my camera, I sensed a problem. Abby made the shot, but she had tunnel vision. She didn't even wait for the team to form up the offense. She was nervous.
Kamloops came down the court and lobbed a pass into Emma that she converted. Then on the next possession their guard made a three pointer. Handsworth was nervous, disorganized, and turning over the ball. Emma scored again. And again.
The crowd started to thicken as teams who had finished their earlier games found some seats. Players and parents from the boy's game following ours also started to file in. Soon there were at least two hundred people watching, and picking a side. To the crowd watching it looked absolutely hopeless for Handsworth. The Kamloops guards were putting lob passes in to Emma, which she was converting into easy points as she was, after all, the tallest person in the gym. The crowd turned against Kamloops, sensing that they had too easy a way to victory with such an obvious height advantage. Other than the Kamloops faithful, Handsworth had a cheering section of hundreds. The fans started chanting in Handsworth's favour, some had drums, everyone else was stomping their feet and screaming, the noise was unbelievable.
As easy as it may have looked, I knew it was not so. The passes to Emma had to be perfect or they would fall short and be intercepted. Once they got through Emma had to deftly re-direct the ball properly against the backboard so it would go in. It looked easy, but it wasn't. Plus Emma was not doing all the scoring, the Kamloops guards were also scoring jump shots when the inbound pass looked risky. And what the crowd didn't know was that Handsworth had already beaten this team this year, and was supposed to be the favoured side. The Kamloops game plan had not worked at CG Howe, and so was not as guaranteed a route to victory as it looked, but it was sure working now.
It was, pretty much, a one sided game. Abby's passes were missing the mark, Elisa's shots were not falling, Lizzy's drives were not working, and when Alanah and Delaney were sucessful disrupting some of Emma's flow in the post one of her guards would just sink a jumper instead. Kamloops was loose, Handsworth was tense. It was slipping away very early. I shouldered my camera and sat down.
Going into the half the game looked over, Handsworth was down by an unprecedented 22 points.
Insurmountable. The teams filed off for the break. The crowd calmed. The game was effectively over, and we all knew it.
The second half started. Handsworth was playing a bit looser, as by now they had nothing to lose. Alannah sunk several consecutive jump shots, and Teagan drew at least one charge. Emma was not getting as many clean passes and the Kamloops guards missed a few shots. The gap narrowed by the start of the fourth quarter to 15 points. But really, nobody was paying too much attention at this point.
Then to start the fourth, Coach Steve introduced a change of tactics. To this point Kamloops had a strategy to inbound the ball to Emma, who would hold the ball out of reach of anybody, and then pass off the ball to a guard in the immediate vicinity. Delaney, who was pursuing Emma all game, could not be expected to rush up court to try and steal the ball from Emma on the inbound, then collapse to guard her once she had passed off the ball, too much running. So the new plan was to put Abby on Emma on the inbound to try and get a steal. If she didn't get it then she would back off to defend a guard, and Emma would meet Delaney in the post.
That look in her eye again. The Basketball Look. Abby had refined it somewhat since the Grade 7 3D tryouts when I first saw it. It was absolute concentration. She blocked out everything, the crowd, Emma's height advantage, everything except the ball. Anyone noticing that look would know that there was no doubt who the ball truly belonged to. Abby would rush up to Emma, and even though she was already small in comparison, she would get even lower into an athletic stance, ready to go in either direction, and her concentrated expression confidently suggested she knew where the ball was going, and how she would get it.
Things slowly started to change. On the first inbound Emma didn't get the ball high quick enough and Abby took it, pass to Elisa, and a quick score for Handsworth. The second inbound worked exactly the same way. By the third inbound Emma was flustered. She got the ball above her head to keep it away from Abby, but she lost track of time. Five second violation and a turnover. Handsworth scored on the possession, and we were in a 9 point game.
Kamloops calls a time out. A new inbound play. But Coach Steve had guessed the new plan and put Abby on the guard who would likely receive the inbound. The Look. Steal, pass to Lizzy, and another bucket. Gap down to 7.
The crowd had awakened, and were going berserk. They knew they were witnessing an unbelievable comeback. The drums were pounding, feet were stomping, and the fans were drowning out the Kamloops contingent, chanting "LETS GO HANDSWORTH....LETS GO HANDSWORTH!!"
Delaney and Alannah had a tough assignment. Guarding Emma on every one of Kamloops' offensive possessions, each had continued to adjust their angles. The ball was not finding Emma, Kamloops turned the ball over again, and another bucket. The game was down to 5.
Kamloops scored. Handsworth scored. Lizzy was fouled on a drive to the hoop, and made one of her two foul shots. The difference was now only four.
The players were tiring. Coach Steve called a time out to rest his team who were pressing on each possession, as usual. As Abby took the floor, I noted the look in her eyes. It was now even a step beyond the look at CG Howe. At CG Howe she wanted to win, but it was not crucial that she win. She was singularly focused on closing the deal on this game. She was, for the first time, fully invested.
She could not hear the crowd, she only had eyes for the ball.
Next possession was over quickly, Abby stole the ball and completed a layup on her own. The game was down to 2. But she was fouled, and would have another shot. She made it. The game was down to 1.
There was only 30 seconds left in the game. I was absolutely paralyzed. Could not move, could not speak, my mouth drier than a sandcastle on Mars. I told myself, "just make sure you take this all in". The crowd was louder than anything I have ever heard at a sporting event.
Kamloops brought the ball down the court, and a forced pass to Emma was deflected. Elisa grabbed the loose ball and was off to the races for a layup to win the game. As she left her feet to make the shot, she was fouled and she and the ball fell to the floor. Six seconds on the clock.
Two shots. One to tie, two to win.
I'm not sure I will ever see a more pressure packed situation than Elisa faced at this moment. Even in the NBA making high pressure foul shots are known to be one of the toughest things to pull off in sport, but in grade 8, standing at the foul line, the player seems absolutely miles from the hoop. The degree of difficulty of these shots was off the scale. Elisa's team was sweating behind her, they had nothing left whatsoever to give. They needed one of these shots to go in. At least one.
Elisa calmly approached the foul line, and, incredibly, sank both shots. Handsworth up by 1 with 6 seconds to go. The place was absolute pandemonium. An amazing comeback was virtually complete.
Time out. Each team discussed strategy. After the time out the ball was advanced to the half court line to be inbounded. Coach Steve had issued his instructions. Abby's job was to make the guard's life very difficult. Once she got the inbound pass she was to get right in her face. But she could not foul, as both teams were in bonus. Everyone else was to collapse man to man to the key.
The ball was inbounded, and Abby's check caught the ball and started to dribble. Five seconds. More dribbling Abby cut off the easy routes to the key. Four seconds. The Kamloops guard made a mistake, cutting back to the sideline, where Abby trapped her. No way out. Three seconds. Two seconds...
The Kamloops guard pivoted to make a bit of space, and put her pass into the air. It floated in the general direction of the key...
Under the basket there were only bodies and hands and arms in a moving cluster of confusion. As the ball approached them, one set of hands rose above the rest. Emma touched the ball for only a fraction of a second and re-directed it off the glass and into the Handsworth hoop.
Game over. With 0.6 seconds left, Handsworth was down by 1, and would not recover.
A collective gasp from all the fans, and from the far corner ecstatic cheers from the Kamloops faithful could be faintly heard, like through a seashell.
The emotions came quickly. Total and thorough disbelief, disappointment, despair. After that effort, according to every Disney movie Abby and I had ever seen, Handsworth was supposed to win. Handsworth was supposed to win...I waited for the replay in which Handsworth won. The girls looked at first, shocked, then their faces went blank as the pain started to rise up. Abby looked like her world had cheated her. She looked hurt, and cheated. And I was still waiting for the replay that made it all OK, but it wasn't going to happen.
Coach Steve looked like he was just acquitted of something only to be told he would face jail time anyway. His body was only upright thanks to invisible fishing line that had been sent down from the rafters and attached to his knees and elbows; he looked like a listless puppet. He was hunched over at his back, his chin was busy making a permanent campsite in his sternum. I was not sure he would ever recover. This was, simply, impossible. But it was not impossible. I had just seen it. And Abby was living it.
I wondered if, in her young world, Abby would have the ability to deal with this loss. After pouring everything she had along with her team to come all the way back to go up by one point with 6 seconds to go, and still lose? I seriously wondered if this would test her view of fairness in the world forever. Maybe she would quit basketball. Hell, maybe she would quit everything...
The teams shook hands, and slowly started filing out into the parking lot.
Abby approached me, which I was not necessarily expecting. Even I knew it was very uncool for a grade 8 girl to hug her Dad too long in public, but when she reached me her arms went around my neck and she just...sagged. She felt very heavy given she was so slight in weight, but it was mostly the heaviness of her heart that I was supporting. I had nothing to say as she sobbed softly into my shoulder. But for once, the right words just came to me. I whispered, with a catch in my voice, "You did everything you could. You did not give up. Always remember, you did not give up." We lingered together for a brief moment more, just long enough for that hug to sear itself into my heart forever. We parted, and Abby slowly made her way to the little circle of teammates that had assembled. The ponytail hanging over her backpack still had a little bounce to it as she walked. The circle parted and Lizzy and Delaney put their arms around her shoulders and drew her in.
I felt a pang from somewhere deep. Some emotion was coming. It was, very slowly at first, determined to take over the pain I felt in myself, and for Abby. I realized it would be soon be overwhelming. Despair, perhaps, was already losing its purchase on me, and somehow I knew it would be the same for Abby too, after she realized what she had just done.
As time goes on I have forgotten most of the details of the game. But I will never, ever, forget that feeling.
A feeling inspired by watching her experience a real challenge for the first time and rise up to it. From watching her put everything she had into something, more than she thought she had to give, for herself, and for her team. Despite the scoreboard, no matter what it said, she never gave up. Even with 0.6 seconds to go Abby received the inbound pass and tried to win the game with a 3/4 court shot that bounced harmlessly at the foul line. An impossible shot that no one else remembers. But I do.
Although I had felt it before, and have so many, many times since, this emotion will always be measured against how intensely I felt it on that day.
Pride.
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