บท 72: The New School 2

And so he continued the first day of class with all the teachers getting irritated with him and wondering whenever he could in the intermission he asked what Joseph whom he brought here thought of the new school and Joseph liked besides the teachers who seemed boring and implied with his friend.

After the end of classes Jake went for his second obligation to go to basketball practice, today was the day Jake would meet his teammates and he also had to officially join the team.

...

Coach Mike was a little anxious and nervous today as he as the new coach of the Elite school held a meeting before the start of classes this week, the content of the meeting was that he as the new basketball coach had an obligation to win all three championships of the year.

They explained that the school that was now going the way of the sport would have to try to win all the various sports championships and basketball, football and baseball were the school's top priority in both Middle School and high school.

The school that wanted to become a new benchmark had made heavy investments in new players from other schools as well as in sports facilities and new coaches for all teams.

All teams that played last year were undone and new would be created, then the board passed him the list of the 5 players who were recruited from other schools and would be the starting team to win the national championship this year.

As they were not famous the coach did not recognize them by the names, but by their records last year, they all participated in the national championship last year but they ended up being eliminated and they had in common that they were in schools with weak teams of basketball and practically took alone the teams for nationals.

Listed to be the captain he saw Jake's record that he was 12 at that time and had won 2 MVPs from the region last year, the others were from other regions, Coach Mike had to admit that the school had made really heavy investments to beat that year.

The note added to Jake's profile was that he always led the team and that it was good for him to leave control of the team in play for him, and the coach only looked after the team in training, when he saw that coach Mike was not angry and yes impressed.

Because if in his command as PG he led a team with players far below average until the nationals this shows his excellent judgment and leadership, the most important was he able to show his authority to that team that was much better than he had.

...

When Jake entered the school grounds it seemed he was the first to arrive, he found the school facilities very good, he would have to remember to ask the coach to mark for him a time so he could run on the track that the school had done, had a mile to go around.

Although Jake played basketball he still remembered the joy of running, and other than strength training he would still run on the mat even if he did not, even more, because the treadmill had a device that made the treadmill tilt as if it had a rise, which was very good.

Sometimes in his running training he had to hold himself in order not to eat one of his energy bars in order to keep running, he promised himself that as soon as he accumulated 100 of these bars he would start eating them so he could run more, after all too it was a training that increased both speed and endurance.

After a while people started to get on the court when David arrived just waved to Jake and went to sit on the bleachers, it seemed David did not like him very much.

After a while, coach Mike entered the court, he looked at the youngsters, the 5 who were called from another school and had 20 more students that some wanted to join the team this year and others should be players from last year that were taken from the team.

"Welcome all of you, the ones who are here want to be on the basketball team this year, some came from other schools and some were already players last year, for me the best players will play today and then 10 will be the reserves, rest can just watch the training."

"Those who were chosen from other schools were chosen because they have skills to show them all today."

And so the coach put the 5 players on his list into one team and the others were randomly chosen, despite what he said, of course, he would not go against a school order, so he favored the best if they lost anyway they did not deserve to be the best.

It must be said that the representative who spoke to Jake and the others who chose the 5 from different schools chose very well, unlike David who had a more challenging personality, the others got along very well with their teammates and just came for the chance to enter a university.

The team players who were recruited were: Jake (PG) who was the captain of his team and won 2 MVP in the two championships he won, David (SG) who reached the 3 national championship game with a good team that did not was strong enough to win, Harrison (SF) reached the first round of the national championship with his weakest team and was the best player there, Mark (C) reached the second round and was the best defender of his team, took many rebounds, had an average of 2 Block per game and still attacked well and Carter (PF) who reached the final in the national championship and scored Jake in the game that Jake's team was eliminated.

David and Carter knew Jake's abilities very well and the other two had no leadership skills and only obeyed the captain in the game, so it was as if they were chosen to be a team with Jake already decided before to be the captain.

In this game just to decide the inevitable Jake did not have time to combine signals before the game began then he would only mark the plays at the time of the game because when players have skilled it does not matter much if the opponent knows what they did in the attack.

So the game began and Mark got possession of the ball, so the ball was sent to Jake who advanced quickly to the attack, his companions went further and positioned themselves in the attack, so Jake just took a look and gave an assist for Mark who was unmarked to do the layup.

The opposing team was surprised by the fast attack and they started their attack, Jake and his team only returned to the defense and let them attack, when the opponent's PG came close to the 3-point line Jake tightened the mark.

Just as Jake's entire team tightened their scoring and then the opposing PG tried to pass Jake, but without success, he gave a pass to his SG, but David pressed more in the mark, just as the SG tried to return the pass Jake went ahead and intercepted the ball to start a counter-attack.

Jake tried to advance calmly, but David fired for the attack, as he was faster than his opponents Jake just gave the pass to David who with the ball ran up to do a layup and 2 points.

Then the opposing team tried other attacks, but all were always well marked and whenever someone opened Jake, David or Carter stole the ball, so the advantage only increased Jake did not even try to make any point and only organized the attacks.

When the opponent encountered a defensive positioning fault and tried to do a layup, Mark gave a block and protected the basket, so when the 16-minute game ended Jake's team had made 30 points more than his opponent, then no one disagreed that they were the starters and also that Jake was the captain by the position in the court.

Coach Mike was very pleased, seeing personally was better than reading reports, and Jake was able to get used to his teammates' game style quickly and made the best passes at the right time.

So he understood why he was the PG chosen to command a team of talented players like them but as they were all calm none of them were arrogant, perhaps because everyone had lost last year neither of them saw himself as an exceptional player.

The coach was wrong, Mark and Harrison were actually quieter and just did their parts, but Carter and David were more problematic in their teams, they did not listen to the captain and even challenged the coach many times, but that was because their personalities only they let them listen to a player better than them.

And they both knew Jake and had to acknowledge that he was better than them, David just knew that in the individual part, but Carter knew that tactically Jake was perfect at Middle School, Jake knew how to defend better than him up to and on the attack or say, and today Carter saw his skills in assists, and more than anything everyone was very pleased to come to this school.

After all they had the chance to go to a good university and also play in a team that had the ability to win the national championship, everyone liked to sell and when young people liked to boast to others of their achievements, especially those five who were so skillful, so losing last year left a bad taste in everyone's mouth.

And now they were performing several wishes at once in this school, a desire to be in a good school and with proper facilities, study with the best teachers, go to a good university, and even more as basketball lovers to be champions in all competitions.