I loved basketball. My dad didn’t like sports but he cut out a backboard from a ping pong table with a hoop he found dumped in a field, and my across the street neighbor was a retired assistant coach from Air Force and he gave me a few pointers when he’d see me out shooting.

I tried out as a freshman at Mountain View high school, but with 120 guys trying out, I realized the coach had already picked some guys out as they wore matching shoes and team jerseys and knew the drills. Can’t blame him on that.

So sophomore year having learned my lesson I bought the right shoes, worked out with the coaches, even started dating a cheerleader. Since only 40 guys tried out that year coach divided us into 8 teams and put his starting 5 out there, and sent a few of us no names to take a beating, playing to 21. In other words, his team was supposed to hold the court and get practice. He went over to talk to the cheerleaders. I got hot and somehow, we won.

Coach hadn’t watched, and he started to get another team to play his starters, but when he found out they had lost, he ripped on them and told them to start doing ladders. It was then I knew my dream of taking the court for BYU was over.