The Final Four

Malcolm McBride is filled with excited anticipation as his team prepares for overtime. The coach tells the players that Troy will be deflated after McBride’s late equalizing shot. McBride sees his parents in the crowd, cheering him on. His father lost his job at a car manufacturer after 23 years on the assembly line, and McBride feels the need to provide for his family. After the coach finishes talking, McBride encourages his teammates to hit their opponents hard. In particular, he wants them to target Roko Bacic. A Michigan State youngster named Michael Jordan is summoned from the bench and told that he will be playing. In spite of his famous name, Jordan is an unspectacular player. McBride tells Jordan to “play like the man you’re named after” (15).

The narrative shifts to two years and seven months before the game, McBride returns home from a basketball game on a hot summer day. He spots some young men from his neighborhood. They encourage him to drink a beer with them, but McBride refuses. He notices that some of the young men are selling drugs. After a few years of being a troublemaker in high school, McBride has decided to focus his energy on his basketball career. He returns home to his poor neighborhood and jokes around with his older sister, Trisha. She is a skilled drummer and has played in front of packed stadiums with the school band. Her band has won competitions and played at the Olympics in China. Trisha issues instructions for dinner. They plan to celebrate their mama’s birthday that evening. First, Trisha has to do a favor for a friend. McBride rides the elevator up to his family’s apartment. By the time he reaches the right floor, he overhears a panicked crowd talking about gunshots.

Roko Bacic is pulled aside by his coach, Alvin Kennedy, as the Trojans prepare to reenter the game. Kennedy encourages Bacic, who can only look back regretfully on his failure to stop McBride’s late equalizer. Bacic returns to the court alongside his teammates. One of them, Crispin Rice, muses on the serious of basketball while glancing toward his fiancée on the sidelines. Her name is Hope Daniels, and she is a cheerleader for the Trojans. Bacic encourages Rice to relax and play his game.

The night before the game, Bacic and the rest of the squad were invited to a meal held by the family of one of the players, Aaron Boyce. Bacic, a journalism major, made detailed notes about his first experience of Cajun cuisine. Boyce’s mother cooked for more than 30 people and referred to her son’s teammates as her extended family.

The players return to the court, and Bacic faces off against McBride again. The experience of this extended family makes him miss his real relatives, who are still in Croatia. He has kept a journal for many years detailing his experiences in America. In a journal entry dating from ninth grade, Bacic reveals that his uncle Drazen is a journalist in Croatia and has inspired Bacic to write everything down. The journal’s entries include memories from Bacic’s early childhood, when his home country was ravaged by war. The war never really ended, and the country experiences terrible poverty. Basketball was a way for Bacic to escape the grinding poverty of day-to-day life, though his father believes that it is a children’s hobby. Bacic makes his high school basketball team in Croatia and becomes an important player, thanks to Drazen’s help. However, Drazen’s reporting on organized crime in Croatia makes him a target.

Crispin Rice is exhausted as he prepares to play for the Trojans in overtime. He is the tallest player on the team and the Trojans’ only response to the physically intimidating Spartans. The Spartan players taunt Rice with comments about his fiancée. The referee ends the conversation by re-starting the game. Rice wins the ball, and the Trojans attack through Bacic. Aaron Boyce misses a shot, but Rice makes the rebound. The Trojans score the first points of the overtime period. Rice risks an awkward glance at Hope.

That morning, a national newspaper ran a story on Hope. The story recounts how Rice once blew her a kiss from across the court before scoring a seemingly-impossible shot to win the game. He proposed after the dramatic victory; Hope accepted, and Rice has not lost a game since. However, he has struggled to score in recent games and admits that he has lost some confidence. The wedding between Hope and Rice is scheduled for after the NCAA tournament.

Michael Jordan is known as MJ. He may not be the most important player on the Spartans’ team, but he believes in his ability to make any shot. He plays a reserved role while McBride and Bacic battle against one another. Space opens for a pass to come from McBride to MJ, with MJ in a perfect shooting position. McBride does not pass. He takes the shot himself and misses. MJ tries to sink the rebound but collides with another teammate. Both fail, and McBride shouts at MJ.

A sports announcer speaks to the audience about Michael Jordan, the young player who shares a name with basketball’s most famous star. The announcer cuts to a one-on-one interview with MJ from earlier in the week. MJ admits that the famous name can be a burden. People ask him whether his father is the real Michael Jordan; MJ responds that he wishes this were the case, as it would mean that his father was still alive. He never really knew his father, who left behind a box of old possessions when he died. In the box was a basketball. MJ still has his father’s ball at home. MJ admits that his real hero is President Barack Obama, who had a similarly complicated relationship with his father. The interviewer acknowledges that MJ is not a starter for the Spartans and will likely not become a professional player. MJ explains that he is majoring in media and communications. One day, he hopes to have a job like the interviewer. The interview ends, and the sports announcer reveals that the real Michael Jordan is actually in the stadium to watch the second game of the evening.

McBride’s team trails, but he taunts Bacic while they play. Bacic responds, accusing McBride of making himself the center of attention. McBride bristles and disobeys his coaches by passing the ball to a teammate. He knows that the coach will not bench him. McBride fashions a scoring chance and levels the game. He follows this up with a quick attack on the distracted Crispin Rice and puts his team in front with two minutes of overtime left. McBride celebrates in front of the television cameras.

Two years before, McBride steps out of the elevator in his building to see his neighbors pounding on his apartment door. His weeping mother spots him and grabs hold of her son. Together with his father, they travel back down in the elevator. McBride knows that something has happened to his sister. They reach the ground floor, where an ambulance crew is bent over Trisha’s body. They are too late. The family weeps. McBride remembers seeing Trisha just 10 minutes before. Moments later, she was hit in the head by a stray bullet during a territory dispute between local gangs. No witnesses could offer a good description of the shooter, even if they wanted to. After the funeral, McBride struggles to shake off his anger at the world. Ten days later, he shouts at one of the local drug dealers. The other drug dealers try to diffuse his anger; violence is bad for business.

Bacic blames himself for allowing McBride to score. He decides that he should try to play the game in a different way: He needs to see the game in the same selfish way that McBride does. His coach agrees. On the next play, he feints as though he were about to try to score and then passes to a teammate. The Spartan players assume that every other player will be as selfish as McBride. They buy the feint, Bacic passes, and the Trojans score. The game is tied.

Bacic’s journal from years earlier describes the day his uncle Drazen was murdered. The organized crime syndicate placed a bomb in Drazen’s car. Bacic writes about his sadness and anger. Drazen refused to stop writing about crime in Croatia, and he was killed as a result. Bacic refuses to be scared, but his parents fear further violence. Bacic is sent to live in Montgomery, Alabama, with his cousins. He has little in common with his cousins, but he discovers a basketball court. His trash talking angers the other players.

Crispin Rice’s body has become numb from the physicality of the game. He barely feels opponents hitting against him. He slips on a wet patch on the court, and an opponent takes advantage. Rice is forced to foul the opponent to prevent a shooting chance. One more foul and he will be expelled from the game. The free throw puts the Spartans ahead, and the Trojan coach calls a time out. Rice promises to stand up against the tough Spartans and spots Hope as he returns to the court.

Three weeks earlier, Rice is basking in the aftermath of his team’s unexpected victory. He works as a motorcycle courier for a restaurant, and he desperately needs the money to save up for an engagement ring for Hope. They spent most of their fledgling relationship determined to remain casual and easygoing, so Rice was a little shocked when Hope demanded a diamond engagement ring in the wake of his surprise proposal. She is from a wealthy family, and Rice is from a more modest background, but he is determined to get her the ring he feels she deserves. He delivers food to save up the huge sum needed to purchase the ring. Every customer wants to talk to him about basketball. During one delivery, he is sure that he hears Hope’s voice from inside another man’s apartment.