State: A Team, a Triumph, a Transformation

Isaacson, sportswriter for the Chicago Tribune and ESPN, overpromises and underdelivers in this lackluster coming-of-age account of her time on her suburban high school’s basketball team. Isaacson recounts her trials and tribulations with the Niles West High School girls’ basketball squad in 1975—three years after Title IX became law. Her telling feels vague and spotty, especially when quoting dialogue from decades earlier; and too often the details she includes—letters, poems, cheers, and team songs using the tune of 1970s sitcom theme songs—do little to elevate the narrative. In Isaacson’s senior year in 1979, Niles West had a great run, culminating with the state championship win, yet her recap of the season and key plays of that final game lacks intensity. Despite her statement that this book is “evidence of what sports gave to us, of what basketball specifically did 40 years ago to shape our lives today,” she relegates the post–high school experiences of her teammates and herself to a short epilogue. This is a missed opportunity on what could have been a great personal history of the affects of Title IX had on female sports. [em](Aug.) [/em]