The day has come
What the team has been waiting for
All yearlong
They come to the home court
After the heart breaker
At the buzzer away from the home turf
But now
It’s personal
An all day event
Every team
Boys and girls
But every game has lead to the final event
Boys varsity
The two match up
Like Kobe and LeBron
You could make an argument going both ways
Shorewood is better
No
Shorecrest is better
But soon enough
The highly anticipated game
Was about to begin

The two teams run out the doors
Onto the court
To look up and see 4 sets of bleachers
Stacked up with people
All the way to the top
It seemed like everybody in the city
Was packed into the high school gym
Slightly intimidated by an opposing player
The players constantly look over to the other half of the court
To see him warming up
A 6 foot 6 forward
Possible division one player
Only a junior
A nice 3-point shot
And to top it all off
He can jump out of the gym
That’s when they realized that defense
Would be much more important than offense
Warm ups: over

Starter introductions began
The Queen
Gager
Big Dunc
Beej
And of course the mastermind
Pete
The teams line up at the free throw lines
And the national anthem plays
“O say can you see
By the dawns early light…”
The players are breathing heavily
Nervous
But excited
So many things rushing through their heads
But one thought
One goal
One mindset
Went through all of their minds
Revenge
Payback
Time to get the W
“O’er the land of the free
And the home of the brave”
Time for a ball game to remember

The start of the game wasn’t pretty for the home squad
The first quarter ended with the rival ahead
So far it wasn’t looking good
For the underdog
But then the underdog
Released its fight in the second quarter
They came out
With the determination
Of the Seahawks
Ready to play the New Orleans Saints
Going into half time
The game was notched up
Tied
Dead even

They went into the locker room
Pumped up
The most energy the coaches have seen
In a long time
The coach
The leader
The teacher
The wise man
Told everybody to keep their composure
Not to let up a hair
And keep the same intensity
For the rest of the game
And the way the team seemed to be
That didn’t look to be a problem

Third quarter
As coach always says
The first 3 minutes of the third quarter
Will set the tone for the rest of the game
This was said every game in the locker room
But just to make sure he got the message across
Coach said it again
Right before the starters went on the floor
By watching the play of the team
Coach was positive that he got the message across

The team went out and threw the first punch
They went on about a 5-0 run
Then it started going back and forth again
Then the score was tied again
But then came the big hustle play that changed the rest of the game
The ball was going out of bounds
Pete ran after in jumped out of bounds after it
Grabbed it in mid air
Threw it at the ground
Right by the feet of the defender
Into Beej’s hands
For two points
At this play
The whole benched jumped to their feet
Yelling
Screaming
Just plain and simply
Fired up
The other team called a timeout
To try and get his team back into the game
While the other team
Was giving high fives all around
Pumped up out of their minds
By the end of the quarter
The underdog
The Cinderella
Was up by 13
Now all they needed to do
Was hold the lead
And the underdog
Would have gotten their first win against their rival
In 11 games played

A few minutes into the fourth quarter
Was the play that sealed the game
Beej drives to the basket
Goes up
Fouled
And one
At that moment
The roof almost came off the gym
It was so loud
At that point
The other team had put in the backups
Throwing up the white flag
Surrendering

The buzzer sounds
The student section explodes
They storm the floor
They crowd the team
The celebration starts
The drought ends
They won
And the scoreboard reads
Shorecrest-44
Shorewood-58