Showing titles in Basketball

It's a story that weaves its way behind closed doors to reveal intricate machinations normally hidden from public view. Backed by extensive reporting and hundreds of interviews with top players, coaches, and executives, Jake Fischer chronicles secret pre-draft workouts, feuding between player agents and executives, surprising trade negotiations, interpersonal conflict within rosters, organizational power struggles, and the missteps behind infamous public relations fiascos, making for a fascinating and unmissable insider's look at the NBA.

In 1965, 18-year old Lew Alcindor played basketball for Coach John Wooden at UCLA. It was the beginning of what was to become a 50-year long relationship. On the court they broke basketball records. Off the court they transcended their athletic achievements to gain even wider recognition and tremendous national respect.

For far too long the mythology of Indiana basketball has been dominated by Hoosiers. Framed as the ultimate underdog, feel-good story, there has also long been a cultural debate surrounding the film. The Real Hoosiers sets out to illuminate the narrative that the film omits, the story of the unheralded Crispus Attucks Tigers, playing the game at the highest level in the 1950s in a racially divided Indiana.

If you ask a New York Knicks fan about Charles Oakley, you better prepare to hear the love and a favorite story or two. But his individual stats weren’t remarkable, and while he helped power the Knicks to 10 consecutive playoffs, he never won a championship. So why does he hold such a special place in the minds, hearts, and memories of NBA players and fans?

The record-holding two-time National Basketball Association champion reflects on his work ethic, his on-the-court friendships and rivalries, the great teams he's played for, and what it takes to have a long and successful career in this thoughtful, in-depth memoir. Playing in the NBA for 18 years, Ray Allen won championships with the Boston Celtics and the Miami Heat and entered the record books as the original king of the three-point shot. Known as one of the hardest-working and highest-achieving players in NBA history, he was legendary for his sharp shooting.

John Feinstein has already taken listeners into the inner circles of top college basketball programs in The Legends Club. This time, Feinstein pulls back the curtain on college basketball's lesser-known Cinderella stories - the smaller programs who no one expects to win, who have no chance of attracting the most coveted high school recruits, who rarely send their players on to the NBA. Feinstein follows a handful of players, coaches, and schools who dream, not of winning the NCAA tournament but of making it past their first or second round games.

The Last Shot: City Streets, Basketball Dreams is the “revelatory” (New York Times), “deeply empathetic” (New Yorker) true story of four teenagers attempting to escape the cycles of poverty, crime, and despair in 1990s Brooklyn by getting recruited to play college basketball. With poignant intimacy, Darcy Frey chronicles the aspirations of these young men, including the future superstar Stephon Marbury, who are among the most promising players in Coney Island.

Against a backdrop of ongoing resistance to racial desegregation and strident calls for Black Power, the NBA in the 1970s embodied the nation’s imagined descent into disorder. A new generation of Black players entered the league then, among them Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Spencer Haywood, and the press and public were quick to blame this cohort for the supposed decline of pro basketball, citing drugs, violence, and greed.

March 28, 1992. The final of the NCAA East Regional, Duke vs. Kentucky. Millions could say they witnessed the greatest game and the greatest shot in the history of college basketball. But it wasn't just the final play - an 80-foot inbounds pass with 2.1 seconds left in overtime - that made Duke's 104-103 victory so memorable. Each player and coach arrived at that point with a unique story to tell. In The Last Great Game, ESPN columnist Gene Wojciechowski turns the game we think we remember into a drama filled with suspense, humor, revelations, and reverberations.

Coach John Wooden's teams won 10 NCAA men's basketball championships at UCLA, and Sporting News magazine named him the greatest coach of all time. Decades after he retired, and now after his passing, his wisdom capsulized so clearly in his famous Pyramid of Success continues to guide new generations of athletes, coaches, and people of all walks of life. In The Greatest Coach Ever, the Fellowship of Christian Athletes features 40 tributes to him from athletes, coaches, and other influential leaders.

In Stephen Curry: The Inspiring Story of One of Basketball's Sharpest Shooters, you'll hear about the inspirational story of one of basketball's premier point guards, Stephen Curry. Curry has had an electrifying five-year career playing in the National Basketball Association. In this short audiobook, we will learn about how Steph became the star point guard that he is today.

A sweeping and revelatory history of basketball, drawing upon hundreds of hours of interviews with the greatest players, coaches, executives, and journalists in the history of the game. In an effort to tell the complete story of basketball in all its fascinating dimensions, acclaimed authors Jackie MacMullan, Rafe Bartholomew, and Dan Klores have compiled nearly a thousand hours' worth of interviews with a staggering number of basketball greats. The audiobook that grew out of those interviews is an extraordinary project and quite possibly the most ambitious basketball work ever made.

At basketball-crazy Durfee High School in Fall River, Massachusetts, junior guard Chris Herren carried his family’s and the city’s dreams on his skinny frame. His grandfather, father, and older brother had created their own sports legends in a declining city; he was the last, best hope for a career beyond the shuttered mills and factories. Herren was heavily recruited by major universities, chosen as a McDonald’s All-American, featured in a Sports Illustrated cover story, and at just seventeen years old became the central figure in Fall River Dreams, an acclaimed book about the 1994 Durfee team’s quest for the state championship.

Gehrig & The Babe: The Friendship and the Feud is the emotionally gripping, electrifying account of the relationship of legendary New York Yankee icons Lou Gehrig and Babe Ruth and the tragic behind-the-scenes fight that bitterly tore them apart until Gehrig was dying of a horrific disease. Written by historian and best-selling author Tony Castro, this critically acclaimed book tells their remarkable story that has often been lost between the pages of individual biographies of the American icons.

NBA Hall of Famer & 4x Champion, Shaquille O'Neal aka SHAQ, goes on the record from Shahookah Studios with co-host Adam Lefkoe to bring you nonstop laughter and unfiltered thoughts on sports, life, entertainment, and more. Along the way, they will be joined by a host of VIP guests for a high energy show you won't soon forget. New episodes every Thursday on YouTube at THE BIG PODCAST WITH SHAQ. This is a Playmaker & Big Podcast Network Exclusive.

Grant Hill always had game. His choice of college was a subject of national interest, and his arrival at Duke University cemented the program’s arrival at the top. In his freshman year, he led the team to its first NCAA championship and would eventually make three championship appearances in four years. His Duke career produced some of the most iconic moments in college basketball history, and Coach K proved to be a lifelong mentor.

Against the backdrop of one of the most tumultuous periods in recent American history, as riots and demonstrations spread across the nation, the Tigers of poor, segregated East High School in Columbus, Ohio, did something no team from one school had ever done before: They won the state basketball and baseball championships in the same year. They defeated bigger, richer, whiter teams across the state and along the way brought blacks and whites together, eased a painful racial divide throughout the state, and overcame extraordinary obstacles on their road to success.

For Merl Code, basketball was life. In college he played point guard for Clemson before turning pro. Later, when he pivoted to marketing, he found himself thrust into a startling world of profit-driven college basketball programs. He realized that the NCAA's amateurism rules could be used to exploit young athletes, and athletes of color in particular.

In this behind-the-scenes look at the making of a champion, the coach of the Villanova University men's basketball team shares his competitive and cooperative philosophy along with lessons from his coaching career and the story of his personal road to success.

If you’ve ever wondered what it’s like to be the best basketball player who ever lived, then Legends in Sports: Michael Jordan is the audiobook for you. In this exciting biography, Matt Christopher, the number one children’s sportswriter in America, puts you on the basketball court with the legendary superstar. Take an inside look at the triumphs, struggles, and statistics of one of the most determined players in National Basketball Association history.