Game Changer

John McLendon and the Secret Game
by John Coy
Illustrated by Randy DuBurke
Genre:  Biography
Award:  Orbis Pictus Honoree

In North Carolina in 1944, basketball was segregated.  White and Black colleges did not play against each other.  White and Black players could not play on the same team as each other.  But Coach John McLendon believed that "...we all play basketball, that we all played it well, and that we should be playing it together."  He arranged for a secret game to take place between the North Carolina College Eagles and Duke University.  What happened next, surprised just about everyone who knew about it.



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