future basketball player essay

• University Navigation University Navigation
• Search Search Button

Gonzaga Home

• Student Life

College & Schools

• College of Arts & Sciences
• Center for Lifelong Learning
• Online Graduate Programs
• School of Business Administration
• School of Education
• School of Engineering & Applied Science
• School of Law
• School of Leadership Studies
• School of Health Sciences
• Future Students
• Current Students
• Military & Veterans
• Parents & Families
• Faculty & Staff
• Our Community
• Basketball Fans

• Search Button
• Toggle Menu

Collections

Publications, let me enfold thee, an essay on basketball by gonzaga faculty member shann ray ferch.

Let me enfold thee, and hold thee to my heart. Shakespeare

What is it like to be a college basketball player?

Probably quite a bit similar to what it’s like being a college student, or a dancer, a poet, or a scientist. College basketball involves a great dream. We might say the dream is life, and then we might wonder, what does life ask of us? The answer may mean the difference between despair and hope; or the distance, nuanced, oblique, between darkness and light; or the resolution and peace that come of being in the presence of beloved others who have loved us and changed us forever.

Gonzaga University has enjoyed a sustained and by some accounts miraculous journey into the heart of college basketball. For those who love basketball and have been graced to witness the journey, there remains both the beauty and vigor of excellence developed over many days, months, and years, and also the ultimate dream of the sport: the possibility of a National Championship. At each level of competitive basketball every player who seeks a higher goal holds the dream of a championship very close. Whether or not the dream is realized is a matter left to the dynamic interplay of devotion, fortitude, chemistry, chance, fate, and luck.

This essay* is a mosaic of my own experiences playing basketball in high school, college, and in the German Bundesliga, and finding myself on the other side of the dream, held by even greater dreams about love, forgiveness, reconciliation, wholeness, and the mystery of the Divine.

* Parts of this essay appeared previously in Narrative Magazine and the book Blood Fire Vapor Smoke

In the dark I still line up the seams of the ball to the form of my fingers. I see the rim, the follow-through, the arm lifted and extended, a pure jump shot with a clean release and good form. I see the long-range trajectory and the ball on a slow backspin arcing toward the hoop, the net waiting for the swish.

In Montana, high school basketball is a thing as strong as family or work and when I grew up Jonathan Takes Enemy, a member of the Apsaalooké (Crow) Nation, was the best basketball player in the state. He led Hardin High, a school with years of losing tradition, into the state spotlight, carrying the team and the community on his shoulders all the way to the state tournament where he averaged 41 points per game. He created legendary moments that decades later are still mentioned in state basketball circles, and he did so with a force that made me both fear and respect him. On the court, nothing was outside the realm of his skill: the jump shot, the drive, the sweeping left-handed finger roll, the deep fade-away jumper. He could deliver what we all dreamed of, and with a venom that said don’t get in my way.

I was a year younger than Jonathan, playing for an all-white school in Livingston when our teams met in the divisional tournament and he and the Hardin Bulldogs delivered us a crushing 17-point defeat. At the close of the third quarter with the clock winding down and his team with a comfortable lead, Takes Enemy pulled up from one step in front of half-court and shot a straight, clean jumper. Though the range of it was more than 20 feet beyond the three-point line, his form remained pure. The audacity and raw beauty of the shot hushed the crowd. A common knowledge came to everyone: few people can even throw a basketball that far with any accuracy, let alone take a real shot with good form. Takes Enemy landed and as the ball was in the air he turned, no longer watching the flight of the ball, and began to walk back toward his team bench. The buzzer sounded, he put his fist high, the shot swished into the net. The crowd erupted.

Many of these young men did not escape the violence that surrounded the alcohol and drug traffic on the reservations, but their natural flow on the court inspired me toward the kind of boldness that gives artistry and freedom to any endeavor. Such boldness is akin to passion. For these young men, and for myself at that time, our passion was basketball.

But rather than creating in me my own intrepid response, seeing Takes Enemy only emphasized how little I knew of courage, not just on the basketball court, but in life. Takes Enemy breathed a confidence I lacked, a leadership potential that lived and moved. Robert Greenleaf said, “A mark of leaders, an attribute that puts them in a position to show the way for others, is that they are better than most at pointing the direction.” Takes Enemy was better than most. He and his team worked as one as they played with fluidity and abandon. I began to look for this way of life as an athlete and as a person. The search brought me to people who lived life not through dominance or coercion but through love and freedom of movement.

In the half dark of the house, a light burning over my shoulder, I find myself asking who commandeers the vessels of our dreams? I see Jonathan Takes Enemy like a war horse running, fierce and filled with immense power. The question gives me pause to remember him and his artistry, and how he played for something more.

By the time my brother Kral and I reached high school, we both had the dream, Kral already on his way to the top, me two years younger and trying to learn everything I could. We’d received the dream equally from our father and from the rez, the Crow rez at Plenty Coups, and the Tsitsistas (Northern Cheyenne) rez in the southeast corner of Montana. In Montana tribal basketball is a game of speed and precision passing, a form of controlled wildness that is hard to come by in non-reservation basketball circles. Fast and quick-handed, the rez ballers rise like something elemental, finding each other with sleight of hand stylings and no-look passes, pressing and cutting in stream-like movements that converge to rivers, taking down passing lanes with no will but to create chaos and action and fury, the kind of kindle that smolders and leaps up to set whole forests aflame.

Kral and I lost the dream late, both having made it to the D-1 level, both with opportunity to play overseas, but neither of us making the NBA.

Along the way, I helped fulfill our father’s tenacious hopes: two state championships at Park High in Livingston, one first as a sophomore with Kral, a massive win in which the final score was 104 to 64, with Kral totaling 46 points, 20 rebounds, and three dunks. And one two years later when I was a senior with a band of runners that averaged nearly 90 points a game before there was a three-point line. We took the title in what sportswriters still refer to as the greatest game in Montana high school basketball history, a 99-97 double-overtime thriller in 85’ at the Max Worthington Arena at Montana State University, before a crowd of 10,000.

Afterward on the bus ride through the mountains I remember my chest pressed to the back of the seat as I stared behind us. The post-game show blared over the speakers, everyone still whooping and hollering. “We’re comin’ home!” the radio man yelled, “We’re coming home!” and from the wide back window I saw a line of cars miles long and lit up, snaking from the flat before Livingston all the way up the pass to Bozeman. The dream of a dream, the Niitsítapi and the Apsaalooké, the Blackfeet and the Crow, the Nēhilawē and the Tsitsistas, the Cree and the Northern Cheyenne, the white boys, the enemies and the friends, and the clean line of basketball walking us out toward skeletal hoops in the dead of winter, the hollow in our eyes lonely but lovely in its way.

At Montana State University, I played shooting guard on the last team in the league my freshman year. Our team: seven Black men from all across America and five White kids mostly from Montana. We had a marvelous, magical point guard from Portland named Tony Hampton. He was lightning fast with wonderful ball-handling skills and exceptional court vision. He brought us together with seven games left in the season. Our record at the time was 7 wins, 16 losses. Last place in the conference. “We are getting shoved down by this coaching staff,” he said, and I remember how the criticism and malice were thick from the coaches. Their jobs were on the line. They’d lost touch with their players. Their players had lost touch with them. Tony said, “We need to band together right now. No one is going to do it for us. Whenever you see a teammate dogged by a coach, go up and give that teammate love. Tell him good job. Keep it up. We’re in this together.”

A team talk like that doesn’t typically change a season.

This one did.

Tony spoke the words. We followed him and did what he asked, and we went on a seven-game win streak, starting that very night when we beat the 17th-ranked team in the country, on the road. The streak didn’t end until the NCAA tournament eight games later. In that stretch, Tony averaged 19 points and 11 assists per game. He led the way and we were unfazed by outside degradation. We had our own inner strength. Playing as one, we won the final three games of the regular season. We entered the Big Sky Conference tournament in last place and beat the fourth-, second-, and first-place teams in the league to advance to March Madness. When we came home from the conference tournament as champions, it felt like the entire town of Bozeman was at the airport to greet us. We waded through a river of people giving high fives and held a fiery pep rally with speeches and roars of applause.

We went on to the NCAA tournament as the last-ranked team, the 64th team in a tournament which at that time had only 64 teams. We were slated to play St. John’s, the number one team in the nation. We faced off in the first game of the southwest regional at Long Beach, and far into the second half we were up by four. St. John’s featured future NBA players Mark Jackson (future NBA All-Star), Walter Berry (collegiate player of the year), and Shelton Jones (future winner of the NBA dunk contest). We featured no one with national recognition. We played well and had the lead late in the second half, but in the end we lost by nine.

When my brother graduated from Montana State I transferred and played my final two seasons of college basketball for Pepperdine University. At that time, Pepperdine had been a league-leading team for many years. Our main rival was Loyola Marymount University, featuring consensus All-American Hank Gathers and the multi-talented scorer Bo Kimble. My senior year at Pepperdine we beat Loyola Marymount 127-114 in a true barn-burner! Also a fine grudge match, considering they beat us earlier in the season at their place. We were set to play each other in the championship game of the West Coast Conference tournament but before we could meet at the top of the bracket, Hank died, and the tournament was immediately canceled.

The funeral was in Los Angeles, a ceremony of gut-wrenching grief and bereavement in which we gathered to honor one of the nation’s young most-radiant men. We prayed for him and for his family and for all who would come after him bearing his legacy of love for the game, elite athleticism, and the gift of living life to the full. His team went on to the NCAA tournament and made it all the way to the Elite 8. Bo Kimble shot his first free-throw of the NCAA tournament left-handed in honor of Hank. The shot went in. The nation mourned. The athletes who knew Hank were never the same.

As a freshman in high school, I was tiny, barely five feet tall, and my goal was to play Division 1 basketball. I’d had this goal since I was a child and because of my height and weight it seemed impossible, and actually felt impossible. I was small, but I made a deal with myself to do whatever it might take from my end to try to get to the D-1 level, so if I did not accomplish the goal, I knew at least I had given my all. I grew eight inches the summer before my sophomore year in high school, thanked heaven, and began to think perhaps the goal was not totally out of reach.

Hour after hour. Everyday. The dream was now fully formed, bright shining, and excruciating. I played 8 hours per day before my junior year, 10 hours per day before my senior season. At the height of it I played 17 hours in one day. Hours of solitude and physical exhaustion were plentiful. I gave my life to the discipline of being a point guard and a shooting guard. I worked on moves, passing, shooting, defending, ball handling. The regimen involved getting up at 7 a.m. at the singlewide trailer we lived in, on my bike by 7:40, traveling the highway toward Livingston, yellow transistor radio (borrowed from my mom) in the front pocket of my windbreaker, the ball tucked up under the coat, and me riding to Eastside, the court bordered by a grade school to the east, the sheriff’s station and the firehall to the north, and small houses to the west. A few blocks south, the Yellowstone River moved and churned and flowed east. Above the river a wall of mountains reached halfway up the sky.

Mostly I was by myself, but because the town had a love for basketball, there were many hours with friends too. In those moments with others, or isolated hours trying to hone my individual basketball skills, I faced many, many frustrations, but finally the body broke into the delight of hard work and found a rhythm, a pattern in which there was the slow advance toward something greater than oneself. Often the threshold of life is a descent into darkness, a powerful and intimate and abiding darkness in which the light finally emerges.

“Beauty will save the world,” Dostoevsky said.

Because of basketball I know there exists the reality of being encumbered or full of grace, beset with darkness and or in convergence with light. This interplay echoes the wholly realized vision of exceptional point guards and the daring of pure shooting guards, met with fortitude even under immense pressure.

At Eastside, both low end and high end have square metal backboards marked by quarter-sized holes to keep the wind from knocking the baskets down. Livingston is the fifth windiest city in the world. The playground has a slant to it that makes one basket lower than the other. The low end is nine-feet, 10 inches high, and we all come here to throw down in the summer. Too small, they say, but we don’t listen. Inside-outside, between-the-legs, behind-the-back, cross it up, skip-to-my-lou, fake and go, doesn't matter, any of these lose the defender. Then we rise up and throw down. We rig up a break-away on the rim and because of the way we hang on it in the summer, our hands get thick and tough. We can all dunk now, so the break-away is a necessity, a spring-loaded rim made to handle the power of power-dunks. The break-away rim came into being after Darryl Dawkins, nicknamed Chocolate Thunder, broke two of the big glass backboards in the NBA. On the first one Dawkins’ force was so immense the glass caved in and fell out the back of the frame. On the second, the window exploded and everyone ducked their heads and ran to avoid the fractured glass that flew from one end of the court to the other. Within two years every high school in the nation had break-aways, and my friends and I convinced our assistant coach to give us one so we could put it up on the low end at Eastside.

The high end is the shooter's end, made for the pure shooter, a silver ring 10-feet, two inches high with a long white net. At night the car lights bring it alive, rim and backboard like an industrial artwork, everything mounted on a steel-grey pole that stems down into the concrete, down deep into the hard soil.

A senior in high school, I’m 17. I leave the car lights on, cut the engine and grab my basketball from the heat in the passenger foot space. I step out. The air is crisp. The wind carries the cold, dry smell of autumn, and further down, more faint, the smell of roots, the smell of earth. Out over the city, strands of cloud turn grey, then black. When the sun goes down there is a depth of night unfathomable, the darkness rent by a flurry of stars.

I call the ballers by name, the great Native basketball legends, some my own contemporaries, some who came before. I learn from them and receive the river, their smoothness, their brazenness, like the Yellowstone River seven blocks south, dark and wide, stronger than the city it surrounds, perfect in form where it moves and speaks, bound by night. If I listen my heroes lift me out away from here, fly me farther than they flew themselves. In Montana, young men are Native and they are White, loving, hating. At Lodge Grass, at Lame Deer, I was afraid at first. But now I see. The speaking and the listening, the welcoming: Tim Falls Down, Marty Round Face and Max and Luke Spotted Bear from Plenty Coups; Joe Pretty Paint from Lodge Grass; and at St. Labre, Juneau Plenty Hawk, Willie Gardner, and Fred and Paul Deputee. All I loved, all I watched with wonder—and few got free.

Most played ball for my father, a few for rival teams. Some I watched as a child, and I loved the uncontrolled nature of their moves. Some I grew up playing against. And some I merely heard of in basketball circles years later, the rumble of their greatness, the stories of games won or lost on last second shots.

The body in unison, the step, the gather, the arc of the ball in the air like a crescent moon—the follow-through a small well-lit cathedral, the correct push and the floppy wrist, the proper backspin, the arm held high, the night, the ball, the basket, everything illumined.

We are given moments like these, to rise with Highwalker and Falls Down and Spotted Bear, with Round Face and Old Bull and Takes Enemy: to shoot the jump shot and feel the follow through that lifts and finds a path in the air, the sound, the sweetness of the ball on a solitary arc in darkness as the ball falls into the net.

All is complete. The maze lies open, an imprint that reminds me of the Highline, the Blackfeet and Charlie Calf Robe, the Crow and Joe Pretty Paint, the Cheyenne and Highwalker, a form of forms that is a memory trace and the weaving of a line begun by Native men, by White men, by my father and Calf Robe’s and Pretty Paint’s and Highwalker’s fathers, by our fathers’ fathers, and by all the fathers that have gone before, some of them distant and many gone, all of them beautiful in their way.

Fresh from professional ball in Germany I went with my dad to the Charlie Calf Robe Memorial Tournament on the Blackfeet rez in northeast Montana. The tribe devoted an entire halftime to my father and he didn't even coach on that reservation. They presented him with a beaded belt buckle and a blanket for the coaching he’d done on other reservations, the Cheynne rez, the Crow rez—to show their respect for him as an elder who was a friend to the Native Nations of Montana. During the ceremony they wrapped the blanket around his shoulders, signifying he would always be welcome in the tribe.

On that weekend with him, I received an unforeseen wholly unique gift. Dedicated as a memorial to the high school athlete Charlie Calf Robe, a young Blackfeet artist, long distance runner, and basketball player who died young, the tournament was a form of community grieving over the loss of a beloved son. The Most Valuable Player award was made by Charlie’s wife, Honey Davis, who spent nine months crafting an entirely beaded basketball for the event. When the tribe and Honey herself presented the ball to me, and I walked through the gym with my father, an old Blackfeet man approached us. He touched my arm, and smiled a wide smile.

“You can’t dribble that one, sonny” he said.

I saw my father’s father only a handful of times.

He lived in little more than a one room shack in Circle, Montana. In the shack next door was my grandfather’s brother, a trapper who dried animal hides on boards and leaned them against walls and tables. I remember rattlesnake rattles in a small pile on the surface of a wooden three-legged stool. A hunting knife with a horn handle. On the floor, small and medium-sized closed steel traps. An old rifle in the corner near the door.

My father and I drive the two-lane highway as we enter town. We pick up my grandfather stumbling drunk down the middle of the road and take him home.

Years later my grandpa sits in the same worn linoleum kitchen in an old metal chair with vinyl backing. Dim light from the window. His legs crossed, a rolled cigarette lit in his left hand, he runs his right hand through a shock of silver hair atop his head, bangs yellowed by nicotine. Bent or upright or sideways, empty beer cans litter the floor.

“Who is it?” he says, squinting into the dark.

“Tommy,” my dad says, “your son.”

“Who?” the old man says.

When we leave, my grandpa still doesn’t recognize him.

On the way home through the dark, I watch my father’s eyes.

My grandfather was largely isolated late in life. No family members were near him when he died. He once loved to walk the hills after the spring runoff in search of arrowheads with his family. But in my grandpa’s condition before death his desire for life was eclipsed. He became morose and very depressed. In the end, alcohol killed him.

There’s J.P. Batista, a powerful player dubbed “The Beast” when he played here because he could score on anyone, and if he was hungry on the court, which was always, we said “Feed the Beast!” There’s David Pendergraft, perhaps the most beloved generational talent in Gonzaga’s history because he played with unquenchable fire and if he was guarding the best player on the other team, which was nearly always, the other team was in trouble. There’s Ronny Turiaf, a man whose heart was as big as the world, on and off the court. Finally, there’s Mike Nilson, the soul of the first GU teams to break through into the dream of advancing far into March Madness, a beautiful person with uncommon tenacity and loyalty, who serves others with grace and ease. Too many to be named, the players the community has welcomed, known and loved leave a legacy we as dear as any championship run.

In present-day Montana, with its cold winters and far distant towns, the love of high school basketball is a time-honored tradition. Native teams have most often dominated the basketball landscape, winning multiple state titles on the shoulders of modern day warriors who are both highly skilled and intrepid.

Tribal basketball comes like a fresh wind to change the climate of the reservation from downtrodden to celebrational. Plenty Coups with Luke Spotted Bear and Dana Goes Ahead won two state championships in the early eighties. After that, Lodge Grass, under Elvis Old Bull won three straight. Jonathan Takes Enemy remains perhaps the most revered. Deep finger rolls with either hand, his jumpshot a thing of beauty, with his quick vertical leap he threw down 360s, and with power. We played against each other numerous times in high school, his teams still revered by the old guard, a competition fiery and glorious, and then we went our separate ways.

For a few months he attended Sheridan Community College in Wyoming then dropped out.

He played city league, his name appearing in the Billings papers with him scoring over 60 points on occasion, and once 73.

Later I heard he’d done some drinking, gained weight, and become mostly immobile.

But soon after that he cleaned up, lost weight, earned a scholarship at Rocky Mountain College and formed a nice career averaging a bundle of assists and over 20 points a game. A prize-winning article on Takes Enemy appeared in “Sports Illustrated.”

A few years ago we sat down again at a tournament called the Big Sky Games. We didn’t talk much about the past. He’d been off the Crow reservation for awhile, living on the Yakima reservation in Washington. He said he felt he had to leave Montana. He’d found a good job. His vision was on his family. The way his eyes lit up when he spoke of his daughter was a clear reflection of his life, a man willing to sacrifice to enrich others. His face was full of promise, and thinking of her he smiled. “She’ll graduate from high school this year,” he said, and it became apparent to me that the happiness he felt was greater than all the fame that came of the personal honors he had attained.

Jonathan Takes Enemy navigated the personal terrain necessary to be present to to his daughter. I hope to follow him and be present for my daughters. By walking into and through the night he eventually left the dark behind and found light rising to greet him.

Inside me still are the memories of players I knew as a boy, the stories of basketball legends. From Montana, from Gonzaga, from Europe. The geography of such stories still shapes the way I speak or grow quiet, and shapes my understanding of things that begin in fine lines and continue until all the lines are gathered and woven to a greater image. That image, circular, airborne, is the outline and the body of my hope.

The drive is not far and before long I’m at Mission Park. I take the ball from the space in the backseat of my car and walk out onto the court. I approach the top of the key where I bounce the ball twice before I gather and release a high-arcing jumpshot.

Beside me, Blake Walks Nice sends his jumper into the air and Joe Pretty Paint’s follow through stands like the neck of a swan.

The ball falls from the sky toward the open rim and the diamond-patterned net.

Behind us and to the side only darkness.

An arm of steel extends from the high corner of a nearby building.

A light burns there.

As we draw near to another NCAA tournament, I don’t want to forget the dream. The following poem is written in honor of Jose Hernandez, Tony Hampton, Melichi Four Bear, Gernell Killsnight, Jonathan Takes Enemy, Dexter Howard, Doug Christie, J.P. Batista, Ronny Turiaf, David Pendergraft, Mike Nilson, Tim Falls Down, Bobby Jones, Paul Deputee, Blake Walks Nice, Ron Moses and so many other men, each of us inscribed by culture, intuition, race, and love, each of us united by an elegant game, and united by giving ourselves so that others might become more beautiful, more holy. Of the group above, one died a difficult death after years in prison at the outskirts of San Francisco, another was shot in the head by a high-powered rifle at a party near Crow Agency, a third was knifed to death outside Jim Town Bar, a fourth took his own life by hanging, a fifth died of an alcohol-laced car wreck when his vehicle flew from a bridge into a winter river. The rest are still alive. The rest still love with an undying love those who have passed before us to the next world. We receive from them the blessing they give, and we ask God for the mercy to keep the dream.

the way your hands moved through mid-air reaching for round light leather has always been to me not unlike the intimate fusion that connects the core of high magnitude stars

in the place where God shapes bones and ligament, fingers, thumb and palm we hated each other, brother, until basketball made me a point guard and you a swing man flyer who walked on wind

collectively we’d set our bodies to beat one another until our faces cracked like porcelain and blood-rivers ran the cheek-bone shelves of a south sunk in wine-water because America meant us for violence

but better than we knew God knew us and now that the game is over i can’t unremember you enfolding me as I hold you to my heart and you cup your hand to the back of my head

About the Author

Poet and prose writer Shann Ray Ferch teaches leadership and forgiveness studies at Gonzaga University. Ferch is the author of a work of leadership and political theory, Forgiveness and Power in the Age of Atrocity: Servant Leadership as a Way of Life (Rowman & Littlefield), and co-editor of Servant-Leadership, Feminism, and Gender Well-Being (SUNY Press), Servant-Leadership and Forgiveness (SUNY Press), Global Servant-Leadership (Rowman &Littlefield), Conversations on Servant Leadership (SUNY Press) and The Spirit of Servant Leadership (Paulist Press). In his role as professor of leadership studies with the internationally renowned PhD program in Leadership Studies at Gonzaga, he has served as a visiting scholar in Africa, Asia, Europe, and the Americas. His novel, American Copper (Unbridled Press), is a love song to America revealing the radiant and profound life of Evelynne Lowry, a woman who transcends the national myth of regeneration through violence. The novel won the Foreword Book of the Year Readers’ Choice Award and the Western Writers of America Spur Award, and was a finalist for the Washington State Book Award, the High Plains Book Award and the Foreword Book of the Year Award for Literary Fiction. Explore more of his writing here . 

• Doctor of Philosophy in Leadership Studies

Related Stories

2023 Rewind

Top 10 Gonzaga Stories of 2023

Robert Greenleaf on Servant-Leadership

Professor Shann Ray Ferch Earns High Plains Book Award

Essays About Basketball: Top 5 Examples and 7 Prompts

Among the many essays about basketball out there, how can you make yours stand out? See this article for examples and prompts that will aid you in writing.

Basketball is a famous sport that has been around for 131 years. It was invented by a Canadian physical education instructor named James Naismith with two objectives: to keep athletes playing indoors during winters and to have a safer sport compared to football.

Over the years, basketball has grown to be a loved sport worldwide. It’s why it’s not surprising that it’s a great subject to talk about in your essay.

Below are examples to learn more about the game and how you can effectively write essays about basketball:

1. What Basketball Taught Me by Josh of San Diego, California

2. essay on basketball –  a sport of agility and endurance by randhir singh, 3. national basketball association and the woman national basketball association by lewis rios, 4. basketball: then vs. now by jaime moss, 5. essay on the last shot by darcy frey by mamie olson, 1. the most important skills for basketball, 2. what i learned through basketball, 3. why do i like basketball, 4. my unforgettable basketball experience, 5. my life as a basketball player, 6. basketball book or movie review, 7. the negative side of basketball.

“I believe basketball has taught me many valuable life lessons, and perhaps more importantly, played a significant role in developing me into the successful student and employee I am today.”

The author talks about how he fell in love with the basketball game – from watching it on television to participating in competitive basketball. He took the game with him as he grew. 

Through this sport, he learned many lessons, including commitment, responsibility, and teamwork. He expounds on how these values helped him through life through his essay. Finally, he ends his piece by encouraging others to try basketball or any sport to have motivation in life. For more, see these articles about basketball .

“Basketball is a sport of agility and endurance that develops by hand and eye co-ordination… Basketball even overtakes baseball as the unofficial American pastime.”

Singh reviews basketball rules and how they changed over time but with the same principles. He discusses the main rules and scenarios straightforwardly, making his essay short but informative. You may also be interested in these articles about baseball .

“Some of the differences between NBA basketball and WNBA basketball appear to be related to the differences in size or physical capacity of men and women… I think we can all come to the conclusion that no matter what the gender is or what the rules are, that both of them are out on the basketball court to just WIN.”

Rios’ essay focuses on the differences between the National Basketball Association (NBA) and the Women’s NBA. Some of the things he mentions are ESPN and their basketball video game, where fewer people spend time on WNBA. Additionally, owners of WNBA significantly make less from their teams, thus having less to invest in or pay their players.

He also talks about some similarities between NBA and WNBA, including their popularity among fans. At the end of his essay, Rios hopes he has shared enough information with his readers about basketball.

“Other changes such as uniform colors, dunking rules, regulation on backboards… some over and over again until they became what they are today… Basketball is a great American sport, and perhaps one that requires the most skill along with a great mental game.”

Moss’ essay consists of James Naismith’s original 13 basketball rules and how these rules evolved. These modifications were done to make the game more efficient and fun. Some significant changes include dribbling, boundary lines, and pointing systems. 

He also mentions the controversy surrounding the three-pointer and how it affected the other game rules. In the future, basketball’s rules will continue to develop.

“I do think basketball is a valid option for most students to escape poverty… Basketball may open a few doors but there’s still no guarantee.”

The author recounts what The Last Shot by Darcy Frey is all about, retelling the story of Russel, Tchaka, Stephon, and Cory, who lived in a dangerous neighborhood and found escape in basketball. She then relays her input of basketball, helping these characters stay out of trouble, but it still isn’t enough to prepare them for the lives they’ll have to endure. 

She further expounds on the events in the book, centering on the direct relation between academics and basketball in the story. You might also be interested in these essays about volleyball .

7 Prompts on Essays About Basketball

After understanding more about the different subtopics of basketball, here are prompts that you can get inspiration from for your essay:

You don’t have to be a basketball player to know what skills are in demand for the game. You can simply be a fan or a casual spectator who knows how the game works. Tell your readers what you are so they can appreciate your essay from your point of view. 

Dedication, commitment, and consistency are only some of the things you develop when you love a sport. If you’re not a player yourself, but a close relative is, you can relay what they told you about basketball.

For example, you can relate to what your father tells you when you watch basketball gameplays with him. He may say he loves a particular team because of their teamwork. He may also say it shows in their gameplay. Then, you can delve into what “teamwork” means.

Like the other prompts in this list, this particular prompt doesn’t need you to be a player. Instead, to give you an idea, you can share your experience with the game, such as watching gameplay and liking how the people cheer for the players.

 You can also narrate how great the game was, not because the players are professionals but because they never give up.

If you’re a basketball player yourself, feel free to recount a scene that played out in one of your games that you will never forget. Describe how you got to that point and why. Include what it made you feel like then and what it makes you feel now. 

If you expect non-players to read your piece, write in a way that non-players will understand by avoiding basketball jargon. Or you can briefly explain what those related terms mean, so every reader will understand why it’s a memory you hold dear.

If no one thing stands out for you during your time as a basketball player, you can still write about it in the general term. For instance, you can share how a day in your life went when you were a player.

There are many books, movies, and literary pieces that you can check out and write an essay about. If you have a favorite piece about basketball, briefly summarize it and list why you’re so fond of it. You can also persuade your readers to check out the book themselves through these prompts.

Are you new to persuasive writing? For help with this topic, read our guide explaining what is persuasive writing ?

You can write about the problems connected to the game to give your essay a different atmosphere, such as the potential injuries for players, bullying within a team, or how few only make it to professional basketball. You can talk about something you want to give attention to and let your readers know your thoughts on it.

On the other hand, you can also share a bad experience related to basketball, like your father preferring to watch basketball on television than play with you and your siblings.

Here’s a great tip: If writing an essay sounds like a lot of work, simplify it. Write a simple 5 paragraph essay instead.

Maria Caballero is a freelance writer who has been writing since high school. She believes that to be a writer doesn't only refer to excellent syntax and semantics but also knowing how to weave words together to communicate to any reader effectively.

View all posts

• Free essays

We use cookies to make your user experience better.

By staying on our website, you fully accept it. Read more » It's OK

A Basketball Dream

Get a price quote

Exclusive savings! Save 25% on your ORDER

Get 15% OFF your FIRST ORDER (code: leader15) + 10% OFF every order by receiving 300 words/page instead of 275 words/page

Our Benefits

• English-Speaking Writers
• Plagiarism-Free Papers
• Confidentiality Guaranteed
• VIP Services
• 300 Words/Page
• Affordable Prices

How It Works

Our Customer Support Team is at Your Disposal 24/7

Choose Your Destiny: The Future Promises Options for NBA Prospects

P: Kylie O'Sullivan

Despite a globalizing game, Americans still make up 80% of NBA rosters. For that 80%, the path to the league after high school has traditionally been much more singular than those of their foreign counterparts. Top recruits generally attend college for a year then get drafted, or, play multiple years in the NCAA and hoping their draft stock rises (and that they stay healthy long enough to cash in).

Since 2005, just 12 Americans have played in an NBA game without attending college. Over the past few years however, the spectrum of opportunities for American high school prospects has been broadening and the views of the NCAA and the advantages of college ball have been changing.

As of 2021, athletes from the United States had to be at least one year removed from high school to be eligible for the NBA Draft. Some players, like 2020’s third overall pick and 2021 NBA Rookie of the Year LaMelo Ball, chose to play professionally in a different country for a year before the NBA. Others, like 2021 top- 10  picks Jalen Green and Jonathan Kuminga, selected to play in the NBA’s developmental league, the G League. Most high school prospects however elect to play college basketball, many for just a single season in order to meet draft requirements.

There has been recent criticism by NBA athletes who see the “one and done” trend as more of a detriment than a benefit for the players. A large critique of the NCAA has been their lack of compensation for athletes and particularly their exploitation of basketball players. Philadelphia 76ers star Ben Simmons was particularly frustrated with his experience during his one year at LSU and the “education,” or lack thereof, he received at the accredited university.

“Everybody’s making money except the players,” Simmons said in the 2016 Showtime documentary, One & Done . “We’re the ones waking up early as hell to be the best teams and do everything they want us to do and then the players get nothing. They say education, but if I’m there for a year, I can’t get much education.”

The alternative to the one year playing in the NCAA can be quite fruitful for some athletes. The G League’s new team, G League Ignite  offers six figure professional contracts to top high school recruits and gives them the opportunity to play against more experienced competition. Perhaps the most decorated recruit to join Ignite for the 2020-21 season was ESPN’s top 2020 prospect, Jalen Green. Green signed a contract worth $500,000 with the team and went on to lead Ignite in points before being selected second overall by the Houston Rockets in the 2021 Draft.

Green spoke about his decision to play in the G League rather than college on his Instagram Live in April of 2020, and cited the potential for development in the G League. “I think the main reason for [signing with the G League] is I wanted to get better, I wanted to develop a better game so that way I can be ready for the NBA,” Green said. “I think this is the best route to prepare myself [for professional basketball].”

Two members of the 2020 Draft chose a less traveled route after high school. R.J. Hampton and LaMelo Ball each took professional contracts in Australia’s National Basketball League. Both players were five-star recruits out of high school, but experienced differing levels of success in their year prior to the NBA. Ball won the league’s Rookie of the Year Award while playing 12 games for the Illawarra Hawks and was drafted third overall by the Charlotte Hornets. Hampton on the other hand scored fewer than nine points a game over his 15-game stint for the New Zealand Breakers and saw his draft stock fall from being a top five pick to being selected 24 th overall by the Milwaukee Bucks.

The History

Ball, Hampton and Green are part of a new wave of talent that are approaching the path to professional sports from a different angle, but they are far from the first.

The league’s history with high schoolers can be separated into three rather distinct eras: prior to 1971, 1971-2005, and from 2005 to the present day.

Up until 1971, the NBA required players to be four years removed from high school to be eligible for the Draft. After the 1971 Supreme Court ruling on Haywood v. National Basketball Association allowed players to bypass the four-year rule, two players were selected out of high school in 1975, Daryl Dawkins and Bill Willoughby. For 20 years after that, nobody was selected directly from high school (though several players, like Michael Jordan, left college early), until a 10-year stretch from 1995 to 2005 where 35 Americans were selected. Among those 35 were 10 future All-Stars, three future Hall of Famers and active stars LeBron James and Dwight Howard. In 2005, the current rules came into effect, and it was declared that a player must be at least 19 years of age and one year removed from high school to play in the NBA.

Since 2005, seven of American NBA players who did not attend college played professionally for at least one year first, and seven have been drafted and signed in the last five years.

Throughout the history of the league however, over 4,300 American NBA players have previously attended college, while just 48 never did. The following charts take a more targeted look at this player pool.

Of the 48 Americans to play in the NBA and not attend college, nearly half were lottery picks, players selected within the top 14 picks of a given NBA Draft. This meant that the players who did elect to skip college were considered some of the very best that America’s high schools had to offer. The batch from 1995-2005 had three players selected first overall (Dwight Howard, Kwame Brown and LeBron James) and three MVP winners (Kevin Garnett, Kobe Bryant and LeBron James).

It is a small sample size, but 10 out of the 48 players that didn’t attend college made All-NBA teams, an 18-percent mark during any given NBA season. In contrast, just one out of every 30 NBA players, or 3.3% of the total NBA player pool, is selected to an All-NBA team. 

The number of American players opting for professional contracts prior to entering the NBA Draft has been trending upwards in recent years. Some athletes claimed level of competition as their reason for going pro while others focused more on the monetary potential of professional leagues. This year however, the NCAA has made drastic changes that may impact how players choose their paths to the NBA moving forward.

At the beginning of July 2021, the NCAA changed their tight rulings on the ways that their athletes can profit off of their name, image and likeness. These rule changes were made in response to a June 21 Supreme Court ruling in which the Court voted unanimously in favor of former NCAA athletes who were suing the NCAA due to their rules preventing student compensation, citing anti-trust laws and The Sherman Act . These changes now allow students to promote themselves and make a profit while in college, something that was forbidden for years.

Still, Northeastern University athletic director Jim Madigan, does not necessarily see this ruling changing the landscape of athletes opting to play professionally rather than going to college.

“I think a lot of the top prospects who may have considered going to the G League or other professional leagues solely for monetary gain may rethink that now,” Madigan says. “There are other players however, who simply thought the competition may be better than in the NCAA, so they won’t be swayed by the new changes.”

The NBA Commissioner’s Office has not made any move to stop high school prospects from playing in the G League following the NCAA’s recent ruling.

NBA Commissioner Adam Silver does not seem to have any regrets when it comes to the creation of his Team Ignite. “We created Team Ignite in the G League as an opportunity for players who choose not to go to college and want to become professionals,” Silver says. “They can go directly into the G League and be well compensated.”

As of this point, the success of players like Jalen Green and Jonathan Kuminga seems to have convinced other top prospects of the potential of the G League. Jaden Hardy, a top-five prospect in the class of 2021, signed with the G League this season. For now though, the majority of prospects are still going to try their hand at college ball with 35 of 247 Sports’ top 50 prospects in the 2021 class having committed to a school, perhaps due to the new potential for compensation under new NIL guidelines.

The next few recruiting classes will be important when it comes to seeing if the top prospects will continue considering other options beyond the NCAA. The G League’s Ignite completed its first season and produced three draft picks, including two within the top 10, and the NCAA will now allow players to be compensated while playing in college. The coming years will tell if prospects still want to play in other leagues for the different types of competition or go to the NCAA and have similar money-making potential if not greater. How high schoolers in America are getting to the NBA is changing, now the question will be how much will things change and what will those changes look like on the professional hardcourt.

How They Covered It: Kobe Bryant’s Enduring Legacy

How They Covered It: NIL Changes the NCAA Game

How They Covered It: U.S. Women’s National Team Fights for Equal Pay

Leave a reply cancel reply.

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Hall of Fame

• Federations

Inside FIBA

• Courtside1891

Men's Basketball

Olympic Games

• Paris 2024 Olympic Tournament

Olympic Qualifying Tournaments

• Piraeus, Greece
• Riga, Latvia
• San Juan, Puerto Rico
• Valencia, Spain

Women's Basketball

• Antwerp, Belgium
• Xi'An, China
• Belém, Brazil
• Sopron, Hungary

FIBA World Rankings presented by NIKE

FIBA 3x3 Rankings

• Individual Ranking
• Team Ranking
• FIBA Basketball World Cup 2023
• Paris 2024 Olympic Basketball Tournament
• FIBA OQT Greece
• FIBA OQT Latvia
• FIBA OQT Puerto Rico
• FIBA OQT Spain
• U15 Skills Challenge
• FIBA Women's Basketball World Cup 2022
• FIBA WOQT Brazil
• FIBA WOQT Belgium
• FIBA WOQT China
• FIBA WOQT Hungary
• FIBA WOPQT Colombia
• FIBA AfroBasket 2025 Qualifiers
• FIBA AfroCan 2023 - Qualifiers
• FIBA AfroBasket 2021
• FIBA AfroCan
• FIBA Women's AfroBasket 2025 - Qualifiers
• FIBA Women's AfroBasket
• FIBA Africa Women's Champions Cup
• FIBA AmeriCup
• FIBA AmeriCup 2025 Qualifiers
• FIBA AmeriCup 2025 Pre-Qualifiers
• FIBA AmeriCup 2025 Central American Pre-Qualifiers
• FIBA AmeriCup 2025 South American Pre-Qualifiers
• U18 AmeriCup
• U16 Americas
• U18 South American
• U17 Centrobasket
• U15 Centrobasket
• U15 South American
• U14 Central America (COCABA)
• U17 South American
• U16 Central America (COCABA)
• FIBA Women's AmeriCup
• Centrobasket Women's Championship
• South American Women's Championship
• Central American (COCABA) Women’s Championship
• Caribbean (CBC) Women's Championship
• U17 Centrobasket Qualifiers
• FIBA Asia Cup
• FIBA Asia Cup Qualifiers
• Asia Cup 2025 Pre-Qualifiers
• FIBA Women's Asia Cup
• FIBA Women's Asia Cup - Division B
• U18 Division B
• U16 Division B
• FIBA EuroBasket 2022
• FIBA EuroBasket 2025 Qualifiers
• FIBA EuroBasket 2025 Pre-Qualifiers
• #FIBAWC 2027 European Pre-Qualifiers
• European Championship For Small Countries
• Basketball Champions League
• FIBA Europe Cup
• U20 Division B
• U18 Division C
• U16 Division C
• FIBA Women's EuroBasket 2025 Qualifiers
• FIBA Women's EuroBasket 2023
• Women's European Championship For Small Countries
• EuroLeague Women
• EuroCup Women
• SuperCup Women
• FIBA Oceania Championship
• FIBA Melanesian Cup
• FIBA Polynesian Basketball Cup
• Pacific Games
• FIBA Micronesia Cup 2022
• FIBA Oceania Women's Championships
• FIBA Women's Micronesia Cup
• FIBA Women's Melanesia Cup
• FIBA Women's Polynesian Basketball Cup
• FIBA Intercontinental Cup
• Basketball Africa League
• FIBA Africa Basketball League
• ROAD TO BAL 2024
• ROAD TO BAL 2023
• FIBA Africa Women's Basketball League
• Basketball Champions League Americas
• Liga Sudamericana
• Women's Basketball League Americas
• Liga Sudamericana Femenina
• Basketball Champions League Asia - Qualifiers
• West Asia League - Gulf Region
• West Asia League - West Asia Region
• Youth Basketball Champions League
• Afghanistan
• American Samoa
• Antigua and Barbuda
• Bosnia and Herzegovina
• British Virgin Islands
• Brunei Darussalam
• Burkina Faso
• Cayman Islands
• Central African Republic
• Chinese Taipei
• Cook Islands
• Côte d'Ivoire
• Democratic People's Republic of Korea
• Democratic Republic of the Congo
• Dominican Republic
• El Salvador
• Equatorial Guinea
• Federated States of Micronesia
• Great Britain
• Guinea-Bissau
• Hong Kong, China
• Islamic Republic of Iran
• Lao People's Democratic Republic
• Marshall Islands
• Netherlands
• New Caledonia
• New Zealand
• Norfolk Island
• North Macedonia
• Northern Mariana Islands
• Papua New Guinea
• People 's Republic of China
• Philippines
• Puerto Rico
• Republic of Korea
• Republic of Moldova
• São Tomé and Príncipe
• Saudi Arabia
• Sierra Leone
• Solomon Islands
• South Africa
• South Sudan
• St.Vincent and the Grenadines
• Switzerland
• Syrian Arab Republic
• Timor-Leste
• Trinidad and Tobago
• Turkmenistan
• Turks and Caicos Islands
• United Republic of Tanzania
• Virgin Islands

Activities & Services

• National Federations
• .basketball Digital Identity
• Basketball Without Borders (BWB)
• Data and Video Solutions
• Game Page Widget
• Olympic Solidarity
• Her World, Her Rules
• Players Mentor
• Coach (WABC)
• Game Official
• 3x3 Official
• Statistician
• Host a FIBA Event

Equipment & Venue

• Presentation
• Approved Equipment
• Approved 3x3 Equipment
• Approved Software
• Get Approved
• Find a Venue

Integrity & Healthcare

• Anti-Doping
• Report a Breach of Integrity

Basketball Arbitral Tribunal

• Organisation
• Activity Report 2021-23
• Central Board
• Executive Committee
• Secretary General
• Management Team
• Judicial and Other Bodies
• Commissions, Working Groups and Task Forces
• FIBA Family
• Coaches (WABC)
• FIBA Foundation
• Wheelchair Basketball (IWBF)
• Deaf International Basketball Federation (DIBF)
• Basketball Arbitral Tribunal (BAT)

Media & Marketing

• FIBA Media & Marketing Services
• 3x3 Official Partners

Official Basketball Rules

• Basic Rules

FIBA Men's National Team Competition System

• The System Explained
• Qualification Olympic Games

FIBA Women's National Team Competition System

• Qualification
• Hall of Famers
• Selection Process

House of Basketball

• Visit the Exhibition
• Photo Contest
• Book a conference room
• FIBA Fan Forum
• FIBA Fan Forum registration

Other Inside FIBA Sections

Media Center

• FIBA Family news
• Document downloads
• FIBA Privacy Policy
• FIBA Cookie Policy
• Press Releases
• Accreditation

Document Library

• Regulations
• Studies & Facts
• Empower National Federations
• Women in Basketball
• Shape International Club Competitions
• Commissions
• Deaf Basketball (DIBF)
• Qualification for Olympic Games
• Players’ Mentors
• FIBA Venue Guide
• Anti-Doping Education
• BAT Sanctions
• Welcome to the FIBA Media Center
• Media Accreditation
• Photos, Videos & More
• Subscribe to Press Releases
• Visit the House of Basketball
• Sneaker Exhibition

Organization

• Introduction
• Media Rights
• Brand Identity
• Executive Director
• Competitions
• Coaches Training
• Americas Committees
• Americas Basketball Academy
• Americas Mini Basketball Week
• Ball’In Schools
• FIBA Youth EuroBasket 2024 Draw
• Women's Summit
• TIME-OUT 2.0
• Mentoring Program for Coaches & Referees
• Youth Development Fund
• Girls' Program - Her World, Her Rules
• iCoachKids Plus
• Basketball for Good
• Development Staff
• Women In Basketball
• Technical Officials
• Players' Hub
• Players' Off-Court Guide
• Players' blogs
• Players' Workshops
• Find a Players' Mentor
• Become a Game Official
• Game Official Licensing
• Find a Game Official
• WABC Coaches Platform
• Find a WABC Member
• FIBA Europe Coaching Certificate
• Become a FIBA Agent
• Find a FIBA Agent
• Anti-Doping: Information for Players
• Therapeutic Use Exemptions (TUE)
• Registered Testing Pool (RTP)
• Anti-Doping Rule Violations
• Report Doping in Basketball
• What is Doping?
• Consequences of doping
• Roles, Responsibilities and Prevention
• Doping Controls

How basketball creates change, hope and inspires individuals in parts of the world where it's needed

XI'AN - Basketball is more than just a game, something that is being proved over and over in countries all around the world. It is a sport, yes, but it is more than that. It changes lives.

The social impact of basketball is undeniable. That was a topic of a panel discussion at last month's FIBA World Basketball Summit in China.

"IT (BASKETBALL) IS AN AMAZING TOOL. IT HAS A CONVENING POWER, IT CAN REACH DIVERSE SEGMENTS OF SOCIETY THAT TRADITIONALLY MIGHT BE HARD TO REACH FOR VARIOUS FACTORS OF EXCLUSION." - Caroline Baxter, Sports Policy Specialist, UNESCO

Karen Doubilet, the Managing Director of PeacePlayers International, gave stirring opening remarks about how basketball is making a positive impact on children in Israel. 

"I think the best example of how we use sport for social impact is looking at the city of Jerusalem where we have Palestinian and Israeli children - they live literally across the road from one another - and they have absolutely no opportunity for positive interaction, which means they know each other only through media, through myth and through what’s passed down through their families and through their education system," she said.

"(But) Everyone speaks the language of basketball. Everyone can meet as equals on the basketball court. So what we do is use basketball to try and create a space where people can get to know each other, see the humanity in one another, build friendships, change attitudes, change behaviors. We’re also using the sport to instill psychological resources like self-confidence and leadership skills so that the participants can grow up and become effective agents for change in their communities."

Florian Wanninger, representing FIBA's Foundation, the International Basketball Foundation (IBF) , reminded everyone of the very powerful words of Nelson Mandela.

"What does it mean social impact? I always use a quote from Nelson Mandela: 'Sport has the power to change the world. It has the power to unite people in the way that little else does. It speaks to youth in the language that they understand,'" he said. "We have this unique opportunity to use sport for development, not only develop sport, but use sport for development." 

"EVERYONE SPEAKS THE LANGUAGE OF BASKETBALL. EVERYONE CAN MEET AS EQUALS ON THE BASKETBALL COURT." - Karen Doubilet, Managing Director of PeacePlayers International

Caroline Baxter, a sports policy specialist with UNESCO, was also on hand in Xi'an and agreed that basketball is uniquely positioned to make a social impact.

"It’s an amazing tool," she said. "It has a convening power, it can reach diverse segments of society that traditionally might be hard to reach for various factors of exclusion. So that could be people living in hard-to-reach places, small islands, it can be people that are excluded, they might be females in a society where females aren't allow to participate. We can leverage its power."

Sport, Doubilet went on, has a tremendous power to transcend all types of barriers because "whether it's socioeconomics, gender, national, religious, whether you are Jewish, Protestant, Muslim, Catholic, we all play basketball according to the same rules."

"Specifically among Palestinians and Israelis, I want to mention that basketball is the number one sport for women so it has a tremendous power to engage 50 percent of our society which is often left on the sidelines. Basketball is a game where all five players have to share the ball, they have to work together, they need great communication, trust. If we want to win the game, we have to work together so that makes it a very, very powerful tool for peace building."

The game also reaches a key target demography - the youth.

"Basketball appeals to youngsters," Wanninger said. "I think it's one of those sports that will grow in urban areas where we face the challenges we want to tackle. We are a team sport, so you can only be successful if you work as a team. We always try to promote 3x3 basketball. In grassroots basketball, you do not have referees. So when you play the game and you commit the foul, you have to confess the foul as an attacking player which is something that help us achieve our objectives."

"I ALWAYS USE A QUOTE FROM NELSON MANDELA: 'SPORT HAS THE POWER TO CHANGE THE WORLD. IT HAS THE POWER TO UNITE PEOPLE IN THE WAY THAT LITTLE ELSE DOES. IT SPEAKS TO YOUTH IN THE LANGUAGE THAT THEY UNDERSTAND.'" - Florian Wanninger, FIBA Foundation

Wanninger was also keen to stress the importance of grassroots basketball.

"At FIBA, in our membership, our national federations, I think we have a tendency to focus on elite sports," he said. "That's one of our most important roles because  every country wants to be competitive and win something.

"But we have to promote this other element that we can use sports in another way, by investing in grassroots.  I know many of our member federations are doing this already. One of our principles is, whenever we do projects, we like to involve the federations and use the projects to help develop the federations."

There is also a need, Doubilet said, for everyone in the sport to keep working hard and do so together.

"Basketball has incredible power that we need to leverage, both in the public and private sector - FIBA and the NBA, the non-governmental organizations (NGOs)," she said. "We need to work together to scale up our impact to increase what we are doing.

"Funding is a major challenge that all of us face. What we are doing works, and I have empirical data that it works. We cannot stop what we are doing."

Previous news

Guam basketball ready to make a statement, representatives from 5 national federations attend fiba americup 2021 host workshop.

Related news

Princeton produce perfect campaign to win FIBA 3x3 Hongcheon Challenger 2024

U18 teams from Africa Zone 3 set to battle Qualifiers in Abidjan

Last chance for tickets as pools finalized for FIBA 3x3 Olympic Qualifying Tournament 2024

Fiba partners.

Basketball Events

• FIBA Basketball World Cup
• FIBA Women's Basketball World Cup
• FIBA 3x3 World Cup
• FIBA 3x3 World Tour
• FIBA 3x3 Endorsed Events

FIBA World Rankings Presented by NIKE

• FIBA Strategy
• Basketball Rules & Regulations
• 3x3 Rules & Regulations
• FIBA Calendar
• Documents Library
• Report a breach of integrity
• Media Services
• Media Accreditation Portal

Model.Translate(Model.FooterModel.NewsLetterTitle)

Watch live basketball.

FIBA - International Basketball Federation Route Suisse 5 1295 Mies - Switzerland Tel.: +41 22 545 00 00 Fax.: +41 22 545 00 99 Mail: [email protected]

• Terms and conditions
• Cookie Policy
• Cookie Settings

Copyright FIBA All rights reserved. No portion of FIBA.basketball may be duplicated, redistributed or manipulated in any form. By accessing FIBA.basketball pages, you agree to abide by FIBA.basketball terms and conditions .

Page at www.fiba.basketball indicated:

Your suplied Email address ([email protected]) does not seem to be correct

Subscribe to the FIBA Daily:

Unsubscribe from the fiba daily:.

Kobe Bean Bryant: The Outstanding Basketball Player Essay

Works cited.

In general, according to the student, a eulogy is the most important and meaningful way to emphasize the importance and significance of a person for the world and society. A eulogy is aimed at flaunting the virtues, creating a festive mood, and setting up the audience in a friendly way, and it is all humanly understandable and natural. Accordingly, the author has the opportunity not to praise the deceased and give out exactly as much praise as he deserves; to keep silent about those works or their aspects that do not deserve a severe conversation; to subtly hint that in addition to the pros, this subject is endowed with minuses, although it is inappropriate to talk about them. It is important not to overdo it here – too transparent a hint or an unfriendly tone will sound at odds with the general mood in the holiday atmosphere. If there is a situation when it is necessary to say something frankly, then, at least, it is worth remembering that “to tell the truth to kings with a smile.”

All this will avoid hypocrisy but, at the same time, will not violate the general central tone of the event. When a critic cannot resist the temptation to voice unflattering claims, it is unlikely that he will meet with a sympathetic attitude from the public and will be treated as a person who is ill-mannered or does not know how to behave. Saying goodbye to a person disciplines rhetoric, and it is not entirely fair to reproach the deceased for the simple reason that he can no longer answer or justify himself. Hence, Kobe Bean Bryant was a legendary basketball player who proved that one could achieve real success through hard work, perseverance, perseverance, and courage.

On January 26, 2020, at 41, the legend of American and world basketball, Kobe Bean Bryant, died from a helicopter accident in Calabasas, California. The biography of Kobe Bean Bryant is full of bright and exciting events. He was born on August 23, 1978, in Philadelphia, in the family of former NBA player Joe Bryant and Pamela Cox Bryant (Gooden 1). Kobe was a hereditary basketball player, and in addition to an excellent physique and a remarkable talent for the game, nature has rewarded him with a good heredity.

It is no secret that Kobe Bryant started playing basketball seriously abroad. When Kobe was six years old, his family temporarily moved to Italy, where his father continued his sports career (Gooden 1). Bryant was fond of basketball and football in Europe, which his father started teaching him at three. In 1991, the family’s father ended his career as a professional player and, together with the family, returned to the USA, where he took up coaching (Wolfman-Arent 1). Being a talented basketball coach, Joe did not forget to devote time to his son, who already showed himself as a promising basketball player. After moving to the Lower Merion school, he was quickly noticed by scouts recruiting talented players for the local basketball team. His mastery was fully manifested in this school team.

In the “Black Mamba sports biography,” there were many ups but not a single fall (except for numerous injuries). The best moments of the games in which he participated and, in fact, led his native team to victory each time will forever remain in the memory of fans and millions of fans. Young basketball players have been studying these episodes for about twenty years. Twenty years is an era for an athlete, they leave basketball much earlier, but Kobe held on to the last, remaining at the peak of fame by willpower. Talent and willpower allowed the “Black Mamba” to make one of the most brilliant careers in professional sports. Kobe Bryant played his last match in April 2016, when his team, the Lakers, beat the Utah Jazz at the next championship; this decision was not easy, but he won.

Kobe Bean Bryant played for the Los Angeles Lakers of the National Basketball Association (NBA) for 20 seasons. With this club, he won five league titles and received the prize for the most valuable player (MVP) of the 2007/08 season and the MVP of the 2009/10 NBA finals; Bryant finished his professional career in 2016. The death of Kobe Bryant occurred as a result of a helicopter crash. Kobe, along with his 13-year-old daughter Gianna Maria Honoré Bryant and other passengers, flew by helicopter to train at the Mamba Academy, located in the neighboring city. Gianna, like her father, was passionate about basketball; she was on Gigi’s Mamba teen team, and her father accompanied her to games and training sessions. Among the dead girls’ basketball coach was Christina Mauser, who married Tijuana Dogs, Matt Mauser. In all likelihood, the helicopter crash was due to bad weather conditions. Heavy fog made it impossible to land in a given place, and the pilot sent the helicopter to a mountainous area, where he collided with a peak. In the USA, the tragic news about the death of the basketball legend was taken extremely hard.

During his professional career, “Black Mamba” has won many awards. Among them – 5 championship titles, twice won gold at the Olympic Games, won the US championship. In addition, Bryant participated in the All–Star Game 18 times, the All–Star team 15 times and the NBA All-Star defense team 12 times. In 2015, Bryant received the title of the richest NBA player. His fortune at that time was estimated at $ 290 million, while the annual salary of the basketball player was $ 25 million.

“The Black Mamba,” the outstanding basketball player and the superstar – this is how the world will remember Kobe Bean Bryant. There is hardly another basketball player in the world as great as he was and will be for many more years in the eyes of millions of viewers. He is considered the best basketball player in the history of the sport. He was a fantastic basketball player and a winner who almost eclipsed the brilliant this season and, perhaps, the best team in the history of the NBA. Kobe Bean Bryant was a man who worked on himself 24/7 to fulfill his dreams.

Since childhood, Kobe Bean Bryant has been training daily, showing a strong will to win and diligence. The efforts of his professional father and the character traits of the future champion, who proved to be an ardent perfectionist, have already affected him here: he had to become the best and maintain this status by any means. Therefore, Kobe Bean Bryant became the most productive Lakers player in the history of this club. He is known for his dedication not only on the court but also in the gym. He started training earlier than everyone and finished them later than everyone, trained every day, seven days a week, constantly honing his skills, subordinating his whole life, all his actions and thoughts to only one goal – to be the best on the basketball court.

It was worth Kobe to appear on the court, and again he turned out to be the best of the best players, a record holder, breaking his records. Up to a certain point in his career, Kobe made basketball better individually with each of his matches, showing what crazy diligence and “obsession” with his craft can lead to. Numerous injuries and age made themselves felt, and Kobe always gave his best, as his youth does him credit. Whatever it was, the athlete passed away at the peak of fame, having realized a childhood dream. In his last match, he once again led his team to victory, overcoming pain and fatigue, not thinking that this was the last match and that maybe there was no point in trying. That evening, he scored 60 points per game, which allowed his team to beat the opponents with a minimum margin of 5 points.

Hence, Kobe Bean Bryant has repeatedly mentioned that sport is a very emotional thing and knew what he was talking about and was able to create this magic of emotions not only on the court. The texts dedicated to him, the avalanche that has now covered the Internet, are also a lot about emotions. One of the main reasons behind most of these texts is not only the bitterness of loss. Nevertheless, also sad that his current career as a public figure and father, who talks about his own experience of raising daughters and releases stories to help other children and parents, ended so early. Moreover, we will not see everything he wanted to say.

Gooden, Tai. “ Kobe Bryant: The Life Story You May Not Know .” Stacker , Web.

Wolfman-Arent, Avi. “ Kobe’s Basketball Roots in Philly Might Run Deeper Than You Realize .” WHYY MMXXII , Web.

• Chicago (A-D)
• Chicago (N-B)

IvyPanda. (2024, April 19). Kobe Bean Bryant: The Outstanding Basketball Player. https://ivypanda.com/essays/kobe-bean-bryant-the-outstanding-basketball-player/

"Kobe Bean Bryant: The Outstanding Basketball Player." IvyPanda , 19 Apr. 2024, ivypanda.com/essays/kobe-bean-bryant-the-outstanding-basketball-player/.

IvyPanda . (2024) 'Kobe Bean Bryant: The Outstanding Basketball Player'. 19 April.

IvyPanda . 2024. "Kobe Bean Bryant: The Outstanding Basketball Player." April 19, 2024. https://ivypanda.com/essays/kobe-bean-bryant-the-outstanding-basketball-player/.

1. IvyPanda . "Kobe Bean Bryant: The Outstanding Basketball Player." April 19, 2024. https://ivypanda.com/essays/kobe-bean-bryant-the-outstanding-basketball-player/.

Bibliography

IvyPanda . "Kobe Bean Bryant: The Outstanding Basketball Player." April 19, 2024. https://ivypanda.com/essays/kobe-bean-bryant-the-outstanding-basketball-player/.

• Navy White Hat Eulogy Essay
• Invading Your Hearts and Minds: Commercial Analysis
• Contrasting Views of Career Choices Amid the State of American Culture
• Conor McGregor: Champion in Ultimate Fighting Championship
• Roberta Louise Gibb: Athletics Information
• Meet Isaiah: The Biography of Isaiah Murray Chandler
• Female Athlete Health in Saudi Arabia
• A Get-Real Guide to Building Mental Fitness in Sport and Life

Basketball Essay for Students and Children

500+ essay on basketball.

The game of basketball has truly become global in the last few years. The game is currently popular in the United States. Also, it is described by many as an American game because of the fun and competitive element in it. Also, this is one of the games which is played indoors and still caters to billions of fans around the world. This game was Dr. James Naismith from Canada. Initially, he invented the game by using a rectangular pitch which was 6 feet wide and 4 feet high. Additionally, the court includes a free throw line which is 12 feet long. In basketball essay, students will get to know about the different components that make the game of basketball special.

It is a team game that has gained immense popularity. Also, the game is played with the help of a ball and the ball is shot into the basket that is positioned horizontally. So, the objective in the game is to shoot the ball and score the maximum points. This game is played by 2 teams that constitute a total of 5 players each. Also, the game is played on a marked rectangular floor that has a basket on both the ends. 

Originally, basketball was played using a soccer ball. Also, it was James Naismith that used a peach basket which ha ad a nonhollow bottom. So, this basket was nailed at a height of 10 ft. above the ground and on an elevated track. If you consider the manual removal of the ball from the basket a drawback then the bottom was removed to and it took the shape of modern-day baskets. Also, dribbling was not part of the game initially. Eventually, it evolved till 1950 by which the balls got better shape due to manufacturing. 

Additionally, the orange ball was evolved from the brown ball. The brown ball was used in the beginning as it was thought that the ball is more visible. By 1996, the peach baskets used were replaced by metal hoops on the backboard. 

Get the huge list of more than 500 Essay Topics and Ideas

Basketball Game 

At the start of the game, a referee tosses the ball at the center of the court between two players. One player from either team try to get their hands on the ball and the ball is passed on to the teammates. For scoring a point, a team needs to shoot the ball through the basket. If a shot is scored from a distance that is closer to the basket than the 3 point line than it fetches 2 points. Also, if the ball is shot from the distance behind 3 point line, it fetches 3 points. So, the team that has a maximum number of points is declared the winner. 

In case of a draw, there may be additional time allotted to both the teams. In the game, a player is cannot move if he is holding the ball. The player needs to dribble, otherwise, it is considered as a foul. Likewise, when there is a physical contact that affects the other team then it counted as a physical foul. 

Basketball is game played with a maintained and carefully marked court. It is a team sport that is commonly found in many different areas. 

Customize your course in 30 seconds

Which class are you in.

• Travelling Essay
• Picnic Essay
• Our Country Essay
• My Parents Essay
• Essay on Favourite Personality
• Essay on Memorable Day of My Life
• Essay on Knowledge is Power
• Essay on Gurpurab
• Essay on My Favourite Season
• Essay on Types of Sports

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Download the App

Michael Jordan’s Early Years: from Brooklyn to Basketball Icon

This essay about Michael Jordan’s early life traces his formative years from his birth in Brooklyn to becoming a basketball icon. The narrative follows Jordan’s relocation to Wilmington, North Carolina, his experiences of being cut from his high school basketball team due to his height, and how this setback fueled his determination. It highlights his eventual success in high school basketball, leading to a scholarship at the University of North Carolina. There, Jordan’s iconic game-winning shot in the 1982 NCAA Championship solidified his status as a burgeoning star. The essay underscores the influence of Jordan’s family and community, illustrating how his upbringing and early experiences shaped not only his career but also his character. Through this reflection on Jordan’s early years, the essay illustrates how foundational experiences and support systems contribute to personal and professional success.

How it works

Even though the majority of people only remember Michael Jordan as a basketball legend, his modest upbringing prepared the way for his rise from a young, motivated player to a world-renowned sportsman. Michael Jeffrey Jordan was born in Brooklyn, New York, on February 17, 1963. He came from a close-knit family of five children. His early years were characterized by a growing love for baseball and basketball along with normal childhood experiences.

Michael Jordan was still a small child when the Jordan family relocated to Wilmington, North Carolina.

His early life and morals were greatly influenced by this move from the busy city of Brooklyn to the calmer, more relaxed setting of Wilmington. James and Deloris Jordan, his parents, strongly believed in the value of education, hard work, and discipline. Michael and his siblings were raised with these ideals from an early age.

Michael originally displayed his athletic ability while attending Wilmington’s Emsley A. Laney High School. It’s interesting that his basketball career encountered an early setback when, in his sophomore year, he was dropped from the varsity squad due to concerns that he was too small. Jordan saw this failure as a turning point that strengthened his will to succeed and his spirit of competition. He improved his basketball skills throughout the course of the summer and gained a few inches in height, which helped him crack the squad the following year.

Jordan became an outstanding player as soon as he returned to the team. When he graduated, he had broken school records for points scored thanks to his impressive accomplishments on the high school basketball court. Because of his achievements in high school, he was awarded a scholarship to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, which was a crucial first step towards the beginning of his illustrious basketball career.

Jordan was coached by the renowned Dean Smith while he was a player at UNC, and he made tremendous progress throughout his tenure with the Tar Heels, both on and off the court. It is commonly believed that Jordan’s game-winning basket in the 1982 NCAA Championship game versus Georgetown, which he made as a freshman, marked his introduction to the basketball world. In addition to honing his talents, his time in college taught him important lessons about endurance, leadership, and cooperation.

Michael Jordan’s early life serves as an example of the influence of upbringing, the need of resilience, and the ability of athletics to transform. His transformation from a high school player who was discarded to a hero in college basketball paved the way for his subsequent achievements with the Chicago Bulls and his long-lasting impact on the game of basketball. The guy who would become “Air Jordan,” a moniker that represents his almost gravity-defying achievements on the basketball court, was greatly shaped by his modest Brooklyn beginnings and the supportive community of Wilmington.

Considering Michael Jordan’s early years provides more insight than just a look into the beginnings of a legendary athlete. It acts as a motivating reminder of the value of grabbing every chance, the strength of willpower, and the significant influence that family and community support have on a person’s life. Michael Jordan has left a lasting legacy that extends beyond his sporting prowess and includes his ability to motivate people everywhere to pursue greatness in any endeavor. His tale never gets old, demonstrating how greatness frequently starts with modest, uncomplicated actions taken right in one’s own neighborhood.

Cite this page

Michael Jordan's Early Years: From Brooklyn to Basketball Icon. (2024, May 12). Retrieved from https://papersowl.com/examples/michael-jordans-early-years-from-brooklyn-to-basketball-icon/

"Michael Jordan's Early Years: From Brooklyn to Basketball Icon." PapersOwl.com , 12 May 2024, https://papersowl.com/examples/michael-jordans-early-years-from-brooklyn-to-basketball-icon/

PapersOwl.com. (2024). Michael Jordan's Early Years: From Brooklyn to Basketball Icon . [Online]. Available at: https://papersowl.com/examples/michael-jordans-early-years-from-brooklyn-to-basketball-icon/ [Accessed: 15 May. 2024]

"Michael Jordan's Early Years: From Brooklyn to Basketball Icon." PapersOwl.com, May 12, 2024. Accessed May 15, 2024. https://papersowl.com/examples/michael-jordans-early-years-from-brooklyn-to-basketball-icon/

"Michael Jordan's Early Years: From Brooklyn to Basketball Icon," PapersOwl.com , 12-May-2024. [Online]. Available: https://papersowl.com/examples/michael-jordans-early-years-from-brooklyn-to-basketball-icon/. [Accessed: 15-May-2024]

PapersOwl.com. (2024). Michael Jordan's Early Years: From Brooklyn to Basketball Icon . [Online]. Available at: https://papersowl.com/examples/michael-jordans-early-years-from-brooklyn-to-basketball-icon/ [Accessed: 15-May-2024]

Don't let plagiarism ruin your grade

Hire a writer to get a unique paper crafted to your needs.

Our writers will help you fix any mistakes and get an A+!

Please check your inbox.

You can order an original essay written according to your instructions.

Trusted by over 1 million students worldwide

1. Tell Us Your Requirements

2. Pick your perfect writer

3. Get Your Paper and Pay

Hi! I'm Amy, your personal assistant!

Don't know where to start? Give me your paper requirements and I connect you to an academic expert.

short deadlines

100% Plagiarism-Free

Certified writers

Home / Essay Samples / Sports / Basketball / My Passion for Basketball and How It Shaped Me

My Passion for Basketball and How It Shaped Me

• Category: Sports , Life
• Topic: Basketball , Favorite Sport , Training

Pages: 3 (1299 words)

• Downloads: -->

--> ⚠️ Remember: This essay was written and uploaded by an--> click here.

Found a great essay sample but want a unique one?

are ready to help you with your essay

You won’t be charged yet!

Paying College Athletes Essays

Football Essays

Volleyball Essays

History of Taekwondo Essays

Taekwondo Essays

Related Essays

We are glad that you like it, but you cannot copy from our website. Just insert your email and this sample will be sent to you.

By clicking “Send”, you agree to our Terms of service  and  Privacy statement . We will occasionally send you account related emails.

Your essay sample has been sent.

In fact, there is a way to get an original essay! Turn to our writers and order a plagiarism-free paper.

samplius.com uses cookies to offer you the best service possible.By continuing we’ll assume you board with our cookie policy .--> -->