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Part II - Liberty Cup Tournament

The Taipei American School entered its team in the "Liberty Cup Tournament", and on February 2, 1956, the Bunny Hoppers played their first game.

It was a cold brisk day but even so, many of the kids from school turned out to see the Bunny Hoppers trounce their small but fast opponents with a score of 81-36.

Using a fast break play, the Bunny Hoppers went on winning game after game. After a while, the opposition checked this "fast break", and the Bunny Hoppers had to shoot from the outside as well as the inside. Even without this play, however, they won and improved as the tournament went on.

The Bunny Hoppers were at their peak for the last game of the semi-finals. It looked bad at first. At the end of the first quarter, we were behind by a score of 14-5. All five of our points were scored on foul shots. They didn't remain behind, however, for with courage and the will to win, they beat their opponents by 8 points. It was great to watch the team fight back to win after being so far behind. After this game they knew that they would win; they had beaten the best team in the tournament.

Just then, the school got word that the finals would not start for about three weeks. At the time, this did not seem bad but during the lapse, the team lost the perfection and experience which they had gained from the previous games.

The Bunny Hoppers won the first two games of the finals. Then the third game came along and our team lost by a heart-breaking score of 41-40. They had beaten this team in the semi-finals but they failed to repeat their performance. The Bunny Hoppers, however, won the fourth game of the finals showing great teamwork, especially in the last few minutes of the play.

Then on the following night, the last game was played. This game was the most important because the winner would be the champion. Each of the teams participating in this game had lost once.

The Bunny Hoppers played a great game. They regained the spirit and confidence which they had before. In the final two minutes of the game, they scored five points to cute a 2-minute 10-point lead to 5 points.

Well, the tournament was over. The team had lost the championship but they were themselves again---They Were A Team, not individual heros, and to me, this is much more important than being champions. Now the basketball season is over and boys hang up their uniforms. It had been a long hard season, and they had placed second in the tournament of 94 teams. They were not satisfied because they knew that they should have won but bad breaks, and we had plenty of them, will hurt the best teams in the world.

Boys of three great nations had played on this team of the Taipei American School: Peter Chang, James Chang, and Stewart Pei of Free China, Xavier de Larracoechea from Spain, and Sam Wilder, Reeves Barron, Jerry Dale, Tony Early, Chris Brooks and Andy Rowe of the United States of America are the ones that kept the Bunny Hoppers "hopping" forward to victory.

In closing, I would like to say a few words personally to the team. You played many games--you have won many and lost few. You may be proud of yourselves for your tremendous sportsmanship and teamwork. I sincerely hope that you all will lead good lives in the future, and if you live your lives like you play basketball, you will doubtless make great contributions to your native country and the Free World.

I would also like to thank Mr. Moyer for the time and effort he gave to the team. Thanks a lot Coach. You did a swell job!

L. M.