Editor’s note: The following article is an op-ed, and the views expressed are the author’s own. Read more opinions on theGrio.
The year 1996 was a wild time in New York City high school hoops. I have absolutely nothing to back up that assertion — I wasn’t there. But considering that Brooklyn’s Sunset Park High School fielded a championship-caliber basketball team that included, at a minimum, three players who had absolutely no business on a basketball court — much less the basketball team — that played meaningful minutes, anything is possible. For all we know, I was there. That’s the beauty of Black history, we’re writing it right now.
Look, I’m all for a wonderful turnaround, Cinderella story. I love it when an improbable story unfolds and an underdog blossoms. I’m not sure that’s what we really had with this particular team but that’s what happened. You see, I watched them play basketball, in practice and in games and well, they weren’t that good. In fact, they weren’t even “not that good,” they were plain “not good.” And yet, they managed to make it all the way to the NYC Public School Athletic League championship game in Madison Square Garden. They lost — spoiler alert — but they shouldn’t have been there in the first place. And that’s what makes them significant; the amount of hurdles this team had to overcome is astounding, not to mention there weren’t any actual good players on the team!
For starters, their coach, Phyllis Saroka, was the gym teacher who only took the job to save money so she could open up a restaurant in St. Croix. Did she know anything about basketball? Not a lick. She was a little bit like Darrin Hill who took over the choir for money in Monte Carlo, Georgia, despite not having any musical talents but became invested. They turned his life story into a movie, “The Fighting Temptation.” Who knows, maybe…
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