The Super Hoopers_ The basketball tournament of dreams

For my cousin Juanma
and those Extremadura summers
that heard our childhood dreams
A. C.
THE SUPER HOOPERS VOL. 1
The Basketball Tournament of Dreams
First edition: February 2024
© Text: Alberto Casamayor Otero, 2024
© Illustrations: Palma&Kako, 2024
Translation from Spanish: Carolyn Louise Black, 2024
© Editorial el Pirata, 2024
Sabadell (Barcelona)
info@editorialelpirata.com
editorialelpirata.com/en
All rights reserved
ISBN: 978-84-19898-07-4
Legal deposit: B 11169-2023
Printed in China
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THE BASKETBALL TOURNAMENT
OF DREAMS
Written by
Alberto Casamayor
Illustrated by
Palma&Kako

Over
heeerrrre!
I’M JOEL,
I’M NINE YEARS OLD,
AND UNTIL A FEW WEEKS BACK
I DIDN’T EVEN
LIKE BASKETBALL.
BUT HERE I AM…

My field goal percentage is soooooo low that
any one of my teammates would pass the ball to
an orangutan before they’d pass to me.
1
Bermúdez, who’s point guard of my team and my
best buddy, makes a fake, but he’s really unlucky;
the ball bounces off his foot, and he loses it.
Bounce, bounce, the ball’s coming in my direction.
Five seconds to go.
I catch it.
Why have I spent the whole game asking for it?
I’m scared to death!
The crowd roars, a lady flings up her arms, and
the salami goes flying out of her sandwich.
The coach yells:
“Shoooooooooot!”

I’m shaking all over.
The tallest player in the other team, who looks
about the height of three giraffes to me, stretches
out his arms to block the basket.
Four seconds!
I turn around so he doesn’t take the ball from me.
Shoooooooooot!

With my back to the basket, I shoot.
The whole world seems to move in slow
motion: The ball rises and curves in front of the
scoreboard and stopwatch.
Two seconds!
It starts to fall.
I realize it’s not going anywhere near the basket.
We’re going to lose the championship.
Shoot!
Shoot!
No! Not him!
No! Not him!

But wait up, wait up… I told you I didn’t even use
to like basketball.
Do you want to know how it all began?
What brought me and my buddies to the big
final of our town's Youth Basketball Tournament,
sponsored by Meaty Beans, ‘The veggie burger of
your dreams’?
Well, let’s go back in time a little—you don’t want
to miss this bit.
BOING!
8

JOEL
2
That’s me.
There’s nothing I like better than Mr. Prodigy comics.
He’s my favorite superhero because he can escape
from any kind of trap,
no matter what.
I dream of going to
a comic convention,
but my parents
are both freelancers
so they don’t have
the time or money
to take me.
Badly-combed,
wavy hair
I’ll let you in on a secret:
When I’m in my room,
I make little balls
from muffin liners
and throw them
into the waste basket
with my back turned!
And they often go in.
Well, actually, just twice…
in my entire life…
Ketchupstained
T-shirt
9
Mr. Prodigy
comic
Injury from
last game

It’s the first Thursday of the school year, a few
weeks before the shot I was telling you about, and
I'm in my physical education class.
We’re changing in the locker room when we hear
that our teacher—who we all call Pithicus, or
πTQs, because he’s supposed to have been around
since before dinosaurs walked the Earth—has
retired.
“What a tragedy,” I say to Bermúdez.
“Yeah, he was an understanding kind of GUY; we
passed the class without really having to TRY.”
Bermúdez and I think physical effort is overrated.
And Mr. Pithicus agreed.
If we managed to stay in line and run around the
schoolyard without hurting ourselves, he gave us
good grades.
Even if we didn’t run, as long as we didn’t hurt
ourselves he still gave us good grades.
A deep voice shakes the locker room walls and
fluorescent ceiling lights.
The voice yells:
10

HEY!
My name
is EVANS…
…and you can call me
Evans, Mr. Evans,
or, if you prefer:
Eh! Vans!
We’re going
to get in shape.
Aaaall out
in two lines!

We rush out like rats from a sinking ship and get
a real shock.
Facing the parallel bars, a circuit’s been put
together which includes jumping over a vaulting
horse, somersaulting over a beam, hanging from
some ladders, and climbing up those ladders to
reach a rope which we have to use to get up to the
ceiling.
I have no idea how it happened, but for the first
time in my life, I’m at the front of the line.
I’m Joel,
I don’t know
if the other teacher
talked to you
about me…

No, Mr. Pithicus clearly didn’t talk to him about
me. I swallow hard and look at the vaulting horse.
I swear I order my legs to run and jump, my
hands to grip the vaulting horse and push me up,
but…my legs are shaking so much that I stagger
jerkily to the vaulting horse.
I want to jump, but I don’t have enough
momentum. My sweaty hands slip and…
He’s crashed into
the vaulting horse!
GH!
UGH
One thing seems
pretty CLEAR:
Gym is going
to hurt a bit
this YEAR.
Everything’s spinning. If I almost break my neck
on the first day, how am I going to survive an
entire year of gym?
13