Sneakers squeak on honey-colored hardwood. The gym, in Wisconsin, has a stage behind one basket, a volleyball marooned in the rafters, a bake sale in the lobby, a raffle in the retractable bleachers and a brass band playing “Louie Louie” and “Rockin’ Robin,” the timeless soundtrack of high school basketball in America.
When the victorious Knights of Dominican High—green letter jackets, white sleeves—board the orange school bus idling outside Shoreland Lutheran on a 27° school night in Kenosha, it could be any year in the last half-century, if not for the Beats pinching Alex Antetokounmpo’s temples like a laurel wreath, or the Amazon warehouse that slides by the bus windows on I-41.