Catch a Star

by Tamika Catchings

  Oh, God, I prayed. I chose this. It was my doing. Somehow, I asked God, get me through. It was an exercise in faith, which you can’t really have in the presence of doubt. But my faith was wobbly. So was the courage I’d briefly found in deciding to move—every bit seemed to spill out of me with all those tears.

  The next morning, with eyes still puffy from crying the night before, I walked into Duncanville High School and prepared for the worst. I realized how alone I was.

  And yet, quickly, I wasn’t alone. Being new was okay.

  Those weeks before school I’d made my way to the open gym and the outdoor courts in the surrounding neighborhood. The guys there noticed my skills.

  “You’re good,” one of them said.

  With that, we started playing. He and his buddies welcomed me, and in the days following they looked for me. I’d go back to the gym or the court, and the same guys would be there, and we’d divide into teams and play. It was so much easier for me to meet people on the court. I didn’t have to talk a lot. I relied on the language of the game. So in those few weeks before school I got to know some kids, enough that one of the guys, a boy named Sam, decided to give me a nickname.

  “We’re going to call you Shaqfu” he said. Some kind of twist on Shaquille O’Neal’s name.

  “Shaqfu?” Even if I hadn’t had trouble hearing, I would have checked what he was saying.

  “Yeah,” Sam said. “Shaqfu because you’re so much taller than everybody, and because you’re going to stomp on any of the girls, even the best.”

  “Because you’re good,” another guy said. “Because you dominate the game.”

  Shaqfu? I gave Sam and his buddies the eye. “Yeah, that’s not my name,” I said, but deep down, liking that nickname or not, I knew I was in. I had respect from some kids already.

  Once again, basketball would get me through.

  And so I discovered that first day at Duncanville High School that the respect was waiting for me.

  The guys I’d met on the court were welcoming. They acknowledged me in the hallway. They called me by that nickname, which I didn’t really like but knew was a term of endearment and acceptance. It wasn’t like other names I’d been called and dreaded through that long night before.

  I was still the new girl, still wasn’t sure if I would belong here. But I wasn’t called out for not fitting in. Rather, I was standing out for being special. Standing out suddenly wasn’t so bad.

  For the first time, being new and special was a way to connect. Kids would check on me. “Oh, you’re new. Do you need anything? Finding your way around all right?”

  It was refreshing. There was kindness. This wasn’t a replay of Abilene. I had proven myself, and my reputation had followed me. And I was discovering that I had changed. For all my shyness still, I was a little more outgoing and more comfortable around people than when I was younger. I had learned some things watching Tauja around people. In a way, because of that, she was still with me.

  And God was there, answering my prayers. I realized that, in fact, it wasn’t basketball that got me through.

  When I was growing up, we regularly went to church. It was important to my parents and it was what we did as a family. I’m not sure it was important to me so much.

  Like a lot of kids, I guess, I didn’t think a lot about God in a personal way. Church was a place I should go on Sundays, and it reinforced for me as a kid what was right and wrong. I remember being involved in Children’s Church, Teen Ministry, Kids of the Kingdom, Vacation Bible School, and in whatever else our parents wanted us to participate at different times in my life. Church put the Bible in my life in the form of Bible stories. That was good, but I don’t think I ever met God in a personal way.

  When we moved to Duncanville, Mom and I went to Oak Cliff Bible Fellowship, a church pastored by Tony Evans. I started to experience God in a different way. I’m not saying my faith became all it should be. But I found a sense of faith something more connected to life than it had been for me before that. It could have been getting older, or simply opening up to receive the Word. Dr. Evans taught the Bible in a way that met me right where I was, or in whatever situation I was dealing with. His teachings gave me a sense of purpose and an understanding of how God had given me all the gifts I possessed. I experienced a true awakening moment to what it meant to be a Christian.

  During that time I also developed a keen interest in Christian music. Preachers tell you what you put into your mind and into your body has a direct effect on you. While you may hear me listening to Christian or country or something else, I like music that has a good message and sometimes just a good beat to nod your head to. That’s the power of music.

  Interestingly, one of the cheerleaders at Duncanville High School was Anthony Evans, Tony Evans’s son. We became friends, and we’ve kept in touch through the years. Of course, he’s gone on to become a stellar Christian music artist and has even performed on The Voice.

  In the next days and weeks, I tried out for sports, made both the volleyball and basketball teams, and started getting to know the players. We ate lunch together, met up after class, and hung out after school and on weekends. I didn’t have Tauj and it wasn’t the same, but it was all right. I was doing okay.

  Duncanville High School had strong sports programs. They’d won titles in soccer, baseball, and basketball, including a number of titles in girls’ basketball. Duncanville took its basketball program seriously. However, in recent years there had been a drought. The girls’ basketball team hadn’t won a championship since 1990.

  Our volleyball team was led by Coach Jan Briggs, who was a veteran volleyball coach and had had a very successful career. Under her leadership that year, our volleyball team won the state championship.

  My success on the volleyball court didn’t hurt my early standing with the other kids in high school. But I was beginning to realize that the kids, while being impressed with my athletic ability, actually liked me for who I was. I relaxed some, and found myself with some good friends to hang out with.

  The year before I got there, the Duncanville girls’ basketball team had made it to the state finals. It was a good team, but they lost the title game to Austin Westlake in overtime. Three starters, however, returned the next year, when I got there. They had strong talent. What they lacked was a center.

  My new coach, Sara Hackerott, had started coaching the team in 1993–1994, taking over for a legend, Sandra Meadows, who led the Duncanville Pantherettes during the late eighties. At one point her teams compiled a consecutive winning streak of 134 games. Coach Meadows had contracted cancer, later passing away in 1994. Now Coach Hackerott, once Meadows’s assistant coach, was making her own mark, determined for the team to overcome its disappointment the year before.

  She says she didn’t really know what she was getting when I walked onto the court at Duncanville. She’d heard some things about me, but kids come and go, she would say, and all kinds of talk precedes those who transfer in. “You never know how much of the reputation you hear is real, and what a girl can actually do on the court,” she says.

  Coach Hackerott tells a story about me. One afternoon in October, a few of the girls on the team were in the gym hanging out, some practicing certain shots and moves. Her back was to the court as she was doing some paperwork. At one point she heard a rim rattle. Her head popped up. As she tells it, she was surprised to hear that sound—it was only heard when the guys played, guys who could jump so high as to pull down on the rim. There were no guys in the gym.

  Coach Hackerott turned around and saw me. “What did you just do, Tamika?” she asked.

  I looked at her sheepishly, with a slight smile.

  “Whatever it was, I want you to back up and do it again,” she said.

  I just looked at her. I didn’t say anything. Then I took a few steps back to the free throw line, took several quick running leaps toward the basket, jumped high, and batted the rim.

  The rim rattled once again.

 
; Coach Hackerott smiled. Later she would say that put a punctuation mark on what she’d heard about me. It was then she really knew what I could do on the court.

  Of course, I’d played center back at Stevenson. Coaches in high school didn’t know quite how to play me—at the time, I was taller than many other high school players, so I was often used at center. Growing up, I’d developed moves like a forward, and I knew how to back into the basket against a defender, then move fast enough to swing one way or the other for a close shot. I often brought the ball up the court, like a point guard. Some referred to me as a “point center.”

  At Duncanville, I was often used at center and filled a hole they had in their starting five. We did well that year, finishing the regular season with a 29–2 record.

  As we entered the playoffs, we were ranked second in the state of Texas and fifteenth in the nation.

  Meanwhile, back in Chicago, Tauja and the Stevenson Patriots had finished 34–1 and were entering their playoffs as the favored team, likely to repeat our championship run the year before.

  Of course, there was media interest in the two of us, now on different teams, both vying for titles in different states. Dad would be interviewed about that and would suggest that we both could win state championships that year. Dad’s comments could be interpreted as pride or as pressure. Sometimes I wasn’t sure how to take them.

  Duncanville didn’t make it through even the areas (quarterfinals), disappointing everyone. Stevenson stayed strong and tore through teams, while Tauja was relentless on both ends of the court—proving that she had just as much skill as I did. As Tauja led the Patriots to the championship round, Mom and I flew up to Chicago to surprise her.

  She was shooting around right before the game and I was positioned up in the stands behind the backboard. After one of her shots floated to the basket, she looked up and saw me. Our eyes connected and she flew off the court up into the stands.

  “Surprise!!!” I screamed.

  What a happy moment! We exchanged a few words, and then she flew back down to the court, looking back to make sure I was really there. I was so proud of my big sis. Tauja led Stevenson to its second straight state title and we all celebrated as if I were still there. I was truly happy for Tauja and for Stevenson. And while I was disappointed that Duncanville didn’t do better in the playoffs, I was happy for the move I’d chosen to make and the year that was. And secretly, I was relieved that Tauja and I didn’t wind up in some cheesy headline about us both winning state championships.

  I had left the Catchings Sisters act far behind.

  In basketball, there’s always a tension between playing as a team and asserting yourself as the go-to player. It was never my style to assert myself that way, and it still isn’t, but it became more of an issue when I got to Duncanville.

  No one player, no matter how talented, can be so good as to take over a game single-handedly. One person can’t beat five opposing players on her own. And when one player begins to take over a game, her teammates usually start to stand around and watch. If you’re not careful, you can take the rest of your teammates out of the game.

  I’d always thought of myself as a team player, and that’s how I enjoyed playing the game—passing off the ball to the open shooter, running plays, drawing players to defend me, then dropping the ball off to my teammate who was streaking to the basket. That’s what good basketball is all about. And I think at Duncanville, all my instincts for team play became even more developed. But there was a point when I needed to play differently.

  I was still just a kid, but I was aware that others on our team were looking at me as playing on a higher level. I knew through me their game could be lifted higher, and through that sense of team we would be successful.

  I realized I’d not just relied on Tauj; I’d made her my crutch. I’d leaned on her for a long time in every way, and in doing so I was limiting what God had for me. I think God dares us to step out on our own in life. He’s saying, “Trust me, I’ve got you.” As you do so, yes, there can be doubt (sure was for me), but you find out God has given you what you need to succeed. I was a stronger person than I knew. Not just in basketball but also in life.

  In Texas, I found something I didn’t expect. I found myself. I had to ask and answer all kinds of questions: Who am I going to be? What am I going to stand for? Where am I going to go? What am I going to do with what I have and who I am? I hadn’t chosen detachment from Tauj, just like she hadn’t chosen to abandon me. We each chose a different path that would allow us to live out our very best.

  And in that, God was helping me find my own self, my own talent, and my own potential.

  In my senior year at Duncanville, everyone was determined to do something about the disappointing ending of the year before.

  Coach Hackerott put in new offensive plays designed to optimize the talents of our best players. In addition to our standard offensive plays, where we would pass and dribble the ball around to find the open player, there were now new offense sets that stacked the play in favor of a particular player. Coach would say it was designed to allow any particular player to create her own offense, to make her own play, and to score on the basis of her own talent.

  Coach would say later that that was a lot to ask of juniors and seniors in high school—to manage two different offenses and to switch them on the fly—but we were up to the task. And while it was difficult for us to execute, it was even harder to defend against.

  I don’t think I was aware that Coach Hackerott was putting in these plays for me at the time. Others on our team were good as well, and the plays could be run through them also. But I later learned that Coach really designed these offensive sets for my sake, to optimize my talents on the court. And to some degree, she had to do so, because before I hadn’t been taking the shots during games I could have and should have.

  We started the season by winning. And winning some more.

  It wasn’t just the new offense that got us wins. In fact, we used it selectively. We had a strong team, and we were good.

  One oddity of that year was a game where I was able to score a “quintuple-double.” People refer to a double-double as a game where a player scores in double digits in two statistical categories—for example, ten or more points and ten or more steals. Sometimes you hear of a triple-double. For that there are five overall statistical categories: points, rebounds, assists, steals, and blocks. And in one game in 1997, I scored double digits in all five categories. What can I say? I was everywhere, and the passion that I play with was seen in every play—offensively and defensively.

  Duncanville plowed through the regular season, living up to the high reputation of Duncanville girls’ basketball from years before. And by the end of the regular season, we were undefeated. How far would we go this year?

  We were determined not to get sabotaged by an early ejection from the playoffs. And we didn’t. In fact, we breezed through the playoffs, beating opponents by a dozen or so points each time. And we landed in the finals, facing a very strong team from Alief Elsik.

  The championship game in Austin, Texas, was hard-fought. Alief Elsik was a very good team. They were as strong a defensive team as we’d played all year. And we might have been dealing with nerves and the game hype at the outset. We kept the game close, but it wasn’t until halfway through the second quarter that we started playing our game, not just playing a game.

  We would lead the game much of the rest of the way, but we never led by a lot. And we all knew that in the final minutes of any basketball game a team can lose through bad foul shooting or getting rattled by a full-court press.

  At one point in the final minutes, during a time-out, Coach Hackerott pulled me aside. “When the ball comes to you,” she said, “take it to the basket. They can’t stop you.”

  This wasn’t our standard offense and it wasn’t the new offense. Coach was making it the “Tamika” offense. For the shy team player I was, this was difficult. I wanted so much to play the team ga
me. And this was in the highest-pressure moment of the whole season, and of my entire high school basketball career.

  Coach was giving me permission to take over the game. She was putting the ball into my hands and telling me to win the game.

  Back on the court, we advanced the ball, and soon enough the ball came to me. I held it a minute on the perimeter, my defender playing me tough. But I saw my advantage, nudged left but dribbled right, and quickly sliced past into the lane, dribbling around another player. I launched myself toward the basket in one, two leaping steps, finally able to bank the ball and see it fall through the net.

  I can’t say that was the turning point in the game, though perhaps it was the point when we really took control. But it was a turning point for me. It was a moment when I could bear the weight of a team on my own shoulders and perform at my greatest ability to score and lead us to a win.

  Both the concept of team and the concept of leadership are important. In many ways, my future career in basketball would become a pendulum swing between both, and I would learn lesson after lesson about each one as I grew in my abilities and opportunities.

  Yes, we won the championship game.

  For me, it was some measure of accomplishment to win state, fulfilling my dad’s wishes, although a year late. I also found some satisfaction in winning two state titles in different states, Illinois and Texas.

  Winning this way—after leaving my team of the Catchings Sisters behind, discovering a new team in Duncanville, and then stepping up in my senior year to be a leader, as shy and young and uncomfortable as I was—felt good.

  And now as I looked forward to graduating from high school, the question was not what I would do with my life. The only question was where I would play.