The Hardest Hit Never Came from the Court

The game was brutal—one of those matchups where every play felt like a battle, and every second on the clock seemed to drag on for an eternity.

The opposing team was relentless, their defense suffocating, and their offense sharp. As the captain, the weight of responsibility bore down heavily on his shoulders. He felt it with every missed shot, every turnover, every mistake. A sense of failure began to creep in, gnawing at his resolve.

"I have to do this for my team," he told himself, over and over like a mantra.

The chance came late in the game, a split-second opportunity that demanded everything he had. He leapt, his focus locked on the ball as he twisted mid-air, aiming for the net. But as he descended, his body collided hard with an opposing player.

The impact was immediate and unforgiving.

He hit the floor with a sickening thud, the wind knocked clean out of him. Pain radiated through his chest, sharp and unforgiving. He knew the feeling—the bruised ribs, maybe worse. He’d been here before.

Before he could even process the pain, he heard the familiar voice cutting through the chaos of the gym.

"Get up!"

It was his father, shouting from the stands. The words weren’t laced with concern or encouragement—just command. An order. A judgment.

He clenched his teeth and forced himself upright, ignoring the throbbing ache in his ribs. The adrenaline dulled the pain, but not the sting of his father’s voice. Now, in collegiate sports, nothing had changed. The arenas were bigger, the stakes higher, but the pressure from his father was the same—constant, crushing, and relentless.

The judgment was always there, looming over him like a storm cloud. It didn’t matter if he had a good game or a bad one; his father always found something to criticize.

"You should’ve done this. You could’ve done that."

The words echoed in his mind even when his father wasn’t around.

In moments like these, he longed for solace. His teammates, a few close ones, sometimes offered that—grabbing dinner after a game, sharing quiet conversations where masks of bravado could drop, even if just for a moment.

And then there was his girlfriend, who became his sanctuary in ways he could never fully express. With her, he felt like a person, not just a player. She didn’t see him as a captain, an athlete, or a potential star. She saw him.

But even those safe spaces weren’t always safe. He remembered the dinners where his father invited a teammate or two to join the family, only to use the occasion to pick him apart in front of them. "Why didn’t you take that shot? You hesitated, didn’t you? That’s why the team lost." The humiliation burned deep.

He would sit there, staring down at his plate, trying to block out the words, the looks, the weight of it all. His teammates would shift uncomfortably in their seats, unsure of what to say or how to react. No one ever stood up for him. How could they? It wasn’t their battle.

Desperation often consumed him. The pressure, the hopelessness, the gnawing feeling that no matter what he did, it would never be enough—it all built up inside him like a dam ready to burst. He would lie awake at night, staring at the ceiling, wondering if it would ever end.

"Will this ever stop?" he asked himself repeatedly. Deep down, he doubted it.

Being from an upper-class family only made it worse. The expectations were suffocating. He wasn’t just supposed to succeed; he was supposed to dominate, to be extraordinary, to carry on the legacy his father thought he had left behind.

His father strutted around like a man still living in his own glory days, trying to relive them through his son. And when his son didn’t measure up? The disappointment was palpable. His father didn’t hide it. He was the first to let him know.

Graduation was the light at the end of the tunnel—or at least, it was supposed to be. He prayed for that day, for the moment when all of this would be over. But would it? He wasn’t sure. He imagined his father finding new ways to criticize him, new ways to remind him that he hadn’t lived up to expectations.

The worst part wasn’t the yelling, the lectures, or even the public humiliation. It was the absence of something he so desperately craved: support. Validation. Love.

"That was okay, but here’s what you should’ve done."

"You could have played better."

Never once had he heard the words he longed for: "I’m proud of you. You did an amazing job."

All he wanted was to be a son. Not an athlete, not a vessel for someone else’s dreams—but a son. Someone who was loved and accepted for who he was, not for what he could achieve.

The pain in his ribs would heal. The bruises would fade. The losses would eventually blur into the background of his memory. But the wounds his father left? Those ran deeper. And some days, he wasn’t sure if they would ever heal.

As the game ended and the crowd began to disperse, he avoided looking toward the stands. He didn’t want to see his father’s face, didn’t want to hear whatever critique was waiting for him. Instead, he walked toward the locker room, his head down, the ache in his chest a reminder of the game and everything it represented.

Someday, he thought. Someday, this will all be over.

But even as he told himself that, he wasn’t sure if he believed it.