Just think about it; it's almost unreal. Here is a guy that wasn't even well known in college - I'd never even heard of him, and college basketball is pretty much life for me in March (alright, maybe that's a little exaggerated, but I love 'the Madness'). Then he went and played in Italy after graduating from Georgia, moved on to the D-league this year, and then gets called up only because the Jazz randomly traded away a solid, young back-up point guard with a bright future, and Deron Williams gets injured days later (it still doesn't make sense to me, but I'm glad it happened now). He'd only played a few games before playing one of the greats in basketball right now, Lebron James, and the Cavaliers on national TV. He plays in the second half only because Deron gets injured again, and quickly wins over an energetic Utah crowd by hustling and hitting a few big shots in the fourth quarter. So coach Sloan puts him in for the last shot after a late blown lead by the Jazz and then a last minute comeback from them thanks to poor free throw shooting from the Cavs. They don't design the original play for him, but another hustler and guy to come from practically nowhere, Ronnie Price, feeds him the ball in desperation. Sundiata gets it and strokes it from 25 feet with a guy right in his face to beat the buzzer win the game!
Now as he shot it, I remember thinking, "there's no way this shot goes in, it would be just too good to be true. Things like that just don't happen in real life!" But they do... in sports! When I saw it go in, I jumped off my seat and yelled with my fists in the air, and I'm not even a huge fan of the Jazz. I think anybody watching that game, even a Cavs fan has to appreciate what happened. The best part, in my opinion, wasn't even the shot, but what happened afterward. His reaction was awesome. In the NBA, you see guys always making some face or hitting their chest or just doing something to show "I'm the man" after hitting these kinds of shots. But Sundiata just fell on the floor and rolled around in joy as if to say, "I can't believe what is happening. My life has probably just changed forever after tonight." When he got up, he went over to the fans, and started slapping fives with tons of people who'd never even heard an utterance of his name two weeks earlier. At this point, I almost felt a tear sneaking out. Even his post game interview was tender. Sure he said a few confident comments (all legit athletes have to have that little swagger though), but you could tell he was a humble, good guy, and he was just so happy that I couldn't help but smile real big either.
It was great! Thanks Yata!! What a player?! (Shout out to "Slumdog".)What a shot?! What a game?! I love sports!!
No comments:
Post a Comment