“I don’t know, Coach. He didn’t pick up his cell.”

“Odd. He’s never missed a practice before. Okay, five-second-denial drill. Get into it.”

Practice didn’t get much better. Whenever we were working on plays, the guys would throw it at my feet, making it nearly impossible to catch. When we scrimmaged, they froze me out, never passing me the ball no matter how open I was. Of course, I got my share of rebounds. I scored twice off steals. But still. If your teammates freeze you out, there is only so much you can do.

And then, with just a minute left in practice, I saw a glorious opening.

I was covering Brandon Foley. He grabbed a rebound and threw a long outlet pass to Troy Taylor. Troy had been what we call “basket-hanging”—not playing defense and staying close to his own basket for easy points. Troy caught the ball and slowed down his dribble. He was taking his time, preparing for takeoff, revving himself up for a big-time slam dunk.

The other guys hung back, watching, waiting to see whether Troy threw it down with one hand or two, or whether he tried a reverse dunk or something trickier.

I didn’t.

I sprinted toward the basket with everything I had. Up ahead of me, Troy took off into the air. His hand was above the rim, palming the ball. He was maybe half a second away from dunking the ball through the hoop when I leapt up from behind him and swatted the ball away.

“What the—?” Troy shouted in surprise.

A completely clean block.

“Foul!” he yelled.

I said nothing, just jogged toward the bouncing ball.

“You fouled me!”

I picked up the ball. I had knocked it out of bounds. It was his team’s possession. My father had taught me that you let your game do the talking. You don’t yell at referees. You don’t trash-talk. You just play.

I handed Troy the ball. He snatched it away.

“He fouled me!” Troy shouted again.

“Take the ball out of bounds, Troy,” Coach Grady said. “Run the stack.”

“But—”

“It’s just a scrimmage. Let’s go. Ten seconds left.”

Troy didn’t like it. He muttered something under his breath. I ignored him and got ready. I covered Brandon Foley tightly. I knew that he was the first option on the stack. Troy would want to lob it over my head to Brandon. I wouldn’t let that happen.

Troy yelled, “Break!” and all the players started to move. I kept a forearm on Brandon, trying to time his jump. I had my back to the ball, my eyes on my man, guarding him closely.

Seconds ticked by.

If five seconds passed, we got the ball. It was getting pretty close to that. I sneaked a glance to see what Troy was about to do.

But he’d been waiting for me to do just that.