Shaq Uncut: My Story by Shaquille O’Neal, Jackie Macmullan Page B
Authors: Shaquille O’Neal, Jackie Macmullan
Tags: BIO016000
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out back to go to the bathroom. So now it’s my turn and I have to take adump. I’m cleaning myself up and I get this idea. It’s definitely kind of gross, but I think it might work. So I come back into the locker room with a tissue covered in crap. I start chasing all my teammates around the room with it. They are all screaming and howling and laughing, and all of a sudden it’s time to go and they are loose. It worked.
Clarksville’s game plan was the same as everyoneelse’s—try to get O’Neal in foul trouble and force him to make free throws. They had a post player named Tyrone Washington who kept stepping out to shoot fifteen-footers. He had twenty-four points at halftime, but we made a decision to have me stay home and protect the basket instead of flying out there and trying to guard him from the perimeter.
He kept baiting me, saying, “You can’t guard me.”I just laughed at him. I told him, “Why don’t you come inside where the real big boys play?”
We got an early lead and never really gave it up. Of course I got into foul trouble again and the nine-or ten-point lead we had going into the fourth quarter was disappearing because I was on the bench with four fouls. Coach Madura turned to me and said, “Can you play without fouling?”
I told him I could.I decided I wouldn’t go for any blocks and I wouldn’t dunk unless it was a clear path so they couldn’t call a charge on me. The first time I got the ball when I checked back in, I made a move like I was going to the rim to jam it, but instead I pulled up and hit a jumper.
The crowd kind of gasped, like they were surprised I could do anything other than dunk. The truth was I took jumpers in practiceall the time. I had three-point range. Ask my teammates. I drained them all the time. Coach Madura told me once if we ever needed a three-pointer at the end of the game he’d consider letting me take it because I could hit it and he knew no one would ever be able to block it.
It just didn’t make sense in games to take those kind of shots when I could just as easily slam the ball through. It wasall about high percentage shots. My field goal percentage in my senior year of high school was 71 percent.
We ended up holding off Clarksville to win the state championship. Even though I told myself I wouldn’t go after any more blocks, I did swat one more shot away in the final minutes. It was one of Tyrone Washington’s jumpers. I couldn’t help it. He scored only five points in the second half.When reporters asked me about him I told them, “He said I couldn’t stay with him. Obviously, that was a lie.”
When the buzzer sounded, I actually lost my breath for a minute. All these guys I loved, my best friends, were on the court with me and we had finally done it. It was an amazing feeling—but, I realized, mostly a feeling of relief. I didn’t realize until it was over how much pressure Ihad put on myself.
Not long after we won, Coach Madura announced he was retiring. He was no dummy. I was graduating and, as he put it, “There will be too many people wanting to get even with me.”
Winning that championship meant the world to him. We could all see that.
Right after the game Coach Madura pulled me into one of the stalls in the locker room and grabbed me and hugged me, and thenhe started to tear up. It was the first time I had ever seen a grown man cry. He told me, “I knew when you arrived at school you were going to be a great player, but I never allowed myself to think we’d win the whole thing. You’re going to do great things in college.”
I didn’t really know what to say. It kind of made me uncomfortable at the time. Here I am, this seventeen-year-old kid who hasspent most of his life trying to be cool, and now my coach is crying in my arms. I wanted to say to him,
Get ahold of yourself, man!
I didn’t get it at the time.
I do now.
JUNE, 1990
Baton Rouge, Louisiana
T he LSU basketball players were scrimmaging in the dungeon,
Clarksville’s game plan was the same as everyoneelse’s—try to get O’Neal in foul trouble and force him to make free throws. They had a post player named Tyrone Washington who kept stepping out to shoot fifteen-footers. He had twenty-four points at halftime, but we made a decision to have me stay home and protect the basket instead of flying out there and trying to guard him from the perimeter.
He kept baiting me, saying, “You can’t guard me.”I just laughed at him. I told him, “Why don’t you come inside where the real big boys play?”
We got an early lead and never really gave it up. Of course I got into foul trouble again and the nine-or ten-point lead we had going into the fourth quarter was disappearing because I was on the bench with four fouls. Coach Madura turned to me and said, “Can you play without fouling?”
I told him I could.I decided I wouldn’t go for any blocks and I wouldn’t dunk unless it was a clear path so they couldn’t call a charge on me. The first time I got the ball when I checked back in, I made a move like I was going to the rim to jam it, but instead I pulled up and hit a jumper.
The crowd kind of gasped, like they were surprised I could do anything other than dunk. The truth was I took jumpers in practiceall the time. I had three-point range. Ask my teammates. I drained them all the time. Coach Madura told me once if we ever needed a three-pointer at the end of the game he’d consider letting me take it because I could hit it and he knew no one would ever be able to block it.
It just didn’t make sense in games to take those kind of shots when I could just as easily slam the ball through. It wasall about high percentage shots. My field goal percentage in my senior year of high school was 71 percent.
We ended up holding off Clarksville to win the state championship. Even though I told myself I wouldn’t go after any more blocks, I did swat one more shot away in the final minutes. It was one of Tyrone Washington’s jumpers. I couldn’t help it. He scored only five points in the second half.When reporters asked me about him I told them, “He said I couldn’t stay with him. Obviously, that was a lie.”
When the buzzer sounded, I actually lost my breath for a minute. All these guys I loved, my best friends, were on the court with me and we had finally done it. It was an amazing feeling—but, I realized, mostly a feeling of relief. I didn’t realize until it was over how much pressure Ihad put on myself.
Not long after we won, Coach Madura announced he was retiring. He was no dummy. I was graduating and, as he put it, “There will be too many people wanting to get even with me.”
Winning that championship meant the world to him. We could all see that.
Right after the game Coach Madura pulled me into one of the stalls in the locker room and grabbed me and hugged me, and thenhe started to tear up. It was the first time I had ever seen a grown man cry. He told me, “I knew when you arrived at school you were going to be a great player, but I never allowed myself to think we’d win the whole thing. You’re going to do great things in college.”
I didn’t really know what to say. It kind of made me uncomfortable at the time. Here I am, this seventeen-year-old kid who hasspent most of his life trying to be cool, and now my coach is crying in my arms. I wanted to say to him,
Get ahold of yourself, man!
I didn’t get it at the time.
I do now.
JUNE, 1990
Baton Rouge, Louisiana
T he LSU basketball players were scrimmaging in the dungeon,
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