STATESBORO – As the confetti fell on the USA U-16 men’s basketball junior national team celebrating its FIBA Americas Championship, Georgia Southern athletic trainer Nick Sparacio tried to pause and take it all in.
True, the Americans had entered the tournament as heavy favorites, but the road to this moment in time had been arduous, and three weeks had passed in the blink of an eye. Each member of the team had their own story on how they had gotten to a gold medal game in Xalapa, Mexico, and just like Sparacio, the most common themes in those stories were hard work and a little luck.