Chapter 41 The Basketball Team 1
So Jake"s vacation ended he went to school normally and as the school was a little away from school and further away from the place that the basketball tournament was held only Joseph knew how Jake had excelled in those holidays.
Jake thought of just pretending to be reading the Spanish book because he already knew how to talk, but later he discovered that even reading this book again there were many things he had to learn.
Then he turned one day he read the Spanish book and the next he read the business management book, this was much harder for Jake because he had not yet studied anything he was reading in those books.
So after the school ended Jake did not go home as usual to train, he went to the basketball club, and today he had heard that it would be made a selection as if it were the first year to see if it would enter the team 1, team 2 and team 3.
Team 1 is the starting team, team 2 is the reserve and team 3 only watches from the stands and only play when all of team 1 and team 2 cannot play whoever does not go either to team 3 can help the team to catch the ball and administrative work or they could only train in physical education cla.s.ses.
Today would be the selection for the 3 teams as the veterans of last year had now graduated, more generally the newcomers went into time3 and at most for team 2, to enter the starting team they had to be good at everything, which Jake did not it was last year, but now he had the confidence.
So Jake introduced himself to the coach named Roy Carter, coach Roy was once the star of the basketball team at a Texas university, but he can not be a professional player because he had to take care of the family business after he got married and his wife asked to take over the business, coach Roy became coach to stay close to the sport he likes so much.
Even though he graduated from physical education and coaching because he was not as well-known as a player and wanted to be trained close to home he agreed to train a team at a not very good school in sports.
After all, his dream was not to be a national basketball champion with his team, more than just one of his players for the NBA, so he could say that he made some contribution to the spore, but in 10 years of work, he never found a player with potential.
In today"s training Roy was not in a very good mood because he thought the team of last year was very good even more were eliminated in the second round of qualifying for the state tournament, which he thought could go at least for the national team was a disappointment, and all the best players of the team formed last year, despite having a few good players from the second year to be holders is still not enough.
Those who signed up for the basketball team this year make up as little as 15 people, as usual, the team had 6 spots open last year, and he would be lucky if he found 6 good enough to fill the vacancy.
So he started calling the names of the new players one by one, the lowest and most overweight were 4 and all were below average and were eliminated, plus 3 had the right weight and height for Middle School also played down and were eliminated.
So now he had 8 players to fill 6 spots, when he started looking at those 8 he saw someone in the corner, was a young blond who had striking eyes and a well-defined body, he was looking calmly at the situation different from others 7, when Roy looked at the plug to see who it was he was surprised.
He was surprised by two things, this young man was in the second year and he has never played in a team before, and was not even interested in signing up last year, when he read the reason he laughed, the reason was because he knew he would not have chance to play for being the first year.
He was right, hierarchy rules are very strong even in basketball in schools, a first-year player hardly ever plays, no matter how good he is.
And the other reason that Roy was surprised was that he knew the face of Jake, this was the young man called by a genius by the teachers, they said that he made a high note in all matters and also that in the meantime he studied Spanish in cla.s.s.
Roy never imagined that the genius of the school would like to play basketball, in his day those who took the highest marks did not like sports very much, and by the height and his body he has the right way for a soph.o.m.ore basketball player.
So the other 7 did their test and 4 pa.s.sed 1 failed and two were left waiting, if there was no one better they would enter.
Jake finally came, he was tired of waiting and was very disappointed with the level of the new players of the team, all were very bad and only went through because the requirement was low and yet only 4 of 14 pa.s.sed.
The test requirements were to get 5 in 10 Free Throw, run 10 laps on the court in minutes and hit 6 in 10 b.a.l.l.s from the 2-point area, and then dribble well a 2-team marker that was almost stopped.
Even with such easy requirements many still did not meet, Jake, of course, did it all very easily by taking praise from everyone who was watching the selection.
After Jake entered the team 2 as the others entered some for team 2 and others for team 3, and now coach Roy asked if team 3 wanted to challenge team 2, no one raised his hand, and when asked if team 2 wanted to challenge the headlines Jake raised his hand and three others as well.
Thus would have a game with the starting team and team 2, the game would be in 2 times of 8 minutes each, and the 5 that improve to play in the opinion of the coach Roy will be of the t.i.tular team.
As the teams were getting ready, seeing what positions they were going to play, what the tactic was, coach Roy was seeing everything from outside, he was paying attention mostly to Jake, he felt that Jake had the ability to be the starter of that team and maybe even the captain, because it looked like he was from PG position, it was the position of the old captain who also went out to go to high school, and the reserve of that position also went to high school.
What was playing in the starting lineup today was the 3 in the position and was the first year and now the second year, this player does not have much confidence in the court and does not play very well also, he is the opposite of Jake who overflows confidence and took over the lead of team 2, and the captain of the starting team is now Center, who said he does not want to continue like this.
So after the two teams were ready the game started, the ball went to the side of team 1 who soon pa.s.sed the ball to the PG who seemed not to have caught the ball but a hot potato when he tried to calm down Jake was already in his marking, he had told his teammates that they could leave the other team"s PG for him to score and worry about the others.
After playing a lot of time in the s.p.a.ce of his imaginary training with his opponents at ever higher skill levels, and also after winning the 1 on 1 compet.i.tion, Jake was now much more confident in his defense, he could not do anything if I opponent was much taller on the ground he had confidence he would not be dribbled.
And his opponent seemed to have no confidence in his dribble either when he saw the good posture of Jake he immediately pa.s.sed the ball, his pa.s.s was good plus he only pa.s.sed to the closest teammates which made the move more predictable and easy to defend.
So when he was going to give another pa.s.s Jake stepped forward and stole the ball running to the court of the other team now empty, some tried to follow in the markup but realized that Jake was very fast and soon Jake did the layup and the first two points.
So everyone soon realized that Jake was very skilled and also that he had already gained the starting position in that move.
After that the PG of the other team seemed to be afraid of Jake and soon pa.s.sed the ball, after a while the t.i.tular team changed the game posture and who was setting the game now was the SG of the other team, this SG was now a veteran of the third year and also started last year, he was the highest scorer of the team and also was the vice-captain last year, he had said that after losing several important points last year because of pressure and made the team be eliminated that not he was mature enough to be the captain.
More was undeniable that he deserved to be the starter and respected, moreover, that defeat made him much more mature and humble, so he would not make the mistake again.
This SG soon picked up the ball made the dribble on his marker and after entering the mid-range makes the 2-point shot.
Jake soon realized that this was the leader of the team and asked his teammate to let Jake mark this SG, the companion was very happy about it and soon accepted Jake did not want to lose this game, he wanted to establish his authority in this block.