When I returned to Uniontown from Los Angeles in late 1996, I can't remember a conversation with an old friend that did not drift to the subject of drugs and street gangs. Walking around Uniontown, I saw the distinct signs of hopelessness. Many houses that had been part of the fabric of my youth had been abandoned or torn down and there were no indications there would ever be houses built to replace them. Teenagers seemed to live in the streets. Violence seemed to lurk around every corner. Coal and steel were all but gone. Our politicians fought publicly and Uniontown and Fayette seemed like nothing but a place to leave, when you graduate from high school.    Those problems may still exist, but I don't think about them as much now. I think about other things. I think I began to start thinking about those other things on March 11th, 2000. That was the day a talented group of little guys from Uniontown, Pennsylvania faced down the city giants of Schenley high school of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and fought from behind in overtime to within a couple of points. The sophomore Terrance Vaughns was fouled and step to the free throw line. He calmly made the first and then the second free throw and I found myself in mid-air. A feeling I hadn't experienced since the fall of 1965, when a Uniontown football team faced a Butler team that had only given up 18 points on the entire season, gave up 14 points alone in a loss to our Red Raiders in the WPIAL Championship game.   It is a feeling you can't get in a hundred years in Hollywood, or in any of the nearly 2 dozen cities I've lived over the years. I've cheered loudly for Magic Johnson, but I didn't know him or his parents or his friends. When young Terrance Vaughns sent me skyward, I knew just how proud his grandfather, Fred L. Vaughns would have been on that day. I cheered and enjoyed my tears of joy for him. And I enjoyed them for each of the Red Raiders who are only generation removed from my friends and neighbors in Uniontown. I can remember the sunny, warm day before Uniontown's fateful visit to meet Chester in the State Championship game that year. I stood in front of the Vet's on East Main Street talking to Rogene Truley about his son Tink. His pride was understandable and obvious. It was a conversation I couldn't have with Magic Johnson's parents.    It seems there has been a distinct change in the dialogues around town since those days. The drug abuse and empty houses still exist. But missed open jumpers and using the backboard for lay-ups have become our main topics of discussion. And then came the fall of 2001, when a win hungry Red Raider football team miraculously surfaced in this basketball crazy town. Kevin McLee and Carl Farrell were the keys to our football reawakening. McLee's and Farrell's family and friends are people we can talk to and with whom share joy. Their ultimate football loss was only the end of a tremendous ride. A ride none of us expected in the first place.    Enter the 2001 - 2002 Uniontown Red Raider basketball team. A team with high expectations placed on their backs. From the first Erie Cathedral Prep game through the Harrisburg game we saw a team that defined the true spirit of Uniontown, Pennsylvania. They had to face a group of little guys, from a little town, fighting for statewide respect. On Saturday evening, March 23rd, 2002 they, and we, got that respect. Something you can't find in a box score, or that doesn't appear in the final numbers. Those bigger guys from that bigger town felt the enthusiasm of the Uniontown Red Raiders and their rabid fans.    They most certainly knew that for that brief time on the basketball court, we had left all of those other things behind. And it may not have been important to the people of Harrisburg, but we have all been taken on a wonderful journey, by 5 little guys in basketball uniforms. Guys who have allowed us to share their spotlight, witness their passion, glow in their victory and feel pride in them - even in defeat.