November 9, 1998

Yesterday at basketball there were only twelve people who showed up. That means a lot more playing time for me. The bad news is that while we were waiting for enough people to show up to play full court we played some three-on-three. I went up for a jumper and came down on the side of someone’s foot spraining my left - good - ankle. I walked it off but all day long I couldn’t pop-stop for jumpers or sprint. We played for about an hour and a half and then someone had the bright idea - me - that we should match up the Americans against the Europeans. (Five Americans and six Euro’s at this point) The bad news is that the Europeans had the 3 of the tallest players while us Americans were all guard types. We were playing to 15 win by two and counting 3s as 2. We had to play a zone because we were oversized and I couldn’t move to my right fast enough to guard anyone one-on-one.

It started off fairly even but the Euros began to pull away and had a 10 - 6 lead. That is when I twisted my ankle again. You can’t imagine how pissed off I was. I pounded the floor, cursing. I jumped up and hobbled down the court. There was no way I would quit a game like this. We got the ball and I took a two pointer and missed. They came down and scored - 11-6. Next time down the court I took another 2-pointer and made it, followed by another - 11-10. They scored a few points and we scored a few points - 13-12. I stole a pass and managed to limp down the court for a lay-up - all tied up. They score, I hit a jumper - 14-14. When we got the ball back I got a pass about 5 feet outside of the three point arch at the top of the key. I pump-faked a shot and my guy went for it. I dribbled past him to the right. Another defender came up. I crossed over back to the left, knifed in-between the two defenders leaned in, jumping off my left foot - barely - and took a leaning three-pointer. Bank-swish. It wasn’t pretty because I had no intention of banking it but we won. America brings home the cup.

Ciao, idano