The Road to 138

In November 2012, Jack Taylor, an unknown 5'10" guard from Grinnell College, an out-of-the-way Division III school, made history. He scored 138 points in a single game, shattering a 57-year-old NCAA record and becoming an instant celebrity. The sports world rushed to newspapers, talk radio, Twitter, and ESPN to praise his achievement - or denounce it as a travesty, a sham, and a mockery of the game of basketball. But no one knew the whole story ... until now. In The Road to 138, former Grinnell player Ross Preston delivers a behind-the-scenes account of the fastest, craziest, most innovative basketball team in the country: the aptly-named Pioneers. For the last 20 years, they've used a unique, extremely chaotic playing style called "The System" to turn the game on its head. What makes "The System" so different? How does it work? Why do so many people seem to hate it? Why would a team choose to play basketball that way? Do the Pioneers just want to break records and get on TV? And most importantly, how does one guy even manage to take so many shots in a 40-minute game? Preston answers these questions and more, drawing on extensive interviews with players and coaches as well as his own experience playing for the Pioneers. Soaring victories. Bold experiments. Unlikely stars. From the early struggles of "The System" to the larger-than-life controversy of Taylor's historic night, The Road to 138 is the surprising, fascinating, often hilarious story of the Grinnell Pioneers, a team that ESPN has called "bat-dung insane," a "circus freakshow," and "the greatest college hoops show on Earth."