The Golden Age of Basketball

Thanks to Nate-Sermonde's connections, Gan Guoyang got himself familiar with The Warriors.

In early November, The Warriors' games were mainly held at their home court in Oakland and surrounding cities, which gave them blocks of time to train.

If it happened to be a Saturday or Sunday, Gan Guoyang would rise early to help Gan Youwei with miscellaneous tasks around the restaurant.

Then, in the morning, Gan Youwei would prepare a dozen or so exquisite Chinese meal boxes, which Gan Guoyang would pack in a large food container and take to The Warriors' training center by bus, providing the team with lunch.

The meal boxes, made with fresh, high-quality ingredients and carefully cooked by Gan Youwei, were highly praised by everyone on The Warriors after eating them.

These meal boxes were essentially Gan Guoyang's "tuition" at The Warriors' training sessions, allowing him to absorb knowledge in a professional environment.

For Gan's Restaurant, their reputation was set to rise through basketball in the future, becoming a pilgrimage site for many fans and tourists alike.

It seemed that playing basketball could promote the restaurant's business more effectively than being a chef, which was something Gan Youwei and Gan Bingguang had never anticipated.

Because of his reputation in San Francisco and regular appearances at The Warriors' training camp, Gan Guoyang got to know Frank Mieuli, the owner of The Warriors.

This owner was an eccentric figure among sports businessmen; quirky in personality and distinguished in his choice of attire. The burly man never wore suits and was often seen in a jacket, leather coat, or striped floral shirt, always paired with his signature checkered deerstalker hat and a bushy beard, reminiscent of some Hollywood director of Italian descent.

Mieuli was a sports enthusiast. He had previously worked as a beer sales manager, which brought him into business dealings with the 49ers and began his work in radio production of sports programs.

This networked him within the San Francisco sports circle, and later he became a minority shareholder of the 49ers.

In 1962, he gathered more than 30 partners and bought The Warriors for just $860,000.

Due to poor management and Chamberlain's departure, which led to a significant drop in attendance, the other minority partners pulled out, and he bought their shares, becoming the majority owner of The Warriors.

Under his management, The Warriors experienced a relatively successful '70s, securing an NBA championship, and now the team was in a rebuilding phase.

After watching Gan Guoyang train a few times, Mieuli took a genuine interest in him and privately approached Gan Guoyang to ask if he wanted to jump directly into the league and play in the NBA.

If Golden State Warriors could enlist such a talented Chinese player, their popularity in San Francisco would undoubtedly skyrocket, helping to resolve the current dilemma of declining attendance and TV ratings faced by The Warriors, and indeed the entire NBA.

However, Gan Guoyang sensibly turned down Mieuli's temptation, stating that he was still too young and needed to attend college rather than plunge into the murky world of professional sports.

During his time training with The Warriors, Gan Guoyang personally witnessed how the NBA, beneath its glamorous facade, was infested with all sorts of lice.

Bernard King candidly told Gan Guoyang of his own struggles with alcoholism and scandal. Now having moved past his troubles, he advised Gan Guoyang against entering the league too early.

He also said that more than half of the players in the league had a history of using banned substances, over two-thirds indulged in excessive drinking and gambling, and more than 90% were womanizers living dissolute lifestyles.

"If you haven't prepared a strong foundation for yourself, it's wiser not to jump into this dyeing vat. Many things aren't so easy to wash away," he counseled.

Bernard King earnestly mentored Gan Guoyang, who had turned over a new leaf since arriving in the Bay Area.

However, Gan Guoyang's hesitation to join the league wasn't out of fear of being corrupted by its culture; he was confident in his willpower.

His concerns still stemmed from basketball techniques and experience. He knew that once in a professional team, the opportunities to improve would be much less.

Professional coaches hardly ever provide the meticulous guidance on fundamentals or teach various tactics to lay the foundation as high school or college coaches do.

Everyone in a professional team is there to work, with coaches under immense pressure to deliver results, not to learn or improve. Playing is all about winning, so the best players play.

After directly facing professional players from The Warriors, Gan Guoyang's confidence improved. He believed he could fill the role of a competent inside scorer and an excellent defender in a professional team.

But his ambition went far beyond that, so how could he possibly rush into the professional arena for a momentary trivial gain and fleeting fame?

Moreover, The Warriors' current roster simply had no place for him, and he certainly wasn't thinking about being a backup for Joe Barry Carroll — that guy probably didn't even train at The Warriors' facilities as long as Gan Guoyang did.

Gan Guoyang's strength continued to steadily increase, and the disparity between him and his teammates grew ever larger.

However, he had not told anyone about his training with the Warriors, so the members of the Shui Zhong Team were unaware that their leader's skills had improved again.

Gan Guohui only knew that for the past few weekends, as soon as he woke up at noon, Gan Guoyang would disappear, assuming that he had gone on a date.

Even Beelman had no clue that the training fanatic on the team didn't rest even on his days off, choosing instead to sneak off for specialized training with a professional team.

At that time, sports media wasn't well-developed, and the NBA was in a stage where it attracted little attention.

Unless one paid special attention to related news, it was unlikely for anyone to notice a tiny corner in the sports section of a newspaper where a reporter had noted, "The Chinese center from Shui Zhong Team is training with the players at the Warriors training facility" as a piece of trivia.

On November 13, the regular season of the CIF San Francisco League high school basketball boys' division officially kicked off at Kezar Stadium.

The games ran from nine in the morning until five in the afternoon, with two games each in both the morning and afternoon slots, coinciding in sequence.

It was apparent that Beiqiao High School had made a wise decision in renting Kezar for a warm-up game against Li Hua back in August.

Since October, a plethora of league sports competitions had been flooding in, and Kezar's calendar was packed full.

In addition to basketball competitions for various age groups and both genders, CIF League also included volleyball, badminton, boxing, and indoor track and field events, all taking place in this old venue—everyone had to wait their turn.

The Shui Zhong Team's game was scheduled from two to three-thirty in the afternoon, against the averagely strong Balboa High School.

Balboa High School is a public school with a long history in San Francisco; however, their strong sports are football and volleyball, and their basketball team was quite ordinary.

As the first stepping stone on Shui Zhong Team's path forward, Gan Guoyang didn't hold back in the game, dominating both the offensive and defensive ends from the first minute of the match.

In high school basketball games, if the strength disparity was significant, the score difference could be quite absurd. After all, for student teams, the weaker ones could be very weak.

The boys were slightly better off; the girls' games could be even more terrifying, with score differences sometimes reaching 60, 70, or even over a hundred points.

Balboa High School was slightly better than Li Hua, but in Gan Guoyang's eyes, they were the same: too short and too slow.

When he was defending under the basket, it became very difficult for the opposing team to score.

However, what surprised Beelman was Gan Guoyang's offense.

In a positional low-post offensive play, facing a defender much shorter than himself, he performed a quick turn-around jump shot after receiving the ball, scoring two points.

Beelman had not seen this technical move in games or practice before.

Previously, when Gan Guoyang received the ball in the low post, his offensive moves mainly included powering into the basket for layups or dunks.

This agile, quick turn-around jump shot was something both Beelman and his teammates were seeing for the first time.

The score gap widened to 20 points by halftime, prompting Beelman to call a timeout and substitute Gan Guoyang out.

He asked, "Did you just use a turn-around jump shot? When did you learn it?"

Gan Guoyang replied, "Just recently."

"Recently? Why the hell haven't I seen you practising it?"

"I used Visualization techniques."

"Visual… what? What the hell are you talking about?"

"It's a method used by professional players to improve their skills. Uh... it's like imagining in your mind."

Beelman looked confused and cursed, "Gan, if you keep talking nonsense and fooling me, I swear I'll hang myself at the entrance of your family's restaurant."