Score tied, eleven seconds left, fourth and goal at the onefoot line. The crowd was on their feet, screaming and clappingat the thought of glory. The quarterback was sweating withfear. He slowly walked into the huddle and carefully looked ateach player. All of his teammates stared at him. His onlythought was, It all comes down to me; the whole season is inmy hands. He took one last look at his players and muttered,"Red 16, hook left." The players broke the huddle for thefinal and deciding moment. The quarterback crouched to thecenter cautiously. He now saw that the defense was in a blitzformation. He sat up and screamed, "Blue 12, Blue 12." Histeammates all looked confused. Blue 12 was a play long gone inthe playbooks. It was a flea-flicker reverse for Brian Thomas,the wide receiver who was better known as Stone-hands. He hadnot had a catch all season and had never run theball.

Now Thomas looked at the quarterback and began toshake. The quarterback winked at him and once again crouched.The coach frantically screamed, "Time out! Time out!" inconfusion from the sidelines. It was too late, however, andthe ball was snapped and the quarterback handed the ball off.The running-back carefully ran to the line and turned andtossed the ball back to the quarterback like a fragile pieceof glass. The quarterback caught it and quickly turned toThomas. Thomas had fear in his eyes. He looked at thequarterback and before he knew it he had the ball.

With all his speed, Thomas charged at his linemen. He lookedup and saw two linebackers charging him. Panic-stricken helooked for a hole and found one. He turned and charged towardit and leaped. A pile stacked on top of him and the refereeshrieked the whistle and ran to the pile. He peeled playersaway quickly until he got to the bottom.

The wholestadium went silent. The referee looked up and threw his armsinto the air. The stadium roared. The entire offensive linepicked up Thomas and carried him off the field. Thomas heard aloud, "Hey, Thomas." He looked over and saw the quarterback,who gave him a wink and smiled. The quarterback laughed andwalked away proudly.