Basketball at Chatham High School ran for 50 weeks straight every year. When one season ended the next was practically beginning. It simply became our way of life, and we loved it.
When the Varsity season ended in early March you had two weeks to rest your body, and recover mentally and physically for the next season. Coaches were prohibited from scheduling formal practices and workouts until November 1st, which is when the season officially started. However starting the final week of March, that group of guys you just went to war with for 50 consecutive weeks was back together. Monday, Wednesday, Friday, and every other Saturday were workout and agility days, Tuesday, Thursday, that alternating Saturday, and Sunday were practice days. Those practice days were where the team gelled together, and where we all learned each other’s style of play and how one player’s role on the team perfectly complimented all other player’s roles. For example I played the Power Forward position (Chatham was a very small school), which meant I would be spending a lot of time down low in the paint, and doing pick and rolls with the point and shooting guards. The guards and the frontcourt worked together in every practice to nail down every possible way the guard could pass the ball. Playing with the same group of guys day in and day out allowed every player to memorize all of the other players’ moves. Our point guard was Mike Flemming. He stood 5’11, which was taller than many opposing guards, and he easily out dueled them in just about every aspect of the game. I remember watching Mike dribble up the court in the middle of games, and just by the way he dribbled the ball, or the pattern he jogged in told me which play he was trying to execute and ev...
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...f our players, Vince Cipkowski, had become very irritated with Sam Mackerer, who was our starting small forward, for forcing up bad shots that rarely went in. Sam had made tremendous improvements during the offseason, and was now taking away a lot of minutes from Vince. Sam heard about what Vince was saying and confronted him. Some of what Vince was saying was true, but it should have been addressed to Sam, not voiced to people outside the team. Since this all happened the friendship Sam and Vince had was never the same. This drama ultimately set the team back in their progress to make the playoffs and play better together. Sam was now more aware about the shots he was taking, and this caused him to over think things on the court. As any basketball coach will tell you, you need to just play the game, over thinking the game is what will force you to make mistakes.
Joes High School’s total enrollment consisted of sixteen girls, and twenty boys. Ten of the boys that had enrolled there played basketball. All of the boys were over six feet tall. Lane Sullivan, the new coach of the basketball team, had never even touched a basketball before he started coaching. Sullivan had never coached anything at all before he started coaching the Joes basketball team. In order to gain knowledge about the sport, he got a book about it. He started coaching in 1927, but before the 1928 basketball season, Joes High School didn’t even have a gym. Instead, they’d practice outside on a dirt court, and two times a week they’d take a bus to the nearest gym, which was ten miles away. In order to play home games, the boys had to play in the local dance hall. The “court” was nowhere near regulation size, and the ceiling was so short that the boys couldn’t shoot an arched shot. The people who attended these basketball games had no place to sit and watch the game, the all stood around the edges of the court and on the small stage. Joes High School finally got their own gym around Christmas time because the people of Joes donated their time and material in order to make it happen.
“When I got the job, I looked at the program as a bus,” said Hoyt. “I am jumping onto the bus. The program and school already exist, and there is a recent history of not having a successful basketball program. How do I change that for the better and make it my own? The first thing is get rid of all the people that you don 't want on the bus, and that is what I did. Then I looked at it as a scorched earth theory, where you burn everything that preexist to the ground. We got new jerseys, new players, and everything else is dead. We brought in new freshman, and those freshman were going to be foundation of what 's going to come down the road.”
You’re 9-11. One more loss and you don’t make it to the playoffs. Do you want to play? Ain’t there nothing else for me to say to you. You got to make the decision to be a team. So before you go out there on the court, you got to work this out amongst yourselves.” At that time, all the players confront Brian about the issues they have with him and tell him to leave. As he’s leaving, Gary tells him to not walk out on the team, but Brain exclaims, “What team.” Gary follows him telling Brain to handle this situation like men. Brain tell his teammates that he doesn’t play for them, so Gary tells him he is right then asks him who he plays for and keeps badgering him about it until he answers the question and Brian tell Gary that he plays for his big brother Ray. He tells his team about his brother’s story about how he was a great player and how a drunk driver had killed him. Brian tells them that its there is a lot of pressure to fill his brother’s shoes and that his father has worked him so much to try to fill them and has to make his dad proud. After hearing Brian talk about his situation, his teammates tell him that they got his back and that they’re his brothers now. I agree his Coach Collins’ method he used because it brought Brian and the team together as a whole. Sometimes, when you have a coach yelling at you all the time, you need the coach to step aside
The first day we got there we had started off so wrong by arguing. We weren’t doing well and we argued most of the time. Us as a team, we honestly made ourselves look bad in front of the coordinators and other teams that were watching us. The coaches had given us a real big pep talking about sticking together as a team to make us better. Although we didn’t think we needed it, it actually
Chapter 1 has familiarity in my life. In the 8th Grade my father moved us to the Midwest from Southern California; culture shock! Dad decided that I should play football at the Junior High, after all my cousin played on the team, and so did my father when he was in school. Most of the other players were a minimum of one year older than me. It is common practice for parents to hold their boys back a year to start school; this gives the boys a size advantage in sports. By the time adolescence rolls around, one year makes a big difference in a young man’s size. Also, I was born in November; not a prime year for sports league cut-offs. When it came playing football, I was severely outsized by my teammates. Due to my experience, I tend to agree with having sports league try-outs split into semesters or trimesters to allow the same opportunities available to more players.
The gym is full of people; the stands are so full that they overflow onto the edge of the court and out the doorway. The shrieks and screeches cry out from the crowd’s cheers. The ball crashes through the net, as they jump popcorn flies. The home team hit a three-point shot; they are winning with only a few seconds left. In these few seconds, the coach looks around. He realizes why he does what he does. At this point, none of the labor, time, and effort matters. The only thing that matters is the win, seeing his team succeed; watching a team grow is unlike any other feeling. In order to understand that feeling, one first has to appreciate the game: the rules and regulations, the legends that have played and coached, the development of the game,
Denis Waitley once said, “Attitude is the criterion for success.” Many philosophies about basketball and the way it should be played and coached have surfaced over the years. The Fab Five created a fresh new philosophy and showed the world that their new way of thinking could turn into greatness. They came out with a new look, a new attitude, and a new way of playing. Shaped by the players’ circumstances, Michigan’s Fab Five impacted basketball extensively and left their legacy still seen today. The players and coach all took many different paths that led to where they ended up together and the greatness they accomplished.
The men in the town had set up a meeting in a barber shop to have a discussion about basketball with the new Coach Norman the men told Norman they needed Jimmy to play in order to win. Norman Dale did not care about who was on the team, it mattered how the players were playing together. Coach Norman went to go visit Jimmy, Coach Norman tells Jimmy a story when he was younger, he would do anything to win a game whether he hurt someone or pushed away someone to win a game. During the movie his perspective about winning had changed. While the team was playing against another team during the game, it did not matter if they were losing it mattered that they were working together. Another example, from the movie Hoosiers was when a player named Ollie had gotten fouled on he had to make the last winning points. Ollie was discouraged, he would not make the winning shot, he gained confidence in himself, so he shot the first shot and made it Ollie was so surprised that he made the first shot, he still had to make the second shot there was a suspense to make the last shot and he did the team was so happy Ollie made the team
The Rebirth of a Game Basketball in my home state goes way back, straight to the beginning. The University of Kansas (KU) hired James Naismith, the inventor of the game, as its first basketball coach in 1898. The fledgling sport has caught on, and has gained force ever since. KU was also the scene of the emergence of Wilt Chamberlain, who dominated the game like none other. At the same time that “Wilt the Stilt” was breaking out, Kansas State University (KSU) had a basketball coach by the name of Tex Winter.
This report enabled me to observe a very fine coach. I am honoured to have given the opportunity to observe Winchester public school boys’ senior basketball team coach Tom Liu during their basketball season. Coach Liu is knowledgeable about the sport he coaches and about the development of his athletes. His qualifications include NCCP level 1: volleyball, basketball, special Olympic (technical) and NCCP level 2 Theory. After observing several basketball practices and one basketball game, I’ve come to conclude coach Liu is a well respected and a good role model for his players. He provides challenging and enjoyable practice sessions. During the practices, he is able to communicate well with the athletes. He is constantly asking for the athletes’ suggestions on how to improve their strategy as a team and what the athletes feel they should work on. This allows the athletes to be involved and to develop their thinking habits. Coach Liu also provides good corrective instructions where he would pull the athlete aside and correct their mistakes either by a...
My sophomore year of high school I played on the Junior Varsity volleyball team. We began preparing for the season by doing two-a-days the first week of August. We worked out hard the first two weeks then had our first scrimmage that next Friday. We won the scrimmage, but it was a pretty messy game. It was like we were all doing our best individually, but we were not working together as a team. The court was silent during each play and each time somebody messed up the rest of the team got mad at them.
Starting my freshman year at County High School, I played basketball and loved every minute of it. I wouldn’t be conceited enough to say I was good, but God did bless me with the talent to play. My life revolved around the sport of basketball; some would say I slept, ate, and breathed every part of it. I spent all my time training and practicing to make myself a more dedicated athlete. This dedication not only helped me as a player, but also molded me into the person I am today. It somehow helped to prepare me for what defeat I would face with back surgery in the future.
“The odds of a high school basketball player making it to the “next level” to play college basketball (DI, II, or III) is slim. In fact, only 3.4% of high school players go on to play college basketball. Taking it even further, only 1.2% of college basketball players go on to get drafted in the NBA” (Winters, 2016). There are two types of players in the game. There are the kids who play basketball because they are athletic, and all they are seeking to gain is the recognition and awards. They want to be known. Those players are self-centered, they do not play for the team, and generally don’t play because they love the game. These are the types of players who don’t usually go on to play at the next level. On the other hand, there are the players that absolutely dedicate their life to the game of basketball just because they love the game. That is what coaches are looking for in a player, and that is the kind of player I am striving to be.
In the classes, Coach provided the class with a safe and warm environment to learn, providing every scholar with an equal opportunity to succeed higher and higher above all society’s critics about students in New Orleans. We proved and continue to prove what people said were impossible, by our rapid growth. On the court other coaches look for skills, but not my coach. She looked for growth, she confidently believes in the idea of a no perfect team, there were always room for growth. Despite how many losses, the scores weren’t what mattered. Instead, it was about the growth and fight of never giving up until the buzzer went off at the end of every game. I was a part of a team that came from 0 wins from freshman year to having my team finally able to enter the playoff with just one more win to reach. My view of life began to change and evolved over time since
All the pressure i had put on me caused me to act out and not be myself. I constantly was in a battle between myself due to the pressure I was under, i just felt I couldn't be myself. Surely as that year went on I came into myself and that developed on into the next year. My junior year I was able to just be me, I no longer had to try so hard to be something else. I felt such a great deal of pressure fall off my once heavy shoulders. I was now at peace with myself, which really helped me do my job better. With those transitions i now found the game to be fun once again no longer was it just a job, no longer was it something i went out and did with fear in my eyes. I was myself just that fun loving guard from long island, and my game really showed. I always will remember my junior year as one of the best years of my young life. That year i feel was the turning point for me, the start of a beautiful journey in not only the game of basketball but in the game of