A League of Their Own

from STEADY - August 2020

by Do South Magazine

A Fresh District Rises

words Dwain Hebda IMAGEs courtesy Arkansas Diamonds

Coach Billy Graves

THWACK!

A twenty-footer hits dead center, the ball snapping the heavy cotton net with its distinctive sound. The whispy shooter scoots to the basket, snatches the ball and darts to the other side of the arc.

It’s two-thirty on an Arkansas summer afternoon and the gym is a brutal sauna. Another group just vacated the space a few minutes ago, their presence and movement having churned the soupy air even thicker. Just standing around, sweat seeps out the pores in streams.

THWACK!

LaVerne Graves doesn’t stop moving and, somehow, never starts sweating. It’s been a long few months since she has been able to get into a gym and shoot a few baskets and danged if she isn’t going to soak up every single moment while she can. Her layup, free throw, jump shot and patented left-handed hook are a little rusty, but she’s quick as a cat and the joy of being back on the court is written all over her.

“I’ve always done my hour-long walk – every day, three miles – even in ninety-one-degree heat,” she says. “I’ve got to stay healthy, that’s my number-one goal. If I don’t do another thing all day, my health comes first.”

THWACK!

LaVerne is soon joined by teammates Sharon Thornton and Jodie Moon, the trio who make up the starters for the Arkansas Diamonds senior women’s basketball team. The pals have played together for more than a decade in Senior Olympics competition and the sport has taken them all over the country for open tournaments and in alternating years, state and national championships.

They’re not kids, but you’d never guess by looking at the age bracket in which they compete: Seventy-five and up.

“I just love basketball,” Sharon said. “It’s just a lot of fun and a good way to get lots of exercise. I’m pretty competitive, I have to say. I guess I’m one of the most competitive ones on the team. That’s one of the things Coach always says, I always stir things up.”

Both Sharon and LaVerne grew up in the sport and have been playing Senior Olympic ball since 1998. Sharon, a Batesville product, is an original Diamond and one of the Hot Springs team’s co-founders. LaVerne, a native of Jessieville, first played in New Mexico for the Albuquerque Canyonettes during a forty-year absence from Arkansas. Returning home, she joined the Diamonds in 2004. Jodie, a Mississippi native, is the relative newcomer, rounding things out thirteen years ago.

“I play point, so I call the plays,” Jodie says. “To be quite honest, some of us are not as mentally sharp as we used to be and don’t hear as well as we used to, so it’s a little bit of a challenge. But Coach expects a lot out of me and he stays on me all the time. All the time.”

“Coach” is Billy Graves, LaVerne’s husband, who took over as Diamond skipper after the previous fella passed away. What many might have seen as an omen, he took as a welcome challenge. “I was at one of these ladies’ basketball games. They had just lost their coach,” he said. “They asked me if I would help them by coaching in that game. So, I agreed, told them I’d try to help them. I did and lo and behold, about the next week I got a letter signed by all the team members asking me to be their coach. I said well, OK, I’ll try. That was in, I believe, 2010. I’m still trying.”

Senior Olympic basketball is played three-on-three, halfcourt. Games are comprised of two fifteen-minute halves with two timeouts per half. Teams that place in the top three in their age division at their respective state games, held in even years, advance to the national tournament, held in odd years. LaVerne, age seventy-seven, has never missed qualifying for nationals since she started playing; Sharon’s played in every one since 2003 and Jodie since 2009.

A retired accountant and former high school baller himself, Billy takes the team’s national pedigree seriously with a mild-mannered exterior that belies the ferocity of his practices. “Being friends with these ladies doesn’t mean I’m easy on them,” he said. “When they’re on the ball court, I don’t differentiate amongst anyone. I treat them all the same and expect the same of all of them and they know that. We’ll hit the gymnasium at 4:30pm each Tuesday afternoon and we’re in there till 7:00pm that evening. I put them through a lot of drills. They work hard. They are a very dedicated group.

“I scold them when they need to be scolded. I don’t hold back. I know they’re older ladies, but they still can learn. We approach it from the standpoint of trying to get better. We’re trying to get the team better.”

Jodie Moon

Sharon Thornton

LaVerne Graves

Billy hammers home the value of an aggressive defense, a strategic tactic that’s worked consistently. The squad once won thirty-two straight games under him but even so, he leaves it up to the Diamonds to invite him back at the end of each season. And thus far, they always have.

“The other girls love him and he loves them. Oh yeah, this is his harem,” LaVerne said with a giggle. “The joke is that I’m sleeping with the coach. We are all family and he’s included. We get along great.”

While it’s obvious how much fun the women are having, participation comes at a price. LaVerne fell over backwards in practice once, breaking her arm. Another time, she had to play an entire tournament on a sprained ankle. Jodie shows up to play in thick kneepads, the better to dive on the floor after a loose ball, which even at age seventy-five she still does with abandon.

Ever the competitor, Sharon easily tops them both in the injury department with stitches and jammed fingers only a prelude. “I had a hip replacement when I was sixty and I thought I wouldn’t be able to play anymore. In fact, they told me not to,” the seventy-five-year-old said. “But I was back after three months and started playing again. Then, I had the other hip replaced at the end of that year and went back to playing again. Then seven years ago, I had my left knee replaced and I started back to playing after that.”

Oh, and by the way, two years ago they discovered Sharon had a pretty serious heart condition which, she quickly points out, only slows, but doesn’t stop her.

“I can’t play as much as I did because [the heart condition] affects my lungs and I run out of air after about four or five minutes. I can’t breathe and I have to go sit down and let somebody else play,” she says nonchalantly. Then her voice turns to a growl.

“Several of the girls on other teams have said, ‘I would rather anybody guard me than Sharon.’ I mean, I’m really tough on defense and at one time, I was pretty tough on offense, too.”

All of the women say the exercise and competitive outlet are compelling reasons to keep playing. They’ve seen women in

their nineties on other teams still competing and see no reason why they can’t do the same. In fact, they’d love to have some new blood join their ranks once they get back to their normal routine from the Covid layoff.

“At one time we had over fifty girls participating on different age levels. We had girls in every age division, just about,” Sharon said of the club. “But people move on, get tired, get old and get hurt. One thing or another and they quit.”

The trio would also love to win a national title together, their best finish thus far having been fourth, in 2011 and 2019. But even if they don’t, they will have given each other enough, in ways far beyond basketball.

“LaVerne and Sharon and I are really tight,” Jodie said. “I’m widowed, so I’m by myself. They are couples, so we don’t do things socially together, but they are like family to me. I could go to them for anything.

“We are a team. We’re like, one for all and all for one. They’re the reason I’m still in Hot Springs. I have no family here. My husband’s been gone eight years. My children live in Memphis, and my grandkids. I stay here because of them, my team. I’d be back in Memphis if it were not for my gals.”