Fixed

"Fixed" follows the point-shaving scandal of the 1978-79 Boston College basketball team. Players profiled in the book include Rick Kuhn, who pulled his teammates into the plot and paid for it with a 10-year prison sentence; Jim Sweeney, a prep school graduate and honor student who found himself trapped between gamblers and a conscience that wouldn't let him cheat his teammates; and leading scorer Ernie Cobb, who saw his dreams of playing in the pros crushed by his association with the fixers. -- Dana Harris * Daily Variety- La *
For college basketball fans who list Goodfellas among their favorite movies and occasionally keep an eye on point spreads, David Porter's Fixed: How Goodfellas Bought Boston College Basketball could not be more in you wheelhouse. The brilliance of Fixed is in the incredible detail Porter uses in depicting how the scheme began, how players were drawn in and, most importantly, how they were affected emotionally and psychologically. Most interesting is Porter's exploration of our country's romanticized notion of sports, and how misdeeds on fields of play are often treated more harshly than off them. -- Jack Schaller * The Review of Higher Education *