HAWKEYE HAND

The Final Chapter Of Extra Point Is The Tragic Tale Of A Man Graced With
Immeasurable Talent But A Penchant For Self-Destruction.

When Hawkeye Hand was found behind a dumpster at Gene's IGA in Ellsworth,
Kan., with a needle in his arm and a gun in his hand, the people that found
him knew his dream of making an NBA roster was over.

It all started in the third grade on the asphalt courts of Ellsworth
Elementary School. The young Hawkeye would go there every day to watch as
the older boys played basketball at recess. One fateful day Hawkeye decided
to join in the fray.

He practiced every day at his house a few miles outside of the city on the
little goal his grandfather put up for him. He was a natural -- a silky
smooth ball handler with a beautiful touch around the rim and a jump shot
that would make Reggie Miller jealous.

After mastering the elementary school courts, he went to Kanopolis Middle
School in Kanopolis, Kan. He took a couple of years off basketball in the
fifth and sixth grade, and that is when he first discovered drugs. The
older guys he used to play with in elementary school introduced Hawkeye to
the cruel and twisted world of marijuana.

Blazing up the courts and the street scene, Hawkeye attracted the attention
of some NAIA coaches. When he was a seventh-grader, he averaged a triple
double in points, rebounds, and assists. He also owns the title of the only
seventh-grader in Kanopolis Bulldog history to ever break a backboard in a
game.

His eighth-grade year was when people saw that this young basketball
prodigy was headed for big time trouble. In the middle of his eighth grade
basketball season, Hawkeye was leading his team to an undefeated season
when he was arrested for assault and battery after beating a younger
player, whom we will call Khomas Tepka, mercilessly for stealing his fruit
cocktail at lunch.

He was forced to quit the team and was sent to a maximum-security juvenile
detention center. He quickly made friends with all of the other inmates
there because of his skills on the basketball courts.

After his release, he went back to Ellsworth for high school and a fresh
start. He was fine during his first two years of school, scoring 40 points
a game and grabbing 15 boards.

He was poised to finish his final two years of high school and declare
himself eligible for the NBA draft when once again his older friends
pressured him into experimenting with hard drugs, which eventually led to
Hawkeye's hard fall.

At first, he was under control. He traveled the country playing in AAU
tournaments, dominating better-known players in bigger cities. He torched
various fabled courts like those at Rucker Park, and began to make a name
for himself outside of rural Kansas.

While his life on the court was magic, his life off the court was tragic.
He was falling deeper in the hole his so-called friends were dragging him
into. He dug so deep he could not dig himself out, and his story eventually
lead him to the alley.

I do not know where Hawkeye is today, but he is not the success he should
have been. He had all the talent in the world, but instead he became one of
the biggest failures.