During my junior year of college at North Dakota State, I applied to coach basketball at a high school summer camp in L.A.

It was late winter, a couple days after yet another blizzard, and I decided sunny California would be a nice change from Fargo. The weeklong skills program was taking place at UCLA in Westwood, not far from Sunset Boulevard and the Santa Monica Mountains. I flew Fargo to Denver, Denver to LAX. But high winds delayed my connecting flight, and that, plus the fact that an accident on the 405 freeway meant it took 90 minutes to go ten miles, had me rushing to Pauley Pavilion. It was nearly 5 o’clock as I approached a registration table. I’d been in touch by text with the other junior camp instructors — all of us college basketball players — and they had all headed to Venice Beach to... Read More