by Fresh8 on Mon May 23, 2011 11:36 pm
Chapter 31
It was crunch time.
Ty walked back to the middle of the floor as the cheers became louder. He looked up at the scoreboard to check the time left in the game. It read 54.4 seconds. The game was tied at 119. It was Seattle ball and on the court with Ty were Bogut, Lee, Iverson and Kidd. The Hawks had Al Horford, Josh Smith, Andrea Bargnani, Manu Ginobili and Stanley Mayo.
Ty rubbed his hands together and laughed at Sheed jumping up and down on the sideline yelling, “Tysonnnnnnnnnnn!”
Kidd patted him on the back, “Relax!”
Ty nodded as the game officials began to take their places. Lee was inbounding the ball at halfway. Kidd came up to get it as the Hawks stayed back on defence. Kidd dribbled the ball on the spot and went closer to the top of the perimeter. Ty came off a Bogut screen that freed him up at the wing on the three point line. Kidd passed him the ball as the crowd was on their feet. Ty squared up and faced the hoop. He didn’t waste any time and began to drive to the rack. Manu had caught up in front of Ty and swiped at the basketball. He caught Ty on the wrist.
“Foul!” Ty was yelling out, “Call the foul!”
He was still dribbling when he felt Manu’s leg make contact with his. Ty tumbled to the ground as the crowd booed.
“That’s a defensive foul on Ginobili!” the ref called out and motioned to the scorers’ bench.
The Hawks had a foul to give and were not in the penalty. It was another Seattle inbound.
“Call the foul!” Ty was yelling out at one of the refs.
Kidd called out to Ty, “Forget about it. Keep playing!”
Manu was tugging on the back of Ty’s jersey as they lined up for the inbound, which was from the sideline right in front of the home team’s bench.
“Stop playing dirty,” Ty said as he grabbed Manu’s arm and pushed it away.
Manu kept nudging Ty out of position. Ty waited for Lee to get the rock and pushed off of Manu to go get the ball. He managed to free himself of Manu for a few moments and enough time to get some personal space in order to get the ball and square up to face the hoop again. Manu was back in his face in no time though and again kept swiping at the ball uncontrollably. Ty was back on the wing at the three point line and looking for options. The shot clock was winding down and he had to do something with the ball. He passed it up to Iverson who pass it to the other side of the court to Kidd. Kidd threw the ball into Bogut who backed down in the post and missed the hook shot.
“I told you to take the shot!” Karl was yelling out to Ty.
“They’re not calling the foul!” Ty was yelling back at Karl as he ran back on defence.
Mayo pushed the ball up the floor and the Hawks set up their offence. Ty was matched up on Manu and would try and return the favour from the other end. The two jostled for position as the Hawks patiently swung the ball around the perimeter and moved around the floor with precision cuts in and out of the painted area. Ty was chasing Manu all over the court. Manu was finally hit with the pass on the left hand side of the floor. Ty thought he had him covered and forced him towards the baseline. Manu dribbled hard to the hoop and precariously close to the edge of the court. Ty was now keeping up with him going sideways and trying to force him out of bounds on the baseline. He had both arms in the air as Manu went strong to the hoop. Manu went up in the air cradling the ball in his left hand and swinging his right elbow into Ty’s body.
“Argh!” Ty managed to yelp out as he held the side of his body.
Manu’s left handed reverse layup did not drop as the refs blew their whistles. Ty was nodding to himself but only too soon as the refs called the defensive foul on him.
“What!” Ty was approaching the game official to protest.
Kidd and Lee both got in his way.
“Calm the fuck down!” Lee was yelling in Ty’s ear as Kidd was pushing him back towards the end of the court.
Manu walked past and slapped Ty on the ass, “Bad luck.”
“Fuck off!” Ty called out to him, trying to compose himself.
George Karl had his hands on his hips, shaking his head. Manu stepped up to the charity stripe and sank both free throws. With only one timeout left, Karl opted to let his team play on. He looked up at the clock and could see there was only around 20 seconds left in the game. His team needed a quick shot.
Kidd knew that his team needed to get down the floor fast. Bogut had grabbed the ball as it came through the hoop on the second free throw. The Hawks were up 121-119 and the clock was still going. He quickly stepped out of the court and passed the ball to Kidd who turned to take the ball down the floor.
“Pass it to Ty!” Lee was yelling.
Ty was already halfway up the floor and trying to beat the Hawks defence. Kidd threw a long pass down the court to Ty. Ty caught the lob in the air and came down with it. He was a few steps away from the three point line. Smith and Mayo were waiting on the other end for him. Ty put the ball on the floor and drove hard to the rack. He put a spin move on Mayo that bamboozled him and the last defender on the floor was Smith. Ty did not hesitate and went for the dunk.
“Come on!” his teammates were yelling from the bench as Ty went up for the jam.
The crowd nearly brought the roof down with their cheers as Ty hung onto the rim. Ty’s teammates were jumping up and down while Sheed was dancing with the cheerleaders.
“That’s a charge!” the ref called out.
Smith had both fists clenched as he sat upright on the ground. Ty had come back down onto the ground and was shaking his head.
“Come on man – that was good. That was not a charge!” he was arguing.
“You barged right into him. That charge was as clear as daylight,” one of the officials stated matter of factly.
“You got to be kidding me!” Ty was now getting really frustrated with all the calls.
The Stealth fans were booing at the top of their lungs and yelling abuse to the refs. A small part of the crowd was even chanting ‘Bullshit! Bullshit! Bullshit!” The Hawks called time out.
“Could this be the end of the Stealth’s winning streak?” Reggie Miller asked aloud.
Steve Kerr was on the broadcast with Reggie and replied, “The two teams are back at their benches trying to plan what to do next. Let’s quickly see what’s happening in the Seattle huddle. But I do think this might very well be the end of the winning streak for Seattle Reg.”
“We need to get back out there and hustle, get the stop and earn that last shot,” Coach Karl said to his team, “Ty, you need to create your shot. You are the best scorer we have on the floor, don’t pass it up. Go up strong against Ginobili. Don’t worry about the foul calls. OK?”
Ty nodded as his teammates all put their hands into the middle of the huddle.
“That was Coach Karl telling Reshawn Tyson to go back out there and lead the Stealth,” Reggie explained, “I think Tyson really has to stay composed and play his own game out there. You could see he was rushing a bit on those last few Stealth possessions.”
Kerr agreed, “You could see that he was trying to force the issue but at the same time seems a bit restrictive on what his own game out there. He’s not doing what he usually does best. We all know he can hit that mid range jay.”
“All he needs is some space out there,” Reggie added.
“Well, we all know you know all about clutch shooting Reggie,” Kerr laughed, “How many times have you been in a situation like this?”
Reggie didn’t boast, “Let’s stay focussed on the game Steve.”
Both teams spilled back onto the floor with the Hawks inbounding from halfway.
“The Hawks will probably want to get this one to Manu so that he can put up the last shot,” Reggie said as both he and Kerr watched Josh Smith surveying the floor.
“And Tyson comes up with a steal!”
Ty had intercepted the pass intended for Stanley Mayo. He had to leave Manu open in order to do so. It was a gamble but a worthwhile one as he came up with the steal. Mayo had beaten Kidd to some open space near halfway and Ty was quick enough to chase after and get in-between Mayo and the basketball. Mayo and Manu immediately swarmed on Ty at halfway, forcing him to call a timeout. It was the Stealth’s last one.
“Quick, quick!” Karl shouted to his players.
Durant sat on the bench and did not look interested in what was going on.
“We got one shot. Let’s try and tie this one. We have about 15 seconds to make it work,” Karl said to his players.
“Make this one count,” he said to Ty as the players broke out of the huddle.
Ty breathed in deeply. This was really it. It was his time to prove that he could be one bit of the player Durant was. He looked over at Durant and knew how much he would hate to see him hit the final shot. Not only was a shot at Durant on the line but the team’s amazing winning streak was also at stake. Ty had 31 points at this stage but had not scored in the past 5 minutes. However, that did not matter as the game could possible come down to this one shot.
“Andrew!” Ty yelled out to Bogut for the screen.
Lee had the ball at halfway and Bogut rushed up to set the screen for Ty. Ty used it to his advantage and got free at the top of the key. The pass from Lee came in quickly. Ty had his hands out ready to receive the pass. Everything else that happened next happened so quickly that he couldn’t even believe it. Ty dropped the pass allowing Manu to poke the ball from the side and knock it ahead towards the other end of the court. Ty did not react fast enough to chase Many down as the Argentine collected the rock and blitzed down the other end for an uncontested layup. The shot put the Hawks up by 4, 123-119, just less than 10 seconds left. With no timeouts to call, that was just enough time for Iverson to put up a bad three point attempt. Al Horford grabbed the board and held onto the ball as the buzzer sounded.