9 Feature Stories You Can't Miss This Week: Errors, Espionage, and Evangelicals

This week for BuzzFeed News, Shaun Raviv revisits the Cold War by way of the basketball court. Read that and these other great stories from BuzzFeed and around the web.

1. The Lost, True Story of the CIA's Greatest Basketball Coach — BuzzFeed News

Courtesy of Jay Mullen for BuzzFeed News

How did a 1972 exhibition basketball game between Russia and Uganda become a crucible for Cold War tensions at the dawn of Idi Amin's brutal regime? Ask the former CIA agent who tried to hit the Soviets where it would hurt them the most: on the court. Read it at BuzzFeed News.

2. The War on Women Is Over — and Women Lost — Mother Jones

Photograph by Donna Ferrato for Mother Jones

Molly Redden takes an unsettling look at how conservative policies have shuttered abortion clinics across the country, forcing many women to go to extreme lengths in order to obtain one. "In every corner of America, four years of unrelenting assaults on reproductive rights have transformed all facets of giving an abortion or getting one—possibly for good." Read it at Mother Jones.

3. Whatsoever Things Are True — The Atavist Magazine

Chicago Tribune

How could overturning a wrongful conviction go so terribly wrong? Matthew Shaer untangles the story behind a gruesome double murder and the two men separately accused, convicted, and exonerated in the decades since. Read it at The Atavist Magazine.

4. The Graduate — BuzzFeed News

Joyce Lee for BuzzFeed News

Anne Helen Petersen profiles Alison Brie, an actress who, after six years playing a college student on Community — and eight playing a ‘60s housewife on Mad Men — is ready to show she’s more than the sum of her characters’ conservative, type-A parts. "I’m a woman, of course I’m more than one thing.” Read it at BuzzFeed News.

5. On the Road With the Unluckiest, Most Unloved Team in Professional Baseball — Maxim

Maxim

Jason Feifer chronicles the trials and tribulations of the Frontier Greys, an independent baseball team whose players put up with having no home, no fans, and virtually no money for the long shot of making it in the big leagues. "Nobody wants to be here. Which is why they’re all here." Read it at Maxim.

6. Slipping Away — Maclean's Magazine

Maclean's Magazine

Meet Jo Aubin, a 38 year old man living with Alzheimer's. Shannon Proudfoot shares the intimate details of Aubin's symptoms, treatment, and marriage post-diagnosis, taking readers inside a reality all too often overlooked. “You’re mourning the person who’s sitting on the couch with you. There are glimmers now and then, but the essence of the person is changed.” Read it at Maclean's Magazine.

7. I Used to Be an Alcoholic. Now I'm a Stoner Who Has a Drink Sometimes. — BuzzFeed Ideas

Illustration by Kiersten Essenpreis for BuzzFeed News

Katie Herzog poignantly chronicles how she recovered from alcoholism — with the help of marijuana. "I was tired of the problems booze brought to my life, but I didn’t want to be sober. I still wanted to get altered to celebrate and bond and mourn and make friends and cope with all the shitty parts of life." Read it at BuzzFeed Ideas.

8. Inside the Duggars' Deep Ties with a Once-Powerful, Now Scorned-Ministry — Talking Points Memo

Talking Points Memo

Sarah Posner exposes the family's longstanding support of the Institute in Basic Life Principles, an evangelical homeschooling ministry whose founder has faced widespread allegations of abuse and harassment. “The only surprising thing was that they knew about this and still decided to do a TV show.” Read it at Talking Points Memo.

9. A Prescription For More Black Doctors — The New York Times Magazine

Credit Brian Finke for The New York Times

New Orleans' Xavier University sends more African-American students to medical school than any other college in the country. Nikole Hannah-Jones investigates, and in doing so illuminates the contemporary struggles facing historically black colleges. Read it at The New York Times Magazine.