With the high school basketball season firmly underway, I've been getting slightly nostalgic. While basketball was far from my favorite sport, there were a few moments in my short-lived hoops career at dear old Jefferson Central that prominently stand out.

There's the game my senior year in which I literally fouled out in the first approximately 25 seconds of the first quarter.

Then of course there's the moment when one of the fiercest competitors in the league, Downsville's Kevin Reed, jokingly asked me not to hurt him in the game. I deadpanned something about trying not to break his neck in my coldest voice, which seemed to freeze his blood a little.

And then there's the whopper. The story to end all stories. This one's a doozy, so grab some hot chocolate and get ready for the long haul.

It started during a basketball practice one day while my best friend Tom and I were shooting around. As we chatted, he told me about a brilliant idea he called the "motivator builder."

It was simple in concept. I would go up for a jump shot and Tom would block it hard, stuffing it right back down my throat. Then he would take a shot, and I would block him even harder. In theory, this would get us so pumped up that we would be twice as good for the rest of practice.

I thought this was the most amazing idea since man put cheese inside the pizza crust. Blocking shots was my favorite part of playing basketball and, next to fouling out, the only thing I was good at. I was gung-ho from the get-go.

I went up for a simple outside shot and Tom blocked me, shooting the ball across the court.

Awesome! I shouted as I ran to fetch the ball, so stoked at what had happened that I forgot how much I hate running.

Tom took the ball, dribbled it a few times and went up for a shot. I leaped in the air with reckless abandon, a frenzied look in my eye, arms swinging wildly ready to knock the ball to the moon. Except, as I rose a little higher, I realized something was missing: Tom and that big orange ball.

Houston, we have a problem.

Tom, a senior and a year older than me, had head-faked and driven in for an easy lay-up, making me look like a colossal idiot. I'd been bamboozled.

After landing (it didn't take long, I was and still am an overweight white boy), I stood there in total shock trying to comprehend what had just transpired. Tom stood underneath the basket doubled over in laughter. Eventually I realized that Tom's scam was pretty funny, but I also realized something else: this injustice would not go unpunished.

Sporadically throughout the remainder of the season, I attempted to stuff Tom's shots any time I thought he wasn't paying attention. I failed in this endeavor every time, my soul dying a little with each miss. After a while, I gave up, accepting the futility of my efforts and Tom's superior intelligence.

Until the final game of the season, that is.

Our record stood at 3-16. We were miserable; a team without hope, and by this point in the season we didn't give a hoot. Tom and I had been riding the pine most of the first half (they were actually folding metal chairs, but "riding the pine" just flows better) and when we came out for the half-time warm-ups we were flying high and riding loose.

As the buzzer sounded signaling the end of warm-ups and as the teams headed back to their benches, I noticed Tom lingering for one last shot. As he lined up for a quick jumper, my legs propelled me forward and I leapt into the air. WHAM!

Tom didn't play in the second half of that game. Not only had I finally exacted my revenge on him, but I had blocked the last shot he would ever take as a high school basketball athlete.

I'd like to say that Tom never played ball again. That I had crushed his hoop dreams with such finality that he couldn't so much as look at a basketball without feeling those pangs of defeat again and again.

While that isn't the case, I did in fact get the last laugh. And sometimes, that's better than a fantasy.