Three-Point Play (11 page)

As the clock ticked away to less than a minute, Cody caught himself frowning at his coach.
Why doesn't he call time-out
? he wondered.
Holy Family is pummeling us again. Why doesn't he put the second five back in? We're gonna lose this game—our home opener! This stinks!

Cody looked down the bench. Judging from their expressions, his teammates shared his bewilderment. Cody shrugged, then slumped in his chair, arms folded across his chest.

The locker room was noiseless—like quiet prayer time during church. Holy Family had won by six, making the victory look much easier than the score indicated.

Cody waited until all of his teammates had left the locker room before sliding next to Coach Clayton, who was sitting on a bench near the showers, pressing his head between his hands, like a vise.

“Coach,” he said softly, “can I talk with you?”

“Not if you're gonna complain about playing time or something like that,” the coach said wearily. “If anyone's gonna gripe and moan about the game, it oughta be me.”

Cody nibbled on his bottom lip. “Well, it's not really my PT that has me confused, but—”

Coach Clayton arched his eyebrows. “But?”

Cody let a long, slow sigh escape his lungs. “Well, I'm not trying to be disrespectful or anything, but I kinda feel like we let the game get away tonight.”

“Not ‘we,' Martin. I. I let the game get away. Isn't that what you mean?”

Cody felt his head nodding. He willed it to stop, but he didn't seem to be in control of his nodding muscles.

Coach Clayton smiled. “An honest man. I like that. And you're not just honest, you're right.”

Cody stopped—in midnod. “But, Coach, I don't understand. We threw a game?”

“Not ‘threw.' Sacrificed. And don't look at me with that constipated face, dawg. You play baseball. You know what a sacrifice is. A guy is willing to get an out, in order to advance a runner. You give up a little thing to get something bigger.”

Cody tried to erase the constipated expression from his face before speaking. “But we lost, Coach. What could be bigger than that?”

“The rest of the season, my man. Think about it: If we had won, do you think half the knuckleheads on this team would have remembered how pathetically we played for most of the game? But dropping our home opener—and our third game in a row? Believe me, this sting will stay with everyone for quite a while. And, I hope—I dearly hope—the sting will help us remember
why
we lost. And you know that ‘why.' Lack of leadership, plain and simple. Lack of Cody Martin leadership.”

“But Coach,” Cody began to protest, “Brett and Bart have played basketball longer than I have. They've been to camps, and—”

Coach Clayton clapped his hands together. The smacking sound echoed in Cody's ears. “I've had a gut full of the But Coach whinin' from you, Mr. Martin. You're not sure you can lead this team—this whole team. I can see that in your eyes. You were good enough to lead my defense last year—and my second string this year. But you're not sure about the whole enchilada.

“So you listen up. I've seen you carrying that big ol' industrial-strength Bible around school lately. That baby's gotta contain the Old Testament as well as the New. And it's been a while since I studied the Good Book, but I seem to recall this dude named Moses who said ‘But Coach God—waa-waaa-waa-waaa!' when he was asked to be a leader. He whined, ‘Make my brother Bart the boss. He's better than I am. He talks better— and he has a better jump shot!' Sound familiar?”

Cody smiled and nodded. “Yeah, it sounds familiar. Except his brother was Aaron, not Bart.”

“I knew that,” Coach Clayton said, standing. “I was testing you. So, we got East in a couple of days, at their place. You gonna be ready, Captain Martin?”

Cody smiled at his coach. “I'll be ready.”

Coach Clayton patted him on the head. “Aw, for the love of Moses—and Moses Malone—I hope so.'Cuz this losing stuff—it stinks like three-day-old roadkill!”

Cody stood alone in Grant High's small auxiliary gym holding his traveling bag. He felt the throbbing in his head subsiding. The locker room had been too noisy.
I'm glad to be outta there,
he thought. The Evans twins were feuding about something, Slaven was pacing up and down singing loudly and off-key to whatever music he had going on his MP3. Gannon, meanwhile, was stalking about trying to snap his teammates with a wet towel someone must have left after a PE class. Cody was in no mood to be snapped. He feared that if Gannon came after him, he'd end up wrapping the towel around Gannon's neck, and the frosh Eagles stood no chance of ending their three-game losing streak with a strangled point guard.

Cody took a few deep breaths.
Okay, time to get back in there. Maybe things have settled down by now. Time to help Coach round up everybody and get'em on the bus to East.

From the opening tip of the East game, Cody tried to will his team to victory. He took on the toughest defensive assignment, the fiery, ultra-athletic Bobby Cabrera, called out picks on defense, and constantly sprinted into the backcourt to help Gannon when he was double-teamed.

Most of the team seemed to be accepting his leadership, but he felt icy glares from the Evans twins every time he directed a comment or barked a command toward one of them. They had stared daggers at Coach Clayton when, in the visitors' locker room before the game, he announced Cody Martin as the new team captain—and that initial resentment showed little sign of fading.

When Brett and Bart weren't challenging Cody, they were sniping at each other—for failing to help on defense, for not giving up the rock on fast breaks, and even over who would sit closest to Coach Clayton on the bench.

The frosh Eagles battled East right down to the last possession, but when Cody fouled out with 1:34 left in the game, Bobby Cabrera took over. He was too quick for Goddard, and East eked out a three-point win.

In the uneasy silence of the visitors' locker room, the now 0–4 Eagles peeled off uniforms, showered, and dressed quickly. Some stuffed their sweaty uniforms in their travel bags. Cody, as his mom had always insisted, placed his uniform on a hanger to let it air out a bit on the bus ride home.

Cody followed Goddard out of the locker room. The slightly portly guard's round face was still flushed, and he moved with a slight limp, as a result of taking a knee to the meatiest part of his right thigh while trying to get around a pick and stay with Cabrera on defense.

Cody studied his teammate and felt a flicker of admiration
. Goddard played harder than anybody tonight,
he thought.
In fact, he's the only one who played hard for the whole game. Maybe Coach should make
him
captain
.
Maybe Brett and Bart would respect him, for his work ethic, if nothing else. They're sure never gonna respect me. Neither will Gannon. Of course, he's too much of a knucklehead to respect anybody. I think I'll talk to Coach on Monday, tell him I resign as captain.

Cody rehearsed his resignation speech all weekend. He arrived at school at 6:15 so he'd be sure to have time to tell Coach Clayton the news before anyone else arrived.

He found the coach in the gym shooting free throws. “Aw, for the love of Chris Dudley,” Coach Clayton moaned, as his shot bounced off the back iron, “that was one ugly shot.”

Cody cleared his throat. The coach turned his head. “Oh, hey, dawg. I hope you didn't see that brick I just threw up. To tell you the truth, I've been throwing up more bricks than a mason's convention. Don't tell anybody, though, or I'll have you runnin' suicides till your feet fall off!”

Cody nodded. “Uh, Coach, you got a minute?”

Coach Clayton frowned. “To tell you the truth, Mr. Martin, I'm fresh outta minutes. I got something important to tend to before practice. So why don't you take this ball here and see if you can bust through the lid someone musta put over the basket.”

“But Coach—”

“But nothin', numb-noggin. You may be captain of the team, but I'm the general. So you go ahead and do what I just told you.” With that, he flipped the ball to Cody and jogged toward the locker room.

“We'll have a special guest joining us this morning,” Coach Clayton told his team after they had completed warm-ups and stretching. He raised his voice. “Uh, Mr. Special Guest, you can quit lurking by the exit and join us now.”

Terry Alston sulked into the gym, head bowed. Gannon looked to Cody and shrugged. Cody returned the gesture with his best “don't look at me” facial expression.

Coach Clayton seemed to be enjoying his team's reactions. He waited several moments before intoning, “It seems our varsity coach was not pleased with Mr. Alston's five-turnover, four-foul, one-point, zero-assist performance last week. I believe I heard the admonition: ‘Alston, if you're gonna play like a stinkin' freshman, you can start practicing with the freshmen!'”

Alston was muttering something to himself, but Cody couldn't decipher it.

“Now, I'm not sure I appreciate my fellow coach impugning my team's ability,” Coach Clayton continued, “but, given the way we've played, I'm not sure I can find fault in his assessment. In any case, Mr. Alston was a teammate to most of you last year, so I trust you'll make him welcome—but not too welcome. He's here to get a workout.”

Alston stretched out while the frosh went through layup drills. He finally joined them as they began tip drills.

Cody had to stifle a grin as he watched Alston, puffy-eyed and sporting a serious case of bed head, go through the motions like an extra in a zombie movie. He considered tossing a few encouraging words to his former teammate, but Alston didn't look like he wanted to be encouraged. He looked like he wanted to be back in bed.

Cody didn't think much about Alston until late in the practice when Coach Clayton said he wanted to spend twenty minutes scrimmaging. He put Alston with Bart, Brett, Gannon, and Hooper—meaning Cody would have to captain a pack of second-teamers.
Way to stack the odds against us, Coach
, he thought, hoping Mr. Clayton could read his mind.

“By the way,” Coach Clayton said, before setting the game clock, “losing team runs suicides after practice. Winners get to shower early.”

Cody wasn't sure if it was the threat of suicides or just Alston's wanting to show the other freshmen how much better he was, but the scrimmage brought Zombie Alston fully to life. Paired against Goddard, he screamed for the ball every time, bellowing “Mismatch! I got a mismatch! Get me the rock!”

On his fivesome's first three possessions, Alston head faked Goddard into the air, then drove past him for easy layups.

Then, after Lang missed a baseline jumper, Alston snagged the rebound and bolted downcourt, Goddard scrambling to stay with him. Alston angled toward the basket, rose gracefully into the air, pushing a leaping Goddard off with his left hand, and floated in a teardrop shot with his right hand. “Eat that, doughboy!” he spat at Goddard as the ball whispered through the net.

As Goddard sprinted back to play offense, Cody thought he could see tears forming in his eyes.

After Cody closed the gap to 8–2 with a driving left-handed layup over Bart, Alston answered with an assist to Brett—via a pass between Goddard's legs. Then, as he moved to the rim for a possible offensive rebound, Alston drove an elbow into Goddard's stomach.

Cody felt his face grow hot. He pulled next to Alston as both of them ran down the court. “You didn't have to do that,” he said.

Alston shrugged. “Basketball's a contact sport. If Goddard can't take it, there's always room in the band.”

Marcus Berringer fired up a wild shot, and Alston pushed Goddard all the way past the baseline before hauling in the rebound.

Cody looked to Coach Clayton as he hunkered down to play defense. The coach slitted his eyes at his captain.
I know what you're wondering, Coach
, he thought.
How many times am I gonna let my teammate get abused? Well, I'm wondering the same thing myself.