Dunk Under Pressure Read online

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  I - The Specialist

  Chapter 2 - Sweaty as a Pig

  Chapter 3 - Nervous Tension

  Chapter 4 - Mind Games

  Chapter 5 - High Intensity

  Chapter 6 - 25,000 Shots

  Chapter 7 - This Close

  Chapter 8 - Back on the Horse

  Chapter 9 - Credentials

  Teaser chapter

  Also by Rich Wallace

  Restless: A Ghost’s Story

  Losing Is Not an Option

  Playing Without the Ball

  Shots on Goal

  Wrestling Sturbridge

  Winning Season Series

  The Roar of the Crowd

  Technical Foul

  Fast Company

  Double Fake

  Emergency Quarterback

  Southpaw

  VIKING

  Published by Penguin Group

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  First published in 2006 by Viking, a division of Penguin Young Readers Group

  Copyright © Rich Wallace, 2006

  All rights reserved

  LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA

  Wallace, Rich.

  Dunk under pressure / Rich Wallace.

  p. cm.—(Winning season ; #7)

  Summary: Free throw specialist Cornell “Dunk” Duncan joins the YMCA summer

  basketball league all-star team, but after losing his confidence in an important game

  the seventh-grader makes some decisions about becoming an all-around player.

  eISBN : 978-1-101-11855-9

  [1. Basketball—Fiction. 2. Self-confidence—Fiction. 3. Aunts—Fiction.] I. Title.

  PZ7.W15877Dun 2006

  [Fic]—dc22

  2005023554

  S.A. Set in Caslon 224 Book

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  FOR JEREMY

  I

  The Specialist

  Cornell Duncan. The guys call him Dunk, but he couldn’t dunk from a six-foot ladder. He’s flat-footed and slow and jumps about two inches. But he knows the game and is a good defender.

  And, man, can he shoot.

  Free throws, that is. Put him at the foul line and he doesn’t miss.

  He made thirty-two in a row one time in practice. Twenty straight is routine.

  He makes it look easy.

  It isn’t.

  He’ll tell you. Last winter he got cut from the sixth-grade team. Didn’t come close to making it. Walked out of the gym blinking back tears and didn’t look at a basketball for nearly a week.

  Then he read about a college player at Georgetown who led the nation in free-throw percentage. “Easiest shot in the game,” the guy said. “Or at least it should be. No one guarding you. Just up, over, and in.”

  Dunk thought about that and decided that the college player was right. He could shoot free throws. He could make some of them. With a little practice (or a lot), Dunk could become a free-throw magician.

  He found a video at the library that demonstrated the perfect technique. Watched it seven times. Then he went to work at it.

  He started with a hundred in his narrow driveway every afternoon for a few weeks. When the weather turned icy, he started finding off-moments at the Hudson City YMCA—early in the morning before school, for example, or during the fifteen-minute interval between the evening aerobics classes that his aunt taught.

  He could take about sixty shots in those fifteen minutes if his aunt rebounded for him. If she was busy talking to a student, then he’d only shoot thirty. When the second class ended, he’d shoot at least eighty more.

  A hundred or more shots a day all winter and spring and into the summer is nearly 25,000 free throws. You shoot that many, you have to get good.

  Dunk got real good. So good that he led the YMCA Summer League in free-throw percentage, hitting thirty-five of forty-two shots during the eight-game season. That’s eighty-three percent.

  Still, he was surprised when he got a call the day after the season ended, inviting him to try out for the league’s all-star team. That team would be spending several days at the Shore, competing in the New Jersey YMCA state tournament.

  Of course, Dunk still was slow and flat-footed and could barely jump over a worm on the sidewalk. But he definitely caught the coaches’ eyes at the tryouts when he hit twenty-three out of twenty-five free throws during warm-ups.

  “That kid can shoot,” one coach said to another.

  “Nice stroke,” said the other. “Consistent. He makes the same motion every time. That’s the key.”

  Guys like Spencer Lewis and Jared Owen and Jason Fiorelli—the stars of the middle school’s championship team—stopped what they were doing to marvel at Dunk’s ability as he worked on his next set of twenty-five. They tried razzing him with whoops and burps and stamping their feet, but Dunk kept his eyes focused on the rim and kept swishing the shots.

  “He’s like a robot or something,” said Fiorelli.

  Dunk smiled and sank another one. “Robots got nothing on me,” he said, never looking away from the basket.

  Still, shooting free throws is only part of the game, so Dunk was not a lock to make the all-star team. His weaknesses were obvious—stronger guys out-muscled him for rebounds, quicker guys darted past him for layups, and springier guys lofted their jump shots over his outstretched arms for buckets.

  He had his good moments, too. A rebound and a put-back with Jared all over him; a sweet pass to Miguel Rivera on a give-and-go; a fade-away jumper from fifteen feet (well, maybe it wasn’t quite a jumper, but a decent shot anyway).

  So the coaches figured they might as well keep him. He wouldn’t play much, but in the right situation he’d definitely be an asset. They’d seen many close games decided by which team could shoot better from the line.

  “Say we’re protecting a lead in the final minute and the opposition has to foul som
ebody to get the ball back,” Assistant Coach Red Creighton said in making his case. “You get the ball to Dunk and let ’em foul him. That’s two points guaranteed.”

  “I could see it,” said Head Coach Larry Temple, rubbing his jaw. “A free-throw specialist.”

  So that’s why Dunk found his name on the all-star roster after three days of tryouts. He’d made more than eighty-five percent of his free throws over those three days. The best pro and college players only make a little more than ninety percent. Of course that’s in the heat of a game, with the heart pounding and the crowd screaming and the intense pressure of competition. Even so, eighty-five percent in practice isn’t bad, either. Especially for a kid who’s not yet thirteen.

  So Dunk was on the twelve-man squad, mostly a practice player, a body to give the first-stringers some competition during workouts. He might get a few minutes of game-time at the tail end of a blowout.

  And in the right situation, at the end of a tight game, he just might surprise a few people.

  2

  Sweaty as a Pig

  “Didn’t you already practice today?” Aunt Krystal asked a few nights later as Dunk walked onto the YMCA gym floor, dribbling a basketball. “Twice?”

  Dunk grinned. With his index finger he straightened his glasses, which had slid down his nose. “The tournament starts tomorrow,” he said. “Gotta be sharp.” He set the basketball down at the free-throw line and helped his aunt stack some gym mats on the side of the court.

  Krystal was dressed in blue running shorts and a white tank top, and she was sweating from leading the aerobics classes. She was only eight years older than her nephew and was a junior at St. Peter’s College in Jersey City. She seemed more like an older sister to Dunk than an aunt.

  “Oh yeah, the big-time trip to the Shore,” she said. “You guys better win a couple of games; I’m driving down for the semifinals if you get that far.”

  Dunk shrugged. “The coaches say there’ll be some outrageously good teams there. I don’t know how we’ll stack up.”

  “You’ll do great if you play hard.”

  “A lot of those teams have been playing together all summer. We’ve only been a team for a few days. We might get toasted.”

  “Don’t worry about it,” Krystal said. “You don’t need that kind of pressure at least until high school. You guys are young; you’re still little.”

  Dunk raised his eyebrows and gave his aunt an amused stare, arching his neck so he was looking down at her. At five-foot-nine, he was three inches taller than she was.

  “You know what I mean,” she said. “Just have fun.”

  Krystal knew what she was talking about. She’d been a star athlete in high school, excelling in basketball and track, but had turned down athletic scholarships from Seton Hall and Rutgers. She was well aware of the line between enjoying a sport and making it a job.

  “Let me ask you something, Cornell,” she said. “How many hours have you spent on basketball today?”

  Dunk shrugged. “Three or four,” he said.

  Krystal raised her eyebrows. “Oh, yeah?”

  “Okay, maybe seven.” He’d had a team practice session from ten A.M. until noon, then played pickup games on the Y’s outside court for most of the afternoon with Spencer and Miguel and a rotating crowd of others. He’d gone through two quarts of water and a bottle of Gatorade playing under that bright, hot sun.

  “Do anything else?” Krystal asked.

  “Ate a couple of hot dogs,” he said with a grin.

  “What do you think would happen if you spent maybe one of those hours doing something else that you like?”

  “I’d be bored?”

  “If seven hours of basketball doesn’t get boring, then I don’t know what else would,” Krystal said. “Tell you what you could do. Take one of my classes sometime.”

  “You’re kidding, right? Bounce around the gym with a bunch of ladies? To music, no less? I don’t think so.”

  The thing was, Dunk couldn’t think of anything else he’d rather be doing. As his basketball skills were slowly improving, so was his devotion to the game. Making that all-star team had given his confidence a big boost. He was sure he’d make the school team this winter, but he’d be taking advantage of every opportunity to get better, just in case.

  “You’re hopeless,” Krystal said sweetly, putting her arm around his shoulder and squeezing. “Maybe we could go to the library one of these days. Maybe you can get something to read.”

  “About basketball?”

  “About anything you want.”

  “Sure,” Dunk said. “Maybe there’s a book about rebounding.”

  Krystal shook her head slowly. “All you ate today was some hot dogs?”

  “Yeah. It was too hot to eat much.”

  “You hungry now?”

  “Very.”

  “Come on. Let’s get something. I’m buying.”

  “Can you wait ten minutes?”

  “I suppose so,” Krystal said, putting on a light sweatshirt. “Why?”

  Dunk picked up the basketball and started dribbling. “Fifty free throws,” he said. “If you rebound for me, it’ll go faster.”

  “Looks like it rained,” Krystal said as they stepped out of the YMCA. The setting sun was shining, but some dark clouds were moving rapidly away toward New York City. The Boulevard was steaming.

  “For about eight seconds,” Dunk said. “I’ve never seen such a quick shower. It sure didn’t cool things off.”

  “So what do you feel like eating?” Krystal asked. “And don’t say another hot dog.”

  “Pizza?”

  “I had it last night. Chinese, maybe? I’m thinking Hunan vegetables and a shrimp roll.”

  “Sounds good.”

  Hudson City’s main street was lined with small shops and restaurants of all types: Mexican, Cuban, Thai, Italian, and many others. The languages and skin tones of the city’s residents were as varied as could be. So was the music that poured out of the shops.

  The nearby choices for Chinese food were the Jade Palace, with its carpeted dining room and booths and waitresses, or the tiny Beijing Kitchen across the street, which relied mostly on take-out orders but had a handful of stools at the counter.

  They stopped on the sidewalk outside the Jade Palace and Krystal gave Dunk a good looking-over. “You’re sweaty as a pig,” she said. “And the food’s better over there anyway.”

  “You’re a little damp yourself,” Dunk said. “Or is that an indelicate thing to say?”

  “Pffft,” Krystal replied. “Where’d you find a word like indelicate? There’s nothing wrong with a bit of honest perspiration.”

  So they crossed the street and sat at the stools in front of the Beijing Kitchen’s open kitchen, where they could watch the food being prepared.

  The skinny young guy behind the counter nodded at Krystal and started to flirt. He obviously recognized her. “This your big brother?” he asked.

  “My little nephew.”

  “Oh, sorry,” the guy said. He looked mischievously at Dunk. “I better bring you the children’s menu.”

  Dunk laughed. “Only if I can get three dinners off it.”

  The phone rang and the guy answered, writing down an order. Behind him, two men were working frantically over giant woks, clattering and stirring, and a woman was assembling orders: putting rice into white cardboard containers, ladling soup into plastic bowls, tossing packets of mustard and soy sauce into bags.

  “You decide yet?” the guy asked after hanging up the phone.

  “What’s good tonight?” Krystal asked.

  “Everything’s good, beautiful.” He winked.

  Krystal rolled her eyes but didn’t seem to mind the compliment. She ordered the Hunan vegetables.

  Dunk asked for shrimp with snow peas.

  “You guys want soup?”

  “I don’t know,” Dunk said. “It’s so hot out.”

  “Nice and cool in here,” the guy said, pointing
to a small window air conditioner that seemed to be laboring hard. The restaurant wasn’t very cool at all.

  “Okay. Wonton for me,” Dunk said. “A small one.”

  “Only one size,” the guy said. “Half a pint.”

  “Half a pint? That’s almost a whole pint!”

  The guy looked at Dunk like he was crazy. But Dunk thought the joke was hilarious.

  “Egg drop,” said Krystal. “And don’t mind my nephew. His sense of humor is a little off.”

  “Chopsticks for the dinners?”

  “Of course,” said Krystal.

  “Not for me,” Dunk said. “Bring me a fork and a spoon. I’m starving.”

  There was a rumble of thunder after dinner as they walked toward Fourth Street, down on the residential end of the Boulevard. Dunk lived two blocks to the left, toward the Hudson River, and Krystal was a block to the right. In the past there would have been no question that she would escort him to his door. But suddenly it occurred to Dunk that it was time for a shift.

  So he turned right on Fourth Street.

  “You’re walking me home?” Krystal said with an amused grin. “I don’t think so.”

  “Why not?” Dunk said. “I know my way around.”

  “True,” she said hesitantly, stopping in her tracks.

  “It’s barely even dark yet.”

  She put her hand on her chin, weighing her options. Dunk was big for his age. And it was only three blocks from her apartment to his house.

  “Okay,” she said, “but you go straight home. And call me right away.”

  “I will.”

  “Don’t even bother. I’ll call your mom as soon as I get in and stay on the line until you get there.”

  Dunk laughed. “It’s quarter after nine. I don’t usually get in until almost ten in the summer.”

  “Well, when you’re with me you do. I don’t care how tall you get, you’re still a little squirt to me.”