As the pandemic pushed back the NBA draft, prospects like former Stanford guard Tyrell Terry have used the extra time to boost their stock by staying in the gym and participating in Zoom calls with NBA teams.

Feel-good stories have been hard to find in a year where so much has gone wrong, and basketball has taken a backseat. On March 11, Tyrell Terry had little reason to think he’d be writing one. That night, Stanford’s NCAA tournament hopes were dashed with a loss to rival Cal at the Pac-12 tourney, a key game played to minimal fanfare and scant observers in the stands. “We came into the locker room devastated,” Terry says. “Then we find out that they cancelled the NBA season. So of course, we figure it’s looking bad for the NCAA to continue as well.”

As the threat of COVID-19 became widely apparent and the cancellation of