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Playing the Game: A Novel
Inspired half-time readings of Thoreau, Emerson et al., carry an Ivy League basketball team to the NCAA playoffs.
361 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1995
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October 10, 2012
I was lent this by my daughter's history teacher on the assumption that, since I am interested in both basketball and history, this would be interesting. I love the premise - an obscure history professor and assistant basketball coach at an Ivy League college gets appointed as head coach, with nobody expecting much. By recruiting disadvantaged youth and reading passages of American history to them, he brings the team to the NCAA finals.
It should work, but it doesn't. The character is not believable, the history excerpts are too long-winded, and the adversities encountered (racist faculty, an NCAA looking askance at the newcomers and plotting against them, etc.) seem contrived. In the end, you start wondering whether the whole story is a figment of the main character's imagination - not just the author's.
Pity, it had so much going for it...watch Danny DeVito in The Renaissance Man instead, it has more going for it.
It should work, but it doesn't. The character is not believable, the history excerpts are too long-winded, and the adversities encountered (racist faculty, an NCAA looking askance at the newcomers and plotting against them, etc.) seem contrived. In the end, you start wondering whether the whole story is a figment of the main character's imagination - not just the author's.
Pity, it had so much going for it...watch Danny DeVito in The Renaissance Man instead, it has more going for it.
Displaying 1 of 1 review