Quis ut Deus

It is not an understatement that the renaissance of Basketball not only at St. Michael’s, but to the whole Island dawned, when Fr. Hebert arrived at Batticaloa full time in the late 70s. I was lucky enough to be part of the team that won the All Island Championship in 1974, which started an era where St. Michael’s became synonymous with the game of basketball. Winning All Island Championships in most age groups was not anything of magical year after year – but the consistent approach of constant practices; sometimes starting on the very next day after the completion of a tourney - mostly on strengthening the fundamentals - everything from strategic passes to familiarity to use either hand in executing lay-ups to prevent rejects by the opposition. Scoring was only secondary, compared to avoidable mistakes, in Father’s fundamentals. No matter how great a player is, he would be substituted immediately for making such mistakes and sent back again after enduring an earful at the bench.

Protection, guidance and ethics

One of the things I always remember is the protection, guidance and ethics, Father provided and instilled in us. Once, when we arrived at a leading school in Colombo for overnight accommodation from a day long train journey, the security guard (Watcher) refused to let us into the building due to some ‘mix-up’ of papers. He was prepared to let only the ‘Father’ to the Priest’s residence upstairs. Father, ever resourceful got permission from the guard to sleep on a roofed but open basketball courts behind the school buildings, and stayed with us the whole night, using his cassock as the bed sheet and a wooden box as his pillow.

He always carried the basketball rule book and demanded quite passionately the strict adherence by the referees and other officials. This attitude of standing for fairness by a gentle giant gave the boys of Batticaloa, the power of confidence that they hardly knew existed. It’s not unusual to see Father exclaiming in disbelief, if he noticed anyone conducting outside the rule book, whether it’s the players or officials. This unbowed action towards established rules quite often brought emotions to the surface; mostly in the form of hostilities towards the team in the form of catcalls from outside the court and aggressive interactions within. But Father always stood firmly on his ground – always on principles. In most of the home games at Batticaloa, he reprimanded the booing home fans against the visiting teams, to the extent of halting the games. It’s an irony even the NBA in the US, allow the home teams to use boos, megaphones and noodles to distract free-throws of the opposition.

Then there was this unbelievable crossing of life lessons, he immersed us time to time, contradicting his fiery approach of nothing but winning Championships. There were instances where we have to return from Colombo without participating in ‘Consolation Finals’ for the very reason we failed our berth to the Finals. Under such a quadrangle of winning platitude, the masses he said during tournaments, in small chapels, was a testimony of triumph between his heavenly vows and earthly victories.

Written by B. Nimal Veerasingham