The Gallaudet women’s basketball team has just defeated the number one ranked team in the country, the College of New Jersey. A reporter, not wanting to be insensitive, delicately broaches the obvious question: “How can you play so well despite your hearing impairment?” Nanette Virnig, a forward for Gallaudet, puts him at ease. “We’re not hearing impaired,” she says. “We’re deaf.”
Winning Sounds Like This is the remarkable story of the nation’s most unique and inspiring women’s basketball team and its 1999–2000 season. It is the touching chronicle of players who don’t hear buzzers or cheers, a coach who has never used a whistle, and a university that is a mecca for deaf culture throughout the world.
Wayne Coffey offers an intimate and unsparing look at the players’ lives on and off the court, their struggles to overcome mistreatment and misconceptions of the hearing world, and their deeply rooted
connection to one another.
Customer Review: It's about basketball!
Women's basketball books occupy a special niche in sportswriting. Writing about a male players, an author might ask, "How did they make it into the big time?" Writing about women, authors are forced to ask, "How did they get here at all?" This question adds a new dimension to the stories of women athletes. Players as young as today's collegians have had to overcome stereotypes. Many played on boys' teams -- or tried to. Gallaudet women have to overcome a double stereotype -- being not only female, but also deaf. There was a time when opposing teams would openly ridicule deaf basketball players. One player was devastated as a high school student when a coach from a Christian academy openly laughed at her speech. She made the team but never forgot the experience. However, the players want to be taken seriously as athletes. They do not want or need pity or condescension. To Coffey's credit, the book focuses on basketball, not deafness. We learn how players and teams compensate for a silent world. They can hear someone dribbling behind them. Referees are briefed: players can't hear the whistle so they may not stop playing immediately. And players on "hearing" teams need ASL translators who understand basketball terms. Yet ultimately the story is about the game: coming together as a team and working to win. Like any sports book, there are stories of triumphs as well as tears. We come to care about the players as they, like all college athletes, balance basketball and books. Perhaps the most difficult story takes place after the book was written. Ronda Jo Miller, an All-American center, cannot reach her goal of playing on a WNBA team. In stories posted on the internet, we can learn that she earned admiration of players and coaches during the tryout camp. She eventually played professionally in Denmark, with a "hearing" team, and has played in Kansas City with an expansion league, the WNBL. What happens to the other athletes? Playing on a winning team can change lives and I found myself hoping they will continue to feel like winners, long after the season has ended.
Customer Review: Page turning, inspirational read for all who love sports
Wayne Coffey not only knows sports but he knows how to write tight, action packed chapters. This story moves. Interpersed with backgrounds on the team members, the history of deaf culture, the story tracks the team through an incredible season. I am not an avid basketball fan nor did I have any particular interest in deaf culture, but this book captured my interest from the first page and held it throughout. A rare find.