Long Shot - Mike Lupica [23]
The problem wasn’t his ego.
It was Ned’s.
It was Ned who had made the whole thing personal. And Pedro knew it was time to fight back. Big-time.
It was probably why even Joe was looking at him funny that night, as if he didn’t recognize the Pedro who was trying to be everywhere at once, diving for loose balls, even flying in from the outside to crash the boards sometimes.
During a water break, Coach Cory came over and said he couldn’t decide whether this was the old Pedro or a new Pedro.
“The old one,” Pedro said to him quietly. “Maybe just with a new attitude.”
He wanted the ball in his hands on offense again, whether he was playing with Ned or not. He pushed the ball up the court every chance he got, and if his teammates didn’t want to run with him, well, they just got left behind.
A couple of times he threaded the needle on passes—one to Bobby, one to Clarence—when he would have been better off holding the ball and not taking the chance.
Right before the end of their scrimmage, first unit against the second unit, the game tied at nine baskets all, Ned’s team had the ball and a chance to win.
Like last ups in baseball.
Ned had the ball in the right corner and was starting to back in toward the basket. It never mattered whether Ned had his back to the basket or not, because he had his own eyes in the back of his head, same as Steve Nash. All the great passers did.
I have them too, Pedro thought, even though I haven’t been using them much lately.
When Ned turned his head this time, Pedro knew exactly what was going to happen next. Just knew.
He could still read the guy’s mind, read him like a book. He knew Ned was going to turn and whip a pass all the way over to the other wing where Jeff Harmon was set up for a wide-open three.
Like Nash the other night.
Pedro was guarding Dave, who’d run down into the opposite corner as a decoy. But Pedro wasn’t worried about Dave now, and left him where he was in the corner as he ran the baseline toward Ned, ran it like a streak of light before anybody realized he was coming up behind Ned Hancock.
Pedro came in behind as Ned took one more dribble, and he slapped the ball away, picked him clean. Then he gathered the ball up before it went out of bounds, took off down the sideline before anybody on the first unit was quick enough to make the transition to defense, and made the easy layup that won the scrimmage for the second unit.
Before the ball was through the net and to the floor, Coach Cory blew his whistle and started clapping his hands, saying, “That’s the way you play defense. Uh-huh!”
Then he turned to Ned, shrugged and said, “Even you got to protect the rock, Mr. Hancock.”
Nobody said a word.
Pedro wasn’t sure everybody was even breathing. Even in a nice way, Coach Cory had never called out Ned Hancock.
For anything.
The moment didn’t last, because Coach was never quiet for very long. He told them to shoot around for the last fifteen minutes until pick-up time, and to start thinking about the Sherrill game on Saturday.
Only then did the gym sound like a gym again: balls bouncing, players scattering to find open baskets, the real ones at both ends or the ones on the side.
Everybody seemed to be in motion except Ned.
He was still standing where he’d been when Pedro stole the ball from him, with his arms at his sides, staring at Pedro.
He was supposed to be the most unselfish, un-cocky player in town, but now he was looking at Pedro the same way he had the day he found out Pedro was running for president against him.
Like nobody else was even supposed to be breathing his air.
Like he was showing Pedro the real Ned Hancock again.
This time Pedro stared right back at him, held Ned’s look and held his ground at the same time, let him know that he wasn’t going anywhere.
Pedro looked down the court at Ned Hancock as if to say, I’m here.
TWELVE
The Knights won again on Saturday,