Hey blog follower! Long time, no see!

#yougotthatright

Yeah yeah. I’ve been dealing with things around school and home and the country and have just felt like the words that I want are not there. I’ve had this set in before, but not like this spell, so hopefully, we can dig our way out.

My favorite time of the year is upon us: basketball season.

#hoopitup

Heck yes! We started our middle school season in late October with mixed expectations. The 7th graders we coach had very few girls who played before coming to our team. We have ten girls playing with us and of those players, half have never played organized basketball. We knew coming it would be difficult, but we’ve had to simplify everything. Even our girls with experience didn’t have that much experience. So we are building from the ground level up. And our lack of experience shows in our games. We’ve struggled all season.

I have to keep telling myself that this is building towards varsity, but I’d love for the girls to score more than two baskets in a game. During our last game, we didn’t score and that was tough. It’s been a while since I’ve had a team like this, so I’m hyping them up in each practice because, next year, I don’t want to have a team of six girls. Our first year girls have really stepped up into their roles, so I cannot complain too much. I’d love to see them win a game this season to help with their own feelings of success!

#trusttheprocess

Our 8th graders I am really excited about. We have 7 girls who are with us for the second year, and they are a dynamic group, full of it. They don’t take any crap from us and we are very willing to give it right back to them. They trust us to do the right thing by them, and that’s huge for not having the classroom relationship with them. They trust each other and we rarely have the drama you might see in middle school girls. They can run the floor with the best of teams and the last two games, have really looked like a team who, in a couple of years, could cause other teams problems.

Our one problem, we are so short! Our tallest girl is 5’3″ and there are times when I have a team of girls who are 5′ or less on the floor. My expectation for them was to double their win total from last year. Because of our lack of size, we just get run over by teams with any kind of tall girls. We’ve only managed one win this year against teams I really thought we could beat.

#yikes

Last night’s games were really difficult for our teams. To be blunt, we got our asses kicked by a team that has been playing together since they left the womb.

#what

Ok, not really, but both of their teams come from a culture of sports that we just don’t have at our school. Each team had a travel group who plays around the state, then a few play for elite squads who travel around the mid-west. We have nothing like those players, which is a positive and negative.

Either way, they handed up our most lopsided losses of the season, which left me in a funk all night. As we came to school, our principal, who had a daughter on that team, grabbed me and talked about how impressed she and other parents were about our overall defense (we gave up a ton of points, so ok). She said we played some of the best defense they’d seen all season, so I took that compliment and ran with it. My wife had a former co-worker who was at the game and has a daughter who plays for that team as well. She commented about how “scrappy” our girls were (again, ok), but when I talked to the girls before practice and told them about these comments from opposing parents, it lifted their spirits, just a little bit.

So we have four games left, all four winnable. We’ll keep the high expectations, work hard, and laugh about things when we can. One of the reasons I love coaching this age group is because they don’t take themselves seriously and they sure don’t take us seriously as well. I will cherish the remaining games and practices because we’ll never have this again.

It’s a good analogy for life. Cherish those things you hold dear because we’ll never have them again. There are many days where these girls are the best part of my day. I am lucky to keep coaching and hope to continue until my wife tells me enough is enough! Until then, I’ll keep swearing under my breath, find the positives, and push them to become better players, but more importantly, better young women.

In the end, that’s all we can ask for! 🙂