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The Capital of Basketball: A History of DC Area High School Hoops
The celebration of Washington D.C. basketball is long overdue. The D.C. metro area stands second to none in its contributions to the game. Countless figures who have had a significant impact on the sport over the years have roots in the region, including E.B. Henderson, the first African-American certified to teach public school physical education, and Earl Lloyd, the first African-American to take the court in an actual NBA game. The city's Spingarn High School produced two players ― Elgin Baylor and Dave Bing ― recognized among the NBA's 50 greatest at the League's 50th anniversary celebration. No other high school in the country can make that claim.
These figures and many others are chronicled in this book, the first-ever comprehensive look at the great high school players, teams and coaches in the D.C. metropolitan area.
Based on more than 150 interviews, The Capital of Basketball is first and foremost a book about basketball. But in discussing the trends and evolution of the game, McNamara also uncovers the turmoil in the lives of the players and area residents as they dealt with prejudice, educational inequities, politics, and the ways the area has changed through the years.
These figures and many others are chronicled in this book, the first-ever comprehensive look at the great high school players, teams and coaches in the D.C. metropolitan area.
Based on more than 150 interviews, The Capital of Basketball is first and foremost a book about basketball. But in discussing the trends and evolution of the game, McNamara also uncovers the turmoil in the lives of the players and area residents as they dealt with prejudice, educational inequities, politics, and the ways the area has changed through the years.
- GenresSportsNonfiction
312 pages, Hardcover
Published November 3, 2019
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Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
December 29, 2019
The author was one of the reporters killed in the mass murder in newsroom in Annapolis in 2018; his widow and a colleague finished it up for him from his draft and voluminous interview notes, etc. What a great tribute on their part and memorial gift to all of us who grew up on basketball in the DMV.
Lots of coverage of my HS coach Bob Dwyer, who said Elgin Baylor was the best high school player he ever saw, of the basketball day camp i went to, of the school where we played our games in 8th grade (the defunct Mackin Catholic High, alma mater of Austin Carr, Johnny Dawkins, and so many great players), of course all the great DeMatha teams (Sydney Lowe and Dereck Whittenburg of the Stags were first-team all-Met my senior year, and 4 years later led NC State to national title in the upset of the Phi Slamma Jamma Houston team, the game remembered for decades thereafter mostly for the footage of the late Jim Valvano running around the court looking for someone to hug after the final buzzer).
Even one of my best friends from grade school is in the index of this book. But nothing about me, alas. I guess it would need to be approximately a billion pages to provide detailed analysis of kids from 40 years ago who were actually not starters on their fairly good high school teams. Oh well.
What is here is awesome -- nice job of describing big games and big plays without bogging down too much. Also appreciated that he gave attention to the burbs -- lots of good stuff on outstanding montgomery county MD teams and northern virginia as well.
Minor quibble -- he got a lot of the well-known nicknames of course (Hawkeye Whitney, Big Sky Shelton, etc.), but did anybody really call Brian Magid "the blond bomber"? that sounds made up. among my friends he was always "Auto-Magid" [get it? because his jumper was "automatic" --hmm, maybe that was just us).
Anyway, if you know that long before Kevin Durant came to Montrose Christian, Stu Vetter got his first big star at Flint Hill in Mike Pepper, who went on to play at UNC and who foreshadowed my school's no longer scheduling Flint Hill as they became one of the best teams in the country over following few years, then this book is for you. And if you didn't know that, it's high time you learned, so get reading!
Lots of coverage of my HS coach Bob Dwyer, who said Elgin Baylor was the best high school player he ever saw, of the basketball day camp i went to, of the school where we played our games in 8th grade (the defunct Mackin Catholic High, alma mater of Austin Carr, Johnny Dawkins, and so many great players), of course all the great DeMatha teams (Sydney Lowe and Dereck Whittenburg of the Stags were first-team all-Met my senior year, and 4 years later led NC State to national title in the upset of the Phi Slamma Jamma Houston team, the game remembered for decades thereafter mostly for the footage of the late Jim Valvano running around the court looking for someone to hug after the final buzzer).
Even one of my best friends from grade school is in the index of this book. But nothing about me, alas. I guess it would need to be approximately a billion pages to provide detailed analysis of kids from 40 years ago who were actually not starters on their fairly good high school teams. Oh well.
What is here is awesome -- nice job of describing big games and big plays without bogging down too much. Also appreciated that he gave attention to the burbs -- lots of good stuff on outstanding montgomery county MD teams and northern virginia as well.
Minor quibble -- he got a lot of the well-known nicknames of course (Hawkeye Whitney, Big Sky Shelton, etc.), but did anybody really call Brian Magid "the blond bomber"? that sounds made up. among my friends he was always "Auto-Magid" [get it? because his jumper was "automatic" --hmm, maybe that was just us).
Anyway, if you know that long before Kevin Durant came to Montrose Christian, Stu Vetter got his first big star at Flint Hill in Mike Pepper, who went on to play at UNC and who foreshadowed my school's no longer scheduling Flint Hill as they became one of the best teams in the country over following few years, then this book is for you. And if you didn't know that, it's high time you learned, so get reading!
July 7, 2020
Just owning this book is such an emotional experience, because of being blessed to have known John for so many years and of knowing what his wonderful wife and friends did to finish his dream project. Now that I've read it, though ... what an outstanding record of one of my favorite topics (basketball and local history all tied together). All the fear of having too-high expectations disappeared as soon as I started reading; it lived up to everything I had hoped it would be. Thanks so much to Andrea and David and everybody who poured themselves into making this possible.
January 31, 2020
John McNamara was a gift to the Washington metro area, and this beautiful history only makes me more upset that we lost him in the Capital Gazette mass shooting.
With every page, it's clear how much DC area basketball meant to him. How he spent hours in gyms talking to coaches and players. Truly dedicated to the craft.
RIP. Read it if you like DC and high school basketball.
With every page, it's clear how much DC area basketball meant to him. How he spent hours in gyms talking to coaches and players. Truly dedicated to the craft.
RIP. Read it if you like DC and high school basketball.
January 6, 2021
The oracle of DC basketball knowledge
May 25, 2020
There is no doubting that the Washington DC area has for many years been a stronghold of high school basketball, with a greater metropolitan area covering the District, northern Virginia and southern Maryland. It may be, it seems from the outside, that this is in part an effect of the absence of other forms of elite and of professional sport from the region, but it seems also to be an effect of a powerful local culture emphasising the importance of basketball and an attachment to high schools in an area with what may well be a highly transient population around the importance of Federal Government institutions. Whatever the reason, basketball is a potent force in a range of local high school leagues built around public schools, a network of Catholic and other independent schools and until the early 1960s a powerful set of Black schools.
Not surprisingly, such a powerful force that could attract over 10,000 people to an inter-league final, would have its dominant figures – mainly coaches, and its heroic stories of individual players, of teams and of coaches, its tragedies, and its chroniclers. John McNamara is one such chronicler, formerly a local sports reporter for many years until he was killed in a shooter attack on his newspaper office adding a layer of tragedy to the existence of the book. This book is very much a chronicle, built around the last 5 decades of the 20th century the emphasis is on stories of post war rivalry, power and development, of the shifting forces of power and influence across the areas component regions and between leagues.
McNamara highlights dominant teams and individuals – it’s intriguing how some schools maintain their dominance over so much of the period, given that the players have, for the most part, careers of no more than three years. Yet the same schools keep turning up in the finals: the turnover of players in the 50 year scope is huge. Equally interesting is the intermittent appearance of other schools as powerful forces for a few years, sometimes a decade or more apart, linked to a cluster of players or the effects of a specific coach and more often than not a serendipitous confluence of both. This is a ‘data rich’ book demonstrating an astounding depth of knowledge about a place where the significance may be seen in the sheer number of NBA and NCAA players of note (so much of note that even I recognised many of the names).
This ‘data richness’ however comes at the expense of an overarching narrative meaning that although this is not a nostalgic narrative it is a commemorative one, marking major events, highlighting key individuals and celebrating great moments it stumbles. It does not have the contextual framing that I’d hope to see in a social history of the era, making this very much a history of a set of sporting events, rivalries, matches, framed by the institutions – schools, leagues and localities – that give them meaning. I suspect if I was a long term DC resident, I’d have read this differently.
Not surprisingly, such a powerful force that could attract over 10,000 people to an inter-league final, would have its dominant figures – mainly coaches, and its heroic stories of individual players, of teams and of coaches, its tragedies, and its chroniclers. John McNamara is one such chronicler, formerly a local sports reporter for many years until he was killed in a shooter attack on his newspaper office adding a layer of tragedy to the existence of the book. This book is very much a chronicle, built around the last 5 decades of the 20th century the emphasis is on stories of post war rivalry, power and development, of the shifting forces of power and influence across the areas component regions and between leagues.
McNamara highlights dominant teams and individuals – it’s intriguing how some schools maintain their dominance over so much of the period, given that the players have, for the most part, careers of no more than three years. Yet the same schools keep turning up in the finals: the turnover of players in the 50 year scope is huge. Equally interesting is the intermittent appearance of other schools as powerful forces for a few years, sometimes a decade or more apart, linked to a cluster of players or the effects of a specific coach and more often than not a serendipitous confluence of both. This is a ‘data rich’ book demonstrating an astounding depth of knowledge about a place where the significance may be seen in the sheer number of NBA and NCAA players of note (so much of note that even I recognised many of the names).
This ‘data richness’ however comes at the expense of an overarching narrative meaning that although this is not a nostalgic narrative it is a commemorative one, marking major events, highlighting key individuals and celebrating great moments it stumbles. It does not have the contextual framing that I’d hope to see in a social history of the era, making this very much a history of a set of sporting events, rivalries, matches, framed by the institutions – schools, leagues and localities – that give them meaning. I suspect if I was a long term DC resident, I’d have read this differently.
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November 2, 2021Any perspectives I have on this book should be understood as coming from an outsider to both DC history and high school basketball.
For the target audience and as an artifact, this book is essential. It tells the story and preserves the key ideas and narratives of what seems a dynamic slice of local sports history.
As an outsider, I wanted more discussion of how high school basketball fit into the landscape (sporting and otherwise) in DC. When McNamara discusses thousands of people attending big games or even a practice, I could not help but wonder about the motivations in the stands. McNamara keeps the story on the court. For most readers, that is exactly what they will be looking for.
The author does discuss the ramifications of segregation and how the desegregation of schools plays an active role in the high school basketball world, and he paints fascinating portraits of key players and coaches.
While I was looking for something different, for someone more within one of the target audiences for this book, I think there is a fantastic book here.
For the target audience and as an artifact, this book is essential. It tells the story and preserves the key ideas and narratives of what seems a dynamic slice of local sports history.
As an outsider, I wanted more discussion of how high school basketball fit into the landscape (sporting and otherwise) in DC. When McNamara discusses thousands of people attending big games or even a practice, I could not help but wonder about the motivations in the stands. McNamara keeps the story on the court. For most readers, that is exactly what they will be looking for.
The author does discuss the ramifications of segregation and how the desegregation of schools plays an active role in the high school basketball world, and he paints fascinating portraits of key players and coaches.
While I was looking for something different, for someone more within one of the target audiences for this book, I think there is a fantastic book here.
May 20, 2024
A labor of love completed by the author’s widow, this book is ideal for basketball lovers. In it, McNamara focuses on the top public and private high schools in DC, Maryland, and Virginia. High school basketball in the DC metro area provides a microcosm in which to best view the changes to broader society as a whole, one moving from segregation to integration. It is evident by the amount of information presented here that a lot of archival research went into the writing of this volume. Some of the country’s best prep basketball has been played in the metro DC area, and by focusing on legendary programs such as DeMatha Catholic, as well as since shuttered ones at Spingarn, McNamara does a huge service for the greater community. Ultimately, this book is the legacy he leaves behind.
June 14, 2023
There could be no more fitting legacy for John McNamara’s life and career than this book. Full of information and knowledge about the best basketball area in the country, this book is a must read for DC sports fans and any of us who grew up in the area watching boys basketball.
December 13, 2019
It was heart breaking and necessary to finish this book because it's full of great stories of remarkable people. I hope the stories mean as much to you as they did to me. Thank you
December 28, 2019
This book is for the real basketball nerd. Very well researched chronicle of Washington D.C. area high school basketball of 20th century.
February 23, 2020
An engaging if not somewhat nostalgic stroll DMV HS Hoop memory lane. Very little discussion of any of the important underlying educational, social or even athletic issues.
June 14, 2020
Excellent history of basketball in DC. Makes me want to head east and catch a game or two.
March 15, 2025
Well worth the read
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews