![\"\"](\"http:\/\/danwashburn.com\/practice.jpg\")
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November 14, 2000 \u00e2\u20ac\u201d You can only run from reality for so long. And last week, I believe reality finally caught up with me.<\/p>\n
It’s been nearly a decade since my days as a high school basketball player. Nearly a decade since I ran my last suicide sprint. Nearly a decade, I learned, wasn’t long enough.<\/p>\n
There are periods from one’s past not meant to be relived, only called upon for reflection \u00e2\u20ac\u201d and embellishment \u00e2\u20ac\u201d when necessary.<\/p>\n
High school basketball careers fit into that category. After practicing with the East Hall Vikings last Thursday, I can assure you of that.<\/p>\n
There was no glory to be recaptured, rather the harsh realization that I am no longer the athlete I once was, and the inescapable fact that I’m growing older every day.<\/p>\n
That was made clear to me before practice even started.<\/p>\n
“Looks like we have a new player,” a young high school girl said from the sidelines.<\/p>\n
I was wearing practice jersey No. 21. Maybe, for a moment, she actually thought I was a new recruit, a transfer from Tallapoosa, perhaps.<\/p>\n
And then I turned around and approached her. As I got closer, her face unfolded into a look of confusion, then embarrassment, then horror.<\/p>\n
“Oh no,” she said, backing away. “You’re a man.”<\/p>\n
Funny how your self image can change in an instant. You go your whole life being told that you are young, so that is what you believe. Until somebody tells you something different. Until somebody tells you that … you are “a man.”<\/p>\n
From that moment on, I knew I didn’t stand a chance. Men don’t play high school basketball.<\/p>\n
And East Hall is not the team to practice with if you’re looking to ease into things. Good teams are good teams because they practice hard. And East Hall is a good team, a very good team.<\/p>\n
The Vikings were 26-2 and advanced to the state championship game last season. Nearly the entire team is back this year for another run. ‘Run’ being the operative word.<\/p>\n
East Hall is not a team that likes to waste time.<\/p>\n
“Basically, we try to really work on getting from one end of the floor to the other quickly,” coach Seth Vining explained. “We then encourage them to shoot the ball the first nice shot they get.”<\/p>\n
Vining began to laugh while adding, “Until some of the guys prove they don’t need to be shooting.”<\/p>\n
East Hall’s up-tempo style is no accident. They practice that way every day. Fast paced. In your face. Run. Run. Run.<\/p>\n
Lucky me.<\/p>\n
“We believe in running,” Vining said. “But we believe in playing while we’re running.”<\/p>\n
And when you play the way East Hall does, the running just happens naturally.<\/p>\n
“I know you’ll be able to hang,” Vining lied to me before practice started. “But if you feel like you need to take a break, just …”<\/p>\n
I thought about taking Vining up on his offer earlier than I had anticipated. A series of fast-break drills in the practice’s opening minutes had me gasping for air and eagerly awaiting the first water break … which, after a while, I feared was never going to happen.<\/p>\n
I began to feel a cramp forming on my right side.<\/p>\n
It was during the shooting drills that followed, that I realized my legs decided they had had enough. They were gone, somewhere, never to be heard from again.<\/p>\n
Free throws followed. A break of sorts. The 12 of us were to shoot one free throw apiece. Vining said we needed to make nine.<\/p>\n
“What happens if we don’t make nine?” I asked Tavarvess Ware, a senior forward.<\/p>\n
“Get your track shoes on,” Ware replied. “Because we’re going to run.”<\/p>\n
Well, we didn’t make our nine free throws \u00e2\u20ac\u201d my miss certainly didn’t help \u00e2\u20ac\u201d so run we did.<\/p>\n
They call them “six packs”: six lengths of the floor in 30 seconds. Up and back. Up and back. Up and back.<\/p>\n
Oh, the bad memories these brought forth!<\/p>\n
And, running beside me \u00e2\u20ac\u201d well, not beside me for long \u00e2\u20ac\u201d was East Hall senior Shaun Foster, the reigning state champion in the 400-meter dash.<\/p>\n
More humiliation. At least our first water break awaited us at the finish line.<\/p>\n
I believe it was during that water break that the rest of my body left me \u00e2\u20ac\u201d arms, torso, everything \u00e2\u20ac\u201d and headed off to join my legs, which were likely enjoying a sub sandwich somewhere in Rabittown.<\/p>\n
The rest of the practice was a blur. Ol’ No. 21 stayed with the pack and went through the motions, but body stopped paying attention to mind long before.<\/p>\n
The thought process would go something like this:<\/p>\n
I’m going to jump to grab that rebound.<\/p>\n
Why aren’t I jumping to grab that rebound?<\/p>\n
I really should have jumped to grab that rebound.<\/p>\n
During a break in the action, I took a seat next to sophomore point guard Matt Causey. I was breathing heavily. He let me know that he noticed.<\/p>\n
“You know, we haven’t really done any running this practice,” Causey said. “He’s taking it easy on us.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
November 14, 2000 \u00e2\u20ac\u201d You can only run from reality for so long. And last week, I believe reality finally caught up with me. It’s been nearly a decade since my days as a high school basketball player. Nearly a decade since I ran my last suicide sprint. Nearly a …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37,9,19],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/danwashburn.com\/sportinglife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/179"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/danwashburn.com\/sportinglife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/danwashburn.com\/sportinglife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/danwashburn.com\/sportinglife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/danwashburn.com\/sportinglife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=179"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/danwashburn.com\/sportinglife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/179\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":183,"href":"http:\/\/danwashburn.com\/sportinglife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/179\/revisions\/183"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/danwashburn.com\/sportinglife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=179"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/danwashburn.com\/sportinglife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=179"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/danwashburn.com\/sportinglife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=179"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}