Fast Break to Line Break

The Game PREGAME Basketball, Poetry, and All Things Beautiful / Todd Davis and J. D. Scrimgeour  FIRST QUARTER Hidden Talents Fail to Materialize / Jim Daniels Basketball and Poetry: The Two Richies / Stephen Dunn Two Things You Need Balls to Do: A Miscellany from a Former Professional Basketball Player Turned Poet / Natalie Diaz The Simple Rhymes of Defense / Gary FinckeBasketball and Poetry: Strange Bedfellows / Margaret Gibson and David McKain Basketball and the Immigrant Faith / Patrick Rosal  SECOND QUARTER Spinning in My Hands / Mary Linton Against All Odds / Linda Nemec Foster The Ball Goes in Clean / Todd Davis Hard / Peter Sears In Praise of Bad Boys and the Evolutionary Leap / Therese Becker Why I Wrote the “Magic” Johnson Poem /  Quincy Troupe  HALFTIME The Art of the Cheer / Debra Marquart  THIRD QUARTER Fast Break / William Heyen Tipping Off / Lauren (Jentz) Jensen Off the Rim / Adrian Matejka Courting Risk: Thoughts on Basketball and Poetry / Patricia Clark Basketball, Failure, and Amateur Pleasure / Jeff Gundy My Two Obsessions: Basketball and Poetry / Marian Haddad  FOURTH QUARTER “More Beautiful Than Words Can Tell”: A Poet’s Education in Southern Basketball / Bobby C. Rogers Blessed / Ross Gay It Was Easier to Say, “I’m a Basketball Player” Than It Is to Say, “I’m a Poet” /  Jack Ridl Reading Sebastian Matthews /  James McKean Going Exactly Where We Want to Go /  Marjorie Maddox Squeak from Shoes /  Richard Newman  OVERTIME Announcing My Retirement / J. D. Scrimgeour Team Roster Acknowledgments