Chad Pollard

I laced up my $100, Allen Iverson inspired basketball shoes and headed out into the bright lights. The huge crowd--it must have been at least twenty fans--sat on metal folding chairs just inches away from the sidelines, which made saving balls from going out-of-bounds quite dangerous. The backboards had no reinforcement, but none of us could dunk anyway. The floor of the court was not wood or composition rubber, but tile--like a bathroom. In fact, our opponents called our gym…