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Gary Laubach: While I am away from my desk for a week, guest blogger and announcing partner, John Leone, offers his thoughts on the meaning of The Game:
The longer I live, the more I realize how desperately futile my attempts at originality have been. That’s not to say that those attempts have been in vain, it’s just that I’m
finding more and more that there truly is nothing new under the sun. Any successful person never lacks for an appreciation of what is good about life. But I think a complete and truly self-aware person never fails to express it, so in at least that regard, the struggle continues.
With time running short at a recent post-season basketball banquet, (or long, depending on your experiences at such events) our Coach, Fran O’Hanlon, closed the ceremony by referring to the glass-enclosed basketball to his right, one that was about to be presented to his most recent 1000-point scorer.
As he glanced over at it, his words seem to trail off just a bit. It seemed to me that he was no longer addressing the audience, but rather indulging himself in some sort of high prayer or mediation.
“There’s magic in that ball,” he said. “It connects us.” I wanted more, and having known Fran for as long as I have, I knew that there was more in there. But there was that time thing. I walked out into a cold and rainy evening feeling tied, with no chance at an overtime period.
Fran succeeded me here at Lafayette some 24 years ago as the Men’s Basketball Coach. One thing is certain and that is that Fran never needed my help with anything related to The Game. He certainly chose his predecessor wisely. That said, I hope he won’t mind – just this once – if I take a stab at what he may have explained to us all had time allowed.
There is magic in that ball. It connects us. Through generations and different eras and even through its evolution, names and faces change but the shared experiences of playing The Game keep it as its constant and recurring focal point. If you’ve played the game, you almost certainly remember someone by name – someone who wasn’t necessarily a close friend or even someone you’d ever see again beyond those endless summer nights on the playground courts – someone with whom you discovered a synergy in playing the game right. And you were always glad to have him on your team when choosing up sides.
Even in the most rudimentary pick-up games, I can remember the feeling of connectedness I’d experience when receiving a pass – or making one – in a key moment.
It was visceral. It was a non-verbal way of saying, “I trust you” or “I respect you”; a heartfelt exchange with someone you may have only just met. And those moments made you want to raise your game a level or two if only to enhance that sense of accomplishment and strengthen the developing bond with a basketball soul mate. It’s a
rare thing. It’s the stuff of which upsets are made at any and all levels of The Game.
Successful coaches are those who are able to get their players to do what they want them to do. X’s and O’s are overrated by comparison. They make great fodder for pundits and fans, but remember: there is nothing new under the sun. There are few – if any – silver bullets on a play sheet or a chalkboard. Imagine striving – and succeeding – over time in building for your team a oneness of spirit that brings the magic. Culture trumps strategy every day of the week. What Coach O was reminding us of that night was the link to not only the men of his program, but to all of those who came before and anyone who’s tried to play the game right.
I’ve had good and well-intentioned friends suggest to me – and wish for me – more balance in my life. All things come back to The Game for me, and Coach O’Hanlon did
me no favors that night by reinforcing in me this ongoing and arguably growth-stunting personal worldview. The Game is a metaphor for living well, and that ball surely does have magic in it.
When we share it, it enhances us. When we dominate it or hoard it, it punishes us – sometimes, embarrassingly so. When we treat it carelessly, we lose it. When we value it, it rewards us. There are times we need to work hard to gain possession of it, risking pain and even injury.
There’s a love of The Game – not unlike the love of art, or music, or dance – that engenders a physical and emotional investment. The magic does not happen without it,
and without it, we are blinded from seeing the game for all that it can offer. The magic in that ball can bring out the best in us, or it can reveal our deepest flaws. When five people can function as a single entity, a single brain and heart – subverting in some cases our own individuality for the greater good – the results can be not just magical, but sometimes legendary. My friend and former Princeton coach, Pete Carril, once said, “Let me watch a kid play for 15 minutes, and I’ll probably be able to tell you all you need to know about him as a person.”
I left the banquet that night thinking of teammates I have had throughout the years and how – despite the distance in time and place – we are and have been inexorably
connected. But even more than that, I thought of the handful of guys from those pickup games of my youth and thought that – if they showed up today after 50 years – I’d still pick them, or still want them to pick me.
John Leone
