Bill, Hillary, and Al? Nope—Boston Globe sportswriter May means big as in BIG. His three are the towering trees of the Boston Celtics: Larry Bird, Kevin McHale, and Robert Parish, whose lives and baskets are cheered to the rafters in this gung- ho hoop-scoop. May has a hot topic here since, as he shouts more than once, the tremendous trio did indeed make up ``the greatest frontcourt in the history of basketball.'' Also the longest-lived, dribbling together for nearly a decade, snaring heaps of championships along the way. As a portraitist, May hits three-pointers every time. Bird: the hick from French Lick, Indiana; the human basketball machine; winner of three consecutive MVPs; the best team player in history and, except for Michael Jordan, the best, period. McHale: laid-back, undervalued, dribbling and driving with breathtaking grace but always in Bird's shadow. Parish: the silent one, indestructible and inexorable, still on the courts in 1993, now the oldest player in the league. As a historian, however, May slows the game to a snail's pace as he reports in endless nit-picking detail about the trio's high-school days, scouting reports, signings, and contract hassles. Things speed up when the guys hit the NBA and tear up the court, blowing away archrivals Philadelphia and Los Angeles and—in the 1985-6 season, when they were 40-1 at the Boston Garden—reaching an apex of basketball harmonics never seen before or since, and making a strong claim to being the best team ever assembled in any sport. ``If I could, I would go back and play that year every year for the rest of my life,'' says McHale with an intensity that readers, egged on by May's partisanship, will likely echo. Not as thrilling as a Bird-McHale-Parish charge to the basket, but good enough for those who never saw—or who want to recapture—the real thing. (Eight pages of b&w photographs—not seen)
Pub Date: Jan. 1, 1994
ISBN: 0-671-79955-X
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 1993
Like eavesdropping on the team bus, sports enthusiasts will enjoy reliving a time when college football was top national...
A rousing look at the colorful coach and players who achieved an amazing 47-game winning streak for the Oklahoma Sooners.
In order to have present-day readers understand the true significance of the Sooners, Texas journalist Dent (The Junction Boys, 1999) gives helpful background information about the state where “Big Oil was a dream. But football was a religion.” Oklahomans, still suffering from effects of the Great Depression, also had to contend with the popular perception (perpetuated by Steinbeck’s Grapes of Wrath) of destitution and dispossession. In an attempt to fight the stereotypic Okie image, the University of Oklahoma decided to answer with a winning football team. And win they did. With coach Bud Wilkinson at the helm, from the second game of the 1948 season to the eighth game of the 1957 season, the Sooners compiled a staggering 94–4–2 record. They had winning streaks of 31 games and the fabled 47, which ended painfully at the hands of archrival Notre Dame. Dent avoids the potentially dry, statistical tone and instead provides atmosphere with snappy dialogue and by fleshing out the team, foibles and all. Wilkinson (dubbed “The Great White Father”) believed in a strong team of 22 “lean, fast, hard-boned country boys,” including a good group of second stringers. Besides their play on the field, the team, including the coach, played hard off of it, with women and drinking figuring prominently. Some players stand out, particularly quarterback Jimmy Harris, 1952 Heisman Trophy winner Billy Vessels, Gomer Jones, and the first black player, Prentice Gautt, whose personal struggles to be accepted by his teammates and his treatment under the Jim Crow laws provide some of the more poignant moments here. An epilogue reveals how many of the key people of those teams led, and still lead, productive, successful lives.
Like eavesdropping on the team bus, sports enthusiasts will enjoy reliving a time when college football was top national news. (16 pages b&w photos, not seen)Pub Date: Sept. 7, 2001
ISBN: 0-312-26656-1
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Dunne/St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2001
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
More than just a game book of college football, The Sweet Season at the innocent appeal of sports in everyday life.
Sports and human interest intertwine as a man rediscovers the pureness of amateur sports as well as the joys of family life.
Journalist Murphy spends a much-needed sabbatical from his stint at Sports Illustrated by taking his family to rural Collegeville, Minnesota, in order to interact with the coach and players at St. John’s, a small Benedictine college, which happens to have the best record in college football history. Through 2000, the Johnnies have won the conference title 23 times, advanced to the national playoffs 16 times, advanced to the title game 4 times, and have won it 3 times—thanks mainly to its head coach, John Gagliardi, the NCAA’s winningest active coach (second on the all-time list to the retired Eddie Robinson) and a regional celebrity. Gagliardi is a friendly and sometimes elusive, Yoda-like coach who insists that his quarterbacks call their own plays and who hides a strategist’s mind behind an unassuming style. But besides Gagliardi, and talented players such as Tom Linnemann, it is the atmosphere of the school itself that Murphy credits with the success of the Johnnies. At first experiencing some culture shock, Murphy and his family settle into life at this place where the Benedictine monks set the reflective tone and unhurried pace. And while Murphy gets involved with the team, he also reconnects with his wife, Laura, and his two young children. With appealing humor, Murphy recounts how he acquires newfound respect for what his wife goes through on a daily basis and how, in turn, Laura sees in her husband “more of the guy she fell in love with.” The epilogue gives a brief synopsis of the 2000–01 year, when the Johnnies lost to Mount Union in the Stagg Bowl.
More than just a game book of college football, The Sweet Season at the innocent appeal of sports in everyday life.Pub Date: Sept. 10, 2001
ISBN: 0-06-019547-9
Page Count: 352
Publisher: HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2001
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