Free A Game Worth Watching by Samantha Gudger

duller yellow tinge on the space,
and the smell of sweat and old shoes choked the air. At least the gym had
hoops. Hoops with nets so old they looked like they would disintegrate with one
swishing three-pointer.
    The
only thing the auxiliary gym was used for was to hide the school’s disgraces.
In other words, it was the perfect place to exile the girls’ basketball team so
no one had to see them, hear them, or think about them. They didn’t deserve
anything better until they won. While the boys’ basketball team practiced in
the main gym on the opposite side of campus, Emma was stuck with girls in the
secondhand gym. No quotes or posters promoted teamwork or inspired students to
dream and achieve. It was just aging bricks and mortar. What more did a losing
team of eight girls need?
    Several
times during practice, Emma and Coach Knowles exchanged glances. Coach’s look
was always part apology for the lack of talent on the team, and part fear Emma
would bolt from practice again. She shouldn’t feel pity for the woman. Jen
Knowles had willingly applied for the position, but she had no idea how to
coach effectively. She tried hard—too hard—to make practice go
smoother, to make the girls learn faster, to make herself coach better. At
least Emma wasn’t the only one struggling.
    Less
than twenty-four hours ago, Coach Knowles had stood on Emma’s neighborhood
court, begging her to come back to the team and do what she could to help.
Well, in Emma’s opinion, the team was beyond help. Or maybe she didn’t want to
waste the energy it would take to bring the girls up to par. Either way, she
remained silent and let Jen Knowles do the coaching. Sure, there were lots of
dropped passes, lots of missed shots, lots of out of control dribbles, but they
never moved past basketball basics: ball handling, passing, shooting, and
defense. Maybe Jen Knowles did a Google search on proper coaching techniques.
Who knew? Whatever she did, Coach Knowles had stopped making excuses and
started being a coach.
    By
the end of practice, the girls actually seemed to know what the game of
basketball was all about. Maybe this team of girls was capable of progress
after all. Even if it did occur in slow motion.
    ***
    Practice
finally ended, the weights of restriction lifting. The rest of the team
shuffled out of the gym, and Emma sighed in relief. Finally. Peace and quiet.
Without girls.
    Standing
in the middle of the court with a ball under her arm, she took a deep breath
and closed her eyes. No feet thudded against the gym floor, no squeals pierced
the silence, and no complaining polluted the air. If she listened hard enough,
she could almost hear the distant notes of the pep band, the cheers from the
crowd, and the yells from Coach creating the soundtrack for Bradshaw’s battle
for victory against an opposing team. She could only imagine what it would be
like to play in a real game against a real team with an actual scorekeeper. In
little more than a week, she would know. Until then, she could only dream.
    Opening
her eyes, she dribbled the ball and listened to it pound against the floor, the
sound echoing in the space around her. She had never had a gym to herself
before. She could dribble, shoot, and run around like a lunatic and no one
would be there to pass judgment on her.
    So
that’s what she did.
    Guarded
by invisible defenders, she jabbed and spun, guiding the ball from one end of
the court to the other. She split the defense and avoided traps, beating her
opponents with the double crossover, the two-step, the fake pump, and every
other move she knew. No matter where she shot from—from inside the key or
from the three-point line—the ball fell through the hoop with nothing but
the swish of the net in its wake. Family problems, girl drama, and all tension
melted away as basketball allowed her to escape from her world and find peace.
    Sweat
poured down her face as she played. She loved competing with the guys and
feeling the sting on