The Miracle of St. Anthony: A Season with Coach Bob Hurley Inside Basketball's Most Improbable Dynasty Book

The inspiring story of an inner-city basketball team and the fiery coaching genius who leads them to greatness. On the mean streets of Jersey City, St. Anthony High School is more than a tiny brick schoolhouse-it is a beacon of hope. Though the school constantly teeters on the brink of bankruptcy, it is held together by two feisty Felician nuns devoted to helping students overcome the scourges of poverty by preparing them for college careers and a chance at a brighter future. And each year from this student body of just over two hundred, Coach Bob Hurley forges an elite nationally ranked basketball team through hard work, his coaching genius, and the sheer force of his persona. In Bob Hurley's gym there are no earrings, no tattoos, and there is never any backtalk. There is only hard-nosed, old-fashioned basketball executed in its purest form, with precision passing and a relentless, swarming defense that has brought 800 victories, twenty-two state titles, and two national championships to a program that has sent over a hundred players to college scholarships. But in the fall of 2003, Hurley will put it all on the line, and fight to build a team of young men he calls "the most dysfunctional group I've had in thirty-two years" into champions, while keeping the school he loves alive to continue its educational mission at any cost. In The Miracle of St. Anthony, one of America's most acclaimed sportswriters, Adrian Wojnarowski, brings the stories of this coaching legend and his St. Anthony Friars players to vivid life. A four-year starter torn between what he could've been and the pull of the streets must prove to his teammates that he can lead when it really counts. a senior haunted by a family tree of drug dealers tries to redeem himself in his coach's eyes. And the privileged son of a suburban Connecticut family who has come to Jersey City to play for Hurley and feed his NBA dreams must find a way to win when his shooting stroke goes cold. In a dramatic narrative, Wojnarowski takes you from the explosive locker room speeches to the final whistle on the pressure-packed hardcourt at the championship final. The Miracle of St. Anthony is a stirring portrait of basketball and life in the inner city, a heartrending story of hope that is sure to become a classic.Read More