Chapter Ninety-Five: A Fiery Opening

After more than twenty minutes on the road, a luxury coach bearing the logo of Feizhi Group came to a stop outside the gates of Deyi Medical University’s gymnasium.

As the coach’s doors opened, one player after another stepped down in black tracksuits.

“Wow! A luxury coach!”

“Isn’t that a bit too extravagant?”

“They must be the team coming to play our university’s basketball squad today, right?”

“A coach that lavish? Only the wealthiest university in the East District could afford one. It has to be them, no doubt!”

“Did you see that? The coach has Feizhi Group printed on it. Could that be the company from the Fortune Global 500?!”

“Their clothes all say Li Group, too. That must be another Fortune Global 500 company!”

Who would have thought that a university basketball team ranked last for three years in a row would receive joint sponsorship from two Fortune Global 500 companies?

Those murmuring onlookers were students from Deyi Medical University, here to watch their school’s basketball team play its first game in this year’s national college basketball league.

In the tournament’s long-standing custom, once the knockout rounds began, the venue for each match would be determined by the team that had finished higher the previous year. Since most universities had their own gymnasiums, games were usually held at the home school’s court.

Seeing the crowd around them looking on with envy, jealousy, and undisguised resentment, Geng Haoshi could not help but beam with satisfaction. So this is what it feels like to be rich, he thought.

At 8:45 a.m., the players from Tiancheng Polytechnic University and Deyi Medical University began their pregame warm-ups.

Yu Manman sat on the sideline bench, with Li Shishi, Yang Mimi, and Lin Ling seated beside her.

At that moment, several boys in the stands behind Li Shishi were chatting.

“Our basketball team is really lucky to draw the last-place team in the very first round!”

“Exactly. That means we can save a lot of energy for the first game.”

“If the next rounds keep giving us these weak bottom-ranked teams, then our school team will definitely make the preliminaries this time!”

The knockout stage of the national college basketball league was played continuously, game after game. Any team that won on a given day had to face another winning team the next day, until twenty-five teams had been decided for the preliminaries.

So if the opponent was merely weak, or very weak, one could preserve a great deal of stamina and be better prepared for the next day’s game.

When Li Shishi heard those boys talking, she was instantly infuriated. She sprang to her feet, turned around toward the boys behind her, and said in a huff, “Don’t look down on people. Who wins and who loses is still up in the air! Hmph!”

Then, ignoring their stunned faces, she turned back around and sat down hard.

Yu Manman glanced at Li Shishi, who was still fuming beside her, and could not help but smile.

If Li Shishi had not stood up just then, she had been ready to lash the floor with her whip and make them shut their mouths.

One should not be deceived by Yu Manman’s usual icy, fierce demeanor toward her players. In truth, she was fiercely protective of her own. Only she had the right to scold or beat them; if anyone else dared show her players disrespect, she would certainly make them pay for it.

In last year’s national college basketball league, Deyi Medical University finished thirty-sixth in the East District and 269th nationwide. Although they had failed to reach the preliminaries last year, they had made it in both the year before and the year before that.

In order to ensure they could advance smoothly this year, Deyi Medical University had even specially invited an old alumnus, a former national team player of little renown, to coach the school squad.

Before long, the warm-up ended, and the match was about to begin. Both teams returned to the sideline to await their coach’s instructions.

With one leg crossed over the other, Yu Manman said languidly, “They’re pretty weak. Handle it yourselves.”

That was all? So casual? The players looked at one another, all except Geng Haoshi.

“Oh? Then should we just crush them?” he asked.

The others had all once experienced the misery of being eliminated in the very first round of the knockout stage, so they were all rather nervous. This was Geng Haoshi’s first time taking part in the national college basketball league, so he felt comparatively unburdened.

“That’s right, senior. We have to make them cry their eyes out!” Li Shishi chimed in, still clearly angry over what had just happened.

Geng Haoshi did not know the reason, but when he saw Yang Mimi nodding repeatedly in agreement, he shouted, “All right! Then let’s make them cry their eyes out!”

Yu Manman could also see that the others were tense, while Geng Haoshi alone looked as if he were brimming with fighting spirit and invincible under heaven.

“In that case... Little Two, you’ll start the first quarter.”

From Geng Haoshi’s overall performance over the past while, combined with the fact that he had posted the team’s best result in the assessment for forty-five percent shooting accuracy, a full fifty-six percent, Yu Manman had made him one of the school team’s core players.

A whistle blew.

With that single sharp note, the knockout match between Tiancheng Polytechnic University and Deyi Medical University officially began.

Tiancheng Polytechnic University’s starting lineup was: center Meng Lang, small forward Zhu Di, power forward Sun Peng, point guard Zhou Xiaoshan, and Geng Haoshi, their designated gap-filler, ready to appear wherever an opening existed.

At the tip-off, Meng Lang secured the ball and quickly passed it to Zhu Di.

Zhu Di drove hard into the paint.

At that moment, Geng Haoshi sped in from the right wing. As he neared the basket, he sprang upward.

“Brother Zhu Di, pass it!”

Seeing Geng Haoshi soar into the air, Zhu Di, with perfect understanding and precision, lofted the ball to the space just in front of Geng Haoshi’s raised right hand.

Watching the basketball arc toward his hand, Geng Haoshi, still airborne, caught it with his right palm and slammed it down hard toward the rim.

Bang!

A thunderous sound rang out as the ball went through the hoop.

The gymnasium fell utterly silent.

“Aaaah—Senior—so cool!”

Li Shishi’s shriek shattered the stillness of the entire gymnasium, and the stands erupted at once.

“Did I see that right? Was that a dunk just now?!”

“And an alley-oop, too!”

“He’s not even as tall as I am, is he? How could he jump that high?!”

Besides Yu Manman, Lin Ling, Yang Mimi, Li Shishi, and the Tiancheng Polytechnic University players who had not been sent onto the court, the stands were filled with Deyi Medical University students.

Originally, Lin Ling had planned to organize Geng Haoshi’s little circle of devoted admirers to cheer Tiancheng Polytechnic University on, but considering that the match would continue game after game and the costs of transportation, meals, and everything else, she had ultimately dropped the idea.

After Li Shishi screamed herself hoarse for Geng Haoshi, she did not forget to turn back and look at the boys who had angered her moments before...