Venus to the Hoop: A Gold Medal Year in Women's Basketball
by: Sara Corbett

Hardcover. NY, Doubleday, 1st, 1997, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright, unclipped dust jacket, 342 pages, b&w illustrations. In the spring of 1995, twelve extraordinary basketball players were chosen to represent the United States in the yearlong march to the 1996 Olympics. For Rebecca Lobo, Sheryl Swoopes, Lisa Leslie, and their teammates, winning the gold medal was only one of many goals. Around them swirled the dreams of the millions of young girls who played organized basketball, the hopes of the fans who sent the team an average of 125 pounds of fan mail each month, the multimillion-dollar bets of Nike, Champion, and other corporate sponsors, the promise of a new women's professional league, and not least, the hopes of female athletes across the country finally to gain the respect accorded male athletes.