Sportswriter Aaron Bracy ’98, M.S. ’99, is seeing his lifelong dream of writing a book come to life with ‘A Soaring Season: The Incredible, Inspiring Story of the 2003-04 Saint Joseph’s Hawks,’ a book about St. Joe’s 2003-04 men’s basketball team. As a criminal justice major at St. Joe’s, Bracy covered women’s basketball for The Hawk, worked for the sports information office and was involved with the student-run radio station, Radio 1851. Bracy now works full-time as an academic designer for McGraw Hill, freelances for the Associated Press and Hoops HQ, and runs Big 5 Hoops and Bracy Sports Media.
After starting his research in late November 2023, Bracy conducted over 90 interviews for the book before shifting to writing. Bracy began the writing process in May 2024 and finished the book by August 2024, to be released March 1. The Hawk spoke to Bracy about his process and what it was like to achieve this long-held goal.
What did your day-to-day routine look like when you were interviewing?
I would do my interview, I would either try and transcribe it right away, or I would do it that night. I transcribed all my own interviews … I wanted to transcribe it all because I could relive the interview, and it gets me thinking about how to use the quotes and how to tell the story, and so that was a little painful, the interviews. Especially Phil Martelli. I talked to him for three hours at his house. Transcribing that interview took me eight or nine hours.
What was your routine when writing it?
I had all this research, and I put the research and the interviews into these buckets. From there, I would handwrite an outline for each chapter, and then I would just start writing. That was really the most enjoyable part of the process, the writing. One thing that really got to help me was I would write the outline a lot of times at night, and then I would go to bed. I would wake up real early, crazy early, like two in the morning, three in the morning, and it was fresh in my head, and I’d start writing. I would write each chapter, and once I felt like it was pretty good, I would record it on my phone, and I would take it for a walk, and I would listen to it. How did it sound? … I would be in my notes, making changes as I’m walking. It helped to get some fresh air and get out of the house. And I’d come back, and I’d revise it, and then I would print it out and put it on the countertop for my wife, and then she would read each chapter.
What was it like to physically hold your book in your hands for the first time?
I’m someone who always has a book with me. Books have been my friends. I love reading. I love books. And to have a book with my name on it, there are no words that can describe the feeling. It’s just surreal, is the best way I can say. When I was writing it and reading it, I was getting emotional, but then to actually see the actual book, when I finished the book, I was just in tears. This is always something I wanted to do.
Were there any skills you learned at St. Joe’s that helped you along the way?
For me, it starts with the Jesuits and their mission, [caring for] the whole person … Through St. Joe’s, I really came to become a lot more spiritual and a lot closer to God. I think, and I hope, St. Joe’s has helped me to be a better person. And I hope that the book, in some ways, gives the message of what these guys were able to do. It was just so much greater than basketball, in the way that they were able to come together, play as a team, the way they were able to overcome so many obstacles.
