Disclaimer: Kuroko no Basuke belongs to Fujimaki Tadatoshi.
The Origin of the Legend
Teikou Middle school was a middle school famous for its focus on sports, particularly basketball. Ever since it had secured a professional national basketball player as a coach, the basketball tournaments always yielded great results. This attracted many students interested in playing basketball, and it took but a few years for their basketball to exceed the level of just an extracurricular activity, and become 'the sport'.
The tryouts for the basketball team were so strict that half of the hopeful students were refused entry. The rest had to undergo difficult trainings, and most of them never even had a chance to play in a tournament. Still, there were some whose talents shined, and they were taken into the first string immediately. Those were the so-called 'aces' of the team.
However, they were so rare that not more than one or two came from the same year, even though Teikou had almost exclusive selection of its basketball players from all the elementary schools in its vicinity. A rare few held onto their positions throughout all three middle school years, but most were soon replaced by the next batch of students, the next generation of 'ace'.
Even the strongest team created could at most last for one year, due to the restrictions for the third years to retire. This was the hope for most other middle schools, in order to hold onto their dreams of winning the tournaments. And this hope was propagated by the fact that some of the talented ones went to their schools instead, preferring to dominate in a small pond rather than becoming lost in the huge lake.
But all that changed that one year, when five talented basketball players entered the school together. While their abilities were greater than most, it was their potential that attracted the coach and made him promote them to first string.
The 'aces' of Teikou's team at that time were two third years, and they were strong. But they were incompatible with the newcomers, and forcing them to accommodate the newcomers just two months before the National Championship was too difficult. The coach made a difficult decision to separate the newcomers from the seniors, in order to allow for the development of the newcomers, the next generation of 'aces'. He knew that if they were made to play together with the seniors, the seniors would only overshadow them and stunt their growth in the future. So he placed them in the first string, and yet never allowed them on the court.
That year, there was no change in the line-up of Teikou's basketball team. Many speculated that Teikou did not find any new special players that year, since only the best would get the chance to play in matches. It was not unusual, and the other schools would finally have the chance to shine after Teikou's 'aces' graduated that year. Everyone trained even harder in order to win, now that winning was no longer impossible.
How wrong they were…
With the graduation of the third years after the National Championship, those five newcomers were immediately placed as starters. They have had half a year to refine their teamwork, and it showed. In the next Spring Tournament, many schools put up a tough fight, but those five newcomers still triumphed over them. They were given the name of 'monsters'. But the nickname did not only refer their strength, but also their aggressive styles of playing that many others disliked.
During the subsequent National Championship, one of the newcomers was replaced halfway. It was not unusual that the line-up changed, since there were always better players entering the school each year. It was then that the team started improving tremendously, with much better teamwork and harmony. There were whispers of that new guy being the next batch's 'ace', but during the interview later, it turned out that the talented replacement was actually of the same batch as the others, and that the whole team was made up of second years. By the second year's Spring Tournament, every match had a huge point difference, and even the seeded schools from other prefectures had a tough time lowering the point difference… By the third year, they were unbeatable as a team.
The title of the 'Generation of Miracles' was then conferred to that team of five basketball players from Teikou, who fought and won almost all the matches with point differences of more than a hundred. While there were many talented others before them, not more than one or two came from the same year. Never had there been one full team, who actually retained their starter positions for more than a year, and never had the coach allowed the third years to participate in their last year's Spring Tournament. He would prefer to hone and showcase the next batch's candidates, but just for that year, he broke the unspoken rule to make the third years retire before the Spring Tournament, in order to fully cement the winner status of Teikou for many years to come.
That spring, the title of the 'Generation of Miracles' became a legend.