End of the season wrap-up

The final games are in the books, and the season is a wrap. Last weekend we played our final 2 basketball games for the 3/4th grade youth basketball. It was a struggle for a majority of the season, but I think the boys actually learned a little bit about how the game of basketball is supposed to be played.

I told them up front that I was not concerned as much with winning as I was with them learning some fundamentals of the game. Though winning is fun, and it is nice to instill that into the boys confidence, to me it is not the be all, end all.

The last 2 games I changed my focus for the kids. I really wanted to get them to understand the importance of Defense, and the proper way to play it. A lot of average offensive teams have won a ton of games by playing solid defense. I taught them to get down in a good defensive stance, and to keep their feet active. Defense is not meant to be played from a straight standing position. We really concentrated on it the last week and a half of practice.

Our first game was against Eddyville-Blakesburg. I had watched them play a couple times before and I had mixed feelings about them. In the first game I watched, they were completely blown out, but the second game I watched, they took it to the opponent. Our focus on Defense seemed to be working well in this game. We were up 12 - 6 at the half. We came out rolling in the second half and pulled away from them. We gave up a couple points at the end of the game, but ended up beating them 23-10.

The second game had us match up against Centerville again. I was really anticipating this game to see just how far we have come on the season. In the first week of games, we lost to Centerville 28-17, so I was anxious to see what we could do with a few more weeks of practice under our belt.

To say that this was a defensive struggle would be an understatement. neither team was letting each other get off too many good shots. We had a fair few good shots in the first half, but failed to get many of them to fall. We were down at the half 10-6. The second half was more of the same as each team struggled to get off many good shotswe trailed late in the game 12-8 before giving up an easy basket, and a foul to make the final 15-8. We ay not have won the game, but we really looked like an improved team this time around.

We finished 2-6 on the season, but had 3 other games that were pretty close. I think had we played defense the first 3 weeks like we did the last week, we would have finished 5-3, but that was not the case.

I had a lot of fun coaching the kids, and I look forward to doing it again next year.