Between 1972 and 1974, the Mighty Macs of Immaculata College -- a small Catholic women's school outside Philadelphia -- made history by winning the first three women's national college basketball championships ever played. A true Cinderella team, this unlikely fifteenth-seeded squad triumphed against enormous odds and four powerhouse state teams to secure the championship title and capture the imaginations of fans and sportswriters across the country. But while they were making a significant contribution to legitimizing women's sports in America, the Mighty Macs were also challenging the traditional roles and obligations that circumscribed their Catholic schoolgirl lives. In this vivid account of Immaculata basketball, Julie Byrne goes beyond the fame to explore these young women's unusual lives, their rare opportunities and pleasures, their religious culture, and the broader ideas of womanhood they inspired and helped redefine.

"Stuff Good Players Should Know" may very well be the best book ever written for basketball players. It is conversational and easy to understand, yet filled with subtle insights into the game of basketball. "Stuff" is page after page of creative concepts, common sense, and special tips that cannot be found anywhere else. "Stuff" is like having a coach right beside you, in your room, discussing the fine points of the game. Basketball fans will enjoy it, but players shouldn't be without it.

A complete basketball guide and training book that'll upgrade your b-ball game to a higher level. Learn the secrets of ball handling techniques, shooting techniques, passing, defense, rebounding and much more. Your game is guaranteed to go from a D- to a A+ within a couple of months. Its easy and its fun.

When James Naismith invented the game of basketball in 1891, he couldn't have imagined the soaring popularity and how inventive the game continues to be. Played on all continents and just about every country on earth, "hoops" provides a ton of athleticism and excitement to players, coaches and fans alike. With this third book from best-selling author Adam E. Murray, you will find some of the most memorable words ever spoken about the game. In "129 Greatest Basketball Quotes from the Game's Most Famous People," you will some pure gems you are not soon to forget. From world class athletes like Lebron James and Michael Jordan to coaches like Phil Jackson and John Wooden to celebrities like Zac Effron and Ashley Judd, to writers such as Jim Murray and Dave Barry, you will be taking a deep dive into a vast pool of basketball's greatest messages from this hand-picked collection. In it, you'll learn: ---What Shaq believes was the reasons for his 40% free throw percentage... ---Who Michael Jordan's true heroes of his life are (Hint: NOT athletes) ---What Charles Barkley would have caused had he not played basketball ---What Ice Cube's going to buried with (Yes, it has to do with hoops) Plus 125 other brilliantly entertaining quotes from players, coaches and celebrities. Love the game of basketball? You're gonna love "Basketball: 129 Greatest Basketball Quotes from the Game's Most Famous People." Here's to putting more hoops into your life

Teams play like they practice. Even in ideal circumstances time for practice is limited. Coaches need to make the most of available practice time. Better Basketball Practices contains valuable information in the areas of: * Overriding Purpose * Planning for optimum learning during practice * Planning to plan practice * Setting the tone for practice * Creating organized, efficient and productive practices * Building intensity in practice * Planning for special situations * Planning for late season practice * Ideas about quality practices * Common coaching mistakes in planning practice Includes 34 simple drills designed to teach essential fundamentals of the game. Complete with 74 diagrams and descriptions of each drill and possible variations. Learn from a veteran head coach with over 460 career varsity wins and 8 Coach of the Year awards. Build a better team and a better basketball program by planning, organizing and conducting better basketball practices.

What makes a coach great? How do great coaches turn a collection of individuals into a coherent "us"? Seth Davis, one of the keenest minds in sports journalism, has been thinking about that question for twenty-five years. It's one of the things that drove him to write the definitive biography of college basketball's greatest coach, John Wooden, Wooden: A Coach's Life. But John Wooden coached a long time ago. The world has changed, and coaching has too, tremendously. Seth Davis decided to embark on a proper investigation to get to the root of the matter. In Getting to Us, Davis probes and prods the best of the best from the landscape of active coaches of football and basketball, college and pro-from Urban Meyer, Dabo Swinney, and Jim Harbaugh to Mike Krzyzewski, Tom Izzo, Jim Boeheim, Brad Stevens, Geno Auriemma, and Doc Rivers-to get at the fundamental ingredients of greatness in the coaching sphere. There's no single right way, of course-part of the great value of this book is Davis's distillation of what he has learned about different types of greatness in coaching, and what sort of leadership thrives in one kind of environment but not in others. Some coaches have thrived at the college level but not in the pros. Why? What's the difference? Some coaches are stern taskmasters, others are warm and cuddly; some are brilliant strategists but less emotionally involved with their players, and with others it's vice versa. In Getting to Us, we come to feel a deep connection with the most successful and iconic coaches in all of sports-big winners and big characters, whose stories offer much of enduring interest and value.

A groundbreaking, timely history of the largely unknown early days of Black basketball, bringing to life the trailblazing players, teams, and impresarios who made the game From the introduction of the game of basketball to Black communities on a wide scale in 1904 to the racial integration of the NBA in 1950, dozens of African American teams were founded and flourished. This period, known as the Black Fives Era (teams at the time were often called "fives"), was a time of pioneering players and managers. They battled discrimination and marginalization and created culturally rich, socially meaningful events. But despite headline-making rivalries between big-city clubs, the savvy moves of innovative businessmen, and the undeniable talent of star players, this period is almost entirely unknown to basketball fans. Claude Johnson has made it his mission to change that. An advocate fiercely committed to our history, for more than two decades Johnson has conducted interviews, mined archives, collected artifacts, and helped to preserve this historically important African American experience that otherwise would have been lost. The Black Fives is the result of his work, a landmark narrative history that braids together the stories of these forgotten pioneers and rewrites our understanding of the story of basketball.

In the 1990's, Dallas was a basketball wasteland. Along came Dirk Nowitzki, a towering Wurzburg, Germany native with a cool efficiency and the ability to make shots from seemingly impossible angles. In the years thereafter, Nowitzki would spend his entire 21-season NBA career with the Dallas Mavericks, the longest tenure of any one player with one team in the league's history, and lead them to their first and only NBA championship, while being named a 14-time All-Star, a 12-time All-NBA Team member, and the first European player to receive the NBA's Most Valuable Player Award. Zac Crain, award-winning journalist for D Magazine who moved to Dallas the same year that Nowitzki began his career in the city, memorializes Nowitzki's career through a lyric essay reminiscent of Hanif Abdurraqib's Go Ahead in the Rain that mixes the author's story with the basketball legend's, charting the highs and lows (and mostly highs) of the Mavs' all-time statistical leader's career. By paying homage to Dallas' star basketball player, author Zac Crain connects the Mavs' success with the growth of the city itself, and what the sport means to Dallas' now basketball-obsessed citizens.

In a city mired in endless decay, where the youth suffer through all the horrors of urban blight, hope comes in a most unassuming form: a tiny brick schoolhouse run by two Felician nuns where a singular basketball genius takes teenagers from the mean streets of Jersey City and turns them into champions on the hardcourt. Coach Bob Hurley had been working miracles at St. Anthony High School for over thirty years, winning state and national championships and offering his players rescue from their surroundings through college scholarships, when he met his most dysfunctional team yet. In "The Miracle of St. Anthony" Adrian Wojnarowski follows Hurley through a gripping and heartrending season as he struggles to lead a troubled team to glory through his unparalleled understanding of the game and his ceaseless determination to see no more children lost to these streets.

In "The Miracle of St. Anthony," acclaimed sports journalist Adrian Wojnarowski follows Hurley through a gripping and heartrending season, as he struggles to lead a troubled team to glory through his unparalleled understanding of the game and his ceaseless determination to see no more children lost to the city streets.
Acclaim for "The Miracle of St. Anthony: "
aIt takes two ingredients to make a book special: a great story and a great storyteller. "The Miracle of St. Anthony" has both. Bob Hurley is a remarkable coach; Adrian Wojnarowski is his equal as a writer.a
aJOHN FEINSTEIN, BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF "A SEASON ON THE BRINK"
aTakes you through this miracle season where this high school basketball team didnat have the greatest talent but somehow came out on top . . . [Coach Hurley] is dedicated to these city kids and helping them overcome the obstacles that the city can offer. A lot of his lessons are not about basketball, but about life, and doing things the right way.a
aBILL RAFTERY, "THE WALL STREET JOURNAL"
aCompelling.a
a"Chicago Tribune"
aA classic.a
a"Boston Globe"
aAstonishinga
a"New York Post"
aHard to put down.a
a"The Washington Post"

Like millions who love college basketball, John Feinstein was first drawn to the game because of its intensity, speed, and intelligence. And like many, he now feels that the vast sums of money involved in NCAA basketball—TV money, sponsorship money, alumnae money—have turned college basketball into a division of the NBA, rather than the beloved amateur sport it was in the past.

Feinstein went in search of college basketball played with the passion and integrity it once inspired. He found it in a place called the Patriot League. The Patriot League is one of the NCAA's smallest Division I conferences, a group of schools that includes Colgate, Holy Cross, Lafayette, Lehigh, Bucknell, Army, and Navy. No one leaves these schools early to join the NBA. Few have athletic scholarships. The players ride on team buses the day of the game—and back to campus the same night. No private planes or deluxe hotels. They carry full course loads of real college classes, without the lavish support network provided at larger schools.

John Feinstein spent an unforgettable season with the players of the Patriot League, and in The Last Amateurs he tells their amazing stories. Every year, these players compete against top programs like North Carolina and Indiana. Every year, one team from the Patriot League enters the NCAA Tournament, joining into the national dream of a David-and-Goliath upset. And every year, virtually every senior in the Patriot League basketball program graduates from college—a success rate unparalleled in the richer conferences.

The Last Amateurs is John Feinstein at his brilliant best, capturing the passion of players for whom sports are neither pastime nor profession, but something more. For anyone who enjoys college basketball, this is an unforgettably moving and enlightening look inside the game at its purest and most intense.

The charismatic basketball coach at the University of Connecticut reveals the victorious secrets behind his team's breathtaking journey to the 1999 NCAA Division I National Championship--and along the way shares his philosophy for winning.
It was one of those games that basketball fans will talk about for years. Here was the seemingly unbeatable Duke Blue Devils pitted against the first-time finalist Connecticut Huskies, and at stake was the ultimate crown: the National Championship. On that unforgettable night in St. Petersburg, Jim Calhoun and his amazing team wrote a new chapter in the storied history of the UConn Huskies program, putting the perfect exclamation point on a season to remember.
But behind the high drama that fateful night in Florida lay an even more fascinating tale of one man's rise to college basketball preeminence. In Dare to Dream, the Huskies iron-willed coach, Jim Calhoun, for the first time shares his own story about his inspirational family and the tragedies they faced; about his early successful years at Northeastern, where he began to compile the first half of a unique double (he's the only coach to have won at least 250 games at two different Division I schools); and about his assumption of ultimate responsibility at the sleeping giant in Storrs, Connecticut.
Along the way, Jim Calhoun paints fascinating portraits of the players who have done battle for him, and of the unsung heroes behind the scenes whose hard work and dedication to Connecticut basketball have kept the dream alive. In just thirteen years, Jim Calhoun has turned the Huskies into one of the leading basketball programs in the country, and in this moving, funny, and inspiring book, he takes us behind the scenes to show us just how he did it.

"From the Hardcover edition."

The world listens when Michael Jordan speaks

Here is just a sample of what you’ll find inside:

"People can fly. Some fly higher than others, that’s all."

"You can practice shooting eight hours a day, but if your technique is wrong, then all you become is very good at shooting the wrong way. Get the fundamentals down and the level of everything you do will rise."

"My heroes were my parents. I can’t see having anyone else as my heroes."

"Confidence allows you to progress in something you’re attempting to accomplish, whether it’s playing basketball or baseball, or whether it’s trying to succeed in business."

"This is going to sound wild–but my ultimate dream is to get a potbelly."

(This book has not been prepared, approved, licensed, or endorsed by Michael Jordan.)

The critically acclaimed, classic autobiography of UCLA basketballs legendary coach

What Knute Rockne was to football, Connie Mack to baseball, and Wilbur and Orville Wright to flying, John Wooden is to basketball. --Los Angeles Times

They Call Me Coach is grassroots Americana, a story bigger than basketball. One of those rare sports books that is must reading for everyone. --Chicago Tribune

Now featuring a great new look and a Foreword by hoop Hall of Famer Bill Walton, this classic bestselling sports bio by Americas winningest coach is back. Still charming fans everywhere, college basketball legend John Wooden reflects on his record-breaking career, his inspired life behind the scenes, and how his top players went on to shape and change the NBA. With worldly wisdom, Wooden offers a very personal history of an unforgettable time in college basketball, answering the most-asked questions about his life, his career, and the players who made his team unbeatable.

In the 2015-16 NBA season, the Jewish presence in the league was largely confined to Adam Silver, the commissioner; David Blatt, the coach of the Cleveland Cavaliers; and Omri Casspi, a player for the Sacramento Kings. Basketball, however, was once referred to as a Jewish sport. Shortly after the game was invented at the end of the nineteenth century, it spread throughout the country and became particularly popular among Jewish immigrant children in northeastern cities because it could easily be played in an urban setting. Many of basketball's early stars were Jewish, including Shikey Gotthoffer, Sonny Hertzberg, Nat Holman, Red Klotz, Dolph Schayes, Moe Spahn, and Max Zaslofsky. In this oral history collection, Douglas Stark chronicles Jewish basketball throughout the twentieth century, focusing on 1900 to 1960. As told by the prominent voices of twenty people who played, coached, and refereed it, these conversations shed light on what it means to be a Jew and on how the game evolved from its humble origins to the sport enjoyed worldwide by billions of fans today. The game's development, changes in style, rise in popularity, and national emergence after World War II are narrated by men reliving their youth, when basketball was a game they played for the love of it. When Basketball Was Jewish reveals, as no previous book has, the evolving role of Jews in basketball and illuminates their contributions to American Jewish history as well as basketball history.

Ernie Johnson Jr. has been in the game a long time. With one of the most recognized voices in sports broadcasting, he is a tireless perfectionist when it comes to preparing and delivering his commentary. Yet he knows that some of sports' greatest triumphs--and life's greatest rewards--come from those unscripted moments you never anticipated. In this heartfelt, gripping autobiography, the three-time Sports Emmy Award-winner and popular host of TNT's Inside the NBA provides a remarkably candid look at his life both on and off the screen. From his relationship with his sportscaster father to his own rise to the top of sports broadcasting, from battling cancer to raising six children with his wife, Cheryl, including a special needs child adopted from Romania, Ernie has taken the important lessons he learned from his father and passed them on to his own children. This is the untold story, the one Ernie has lived after the lights are turned off and the cameras stop rolling. Sports fans, cancer survivors, fathers and sons, adoptive parents, those whose lives have been touched by a person with special needs, anyone who loves stories about handling life's surprises with grace--Unscripted is for all of these.

Legendary UCLA coach John Wooden once said, "People say Morgan Wootten is the best high school basketball coach in the country. I disagree. I know of no finer coach at any level--high school, college, or pro."

Morgan Wootten has retired from coaching, but his knowledge of the game remains unsurpassed and keen as ever. "Coaching Basketball Successfully" contains a wealth of Wootten's timeless wisdom. And, in this third edition, Wootten adds even more value--the coaching experiences, methods, and tactics of his son Joe, a successful high school coach himself.

Loaded with insights, instruction, drills, and Xs and Os, "Coaching Basketball Successfully" is the best single resource on making the most of your program, team, and players each season.

Big money NCAA basketball had its origins in a many-sided conflict of visions and agendas. On one side stood large schools focused on a commercialized game that privileged wins and profits. Opposing them was a tenuous alliance of liberal arts colleges, historically black colleges, and regional state universities, and the competing interests of the NAIA, each with distinct interests of their own. Kurt Edward Kemper tells the dramatic story of the clashes that shook college basketball at mid-century-and how the repercussions continue to influence college sports to the present day. Taking readers inside the competing factions, he details why historically black colleges and regional schools came to embrace commercialization. As he shows, the NCAA's strategy of co-opting its opponents gave each group just enough just enough to play along-while the victory of the big-time athletics model handed the organization the power to seize control of college sports. An innovative history of an overlooked era, Before March Madness looks at how promises, power, and money laid the groundwork for an American sports institution.

This brand-new edition of Classic Cavs counts down the fifty greatest Cleveland Cavaliers games, from their 67-loss inaugural NBA season in 1970-71 through the franchise's renaissance following the triumphant return of LeBron James. The rich, colorful history of the Cavs is woven into tales that tie together the early games at rickety old Cleveland Arena, the incredible highs and heartbreaking lows played out at Richfield Coliseum, and the fierce battles waged at the "Q." Knight ranks last-second nail-biters alongside satisfying routs and postseason epics, from the phenomenon known as the "Miracle of Richfield" to the Cavs' trips to the NBA Finals. Included are the heroics of characters like Bingo Smith, Austin Carr, World B. Free, Mark Price, Craig Ehlo, Kyrie Irving, and, of course, LeBron James. Whether it was because of a fantastic finish or an amazing individual performance, each game included in Classic Cavs is worth remembering and revisiting, appealing to Cavaliers fans everywhere.

Wildcat Wisdom for the Big Blue Nation! For more than a century, the University of Kentucky Wildcats men's basketball team has built a winning tradition that feeds the Big Blue Nation. The history of the winningest program in college basketball is peppered with unforgettable moments and personalities. In Kentucky Passion, Del Duduit and John Huang help fans reexperience some of the most memorable seasons and shots and meet key players and coaches. Readers will learn how they too can rise to challenges and find success through the inspiring stories from Wildcat history. Weekly stories showcasing legendary coaches including Adolph Rupp, Joe B. Hall, Rick Pitino, Tubby Smith, and John Calipari, standout players including John Wall, Kyle Macy, DeAndre Liggins, Goose Givens, and Aaron Harrison, and indelible highs and lows (yes, the BBN still hates Laettner) illustrate the value of persistence, hard work, resiliency, teamwork, and more. Kentucky Passion is for every citizen of the Big Blue Nation and for every sports fan who relishes well-deserved victories, moans at surprise defeats, or wants to learn more about one of the most storied teams in college sports.

Hoosiers have always loved basketball! Long before Larry Bird carried Indiana State University to the 1979 NCAA National Championship or Bobby Knight walked the sidelines at Indiana University, basketball fostered community identity across the Hoosier state. From Indiana's tiniest towns to its biggest cities, high school basketball is a source of pride, unifying communities with different races, religions, and social and economic status. First drawn simply to documenting the architecture of Indiana's high school buildings and basketball courts, Chris Smith and Michael Keating quickly discovered that the real story was about more than just brick and mortar, maple and shellac. Told repeatedly by locals how important these places were to their communities, they began to embrace the "game on Saturday, church on Sunday" mantra that is found in many towns through Indiana, watching countless hours of basketball and becoming a part of the Hoosier tradition themselves. With over 150 color photographs and unforgettable stories from high school basketball and beyond, Chasing Indiana's Game: The Hoosier Hardwood Project is a tribute to the Hoosier state and all who love basketball.