To The Brink: Stockton Malone And The Utah Jazzs Climb To The Edge Of Glory

What separates To the Brink from most annals of a team's season is the ending: the Jazz ultimately failed. All the tumult, anxiety, and excitement that led to this failure make Brink a far more textured tale than the one that would have been written had they prevailed over the Bulls in the 1998 NBA championships. Lewis naturally centers on the often brilliant play and moody personalities of future Hall of Famers John Stockton and Karl Malone, but he works all sides of the court here, and good stories emerge, from Coach Jerry Sloan's metamorphosis in the face of his wife's cancer to the tense bickering over Greg Ostertag's inflated salary and deflated performance. Regularly counted out and always underestimated, the Jazz surprised the NBA by doing what they do best: playing solid ball and prevailing in the West on what often seemed like a triumvirate of heart, perseverance, and Malone's charismatically gargantuan will. They shocked the talented Lakers, sweeping them in the conference finals 4-0 to earn a return trip to face the Bulls in the title round, where they succumbed, a game too soon, to one of Michael Jordan's more sublime moments. That the loss is preordained riffs; like a bad date with destiny, you keep hoping for the best, but a sad air of resignation prevails. --Jeff Silverman