Coach Kevin

Refereeing Soccer In The Rain

2009-04-22T23:24:00.002-05:00

I worked a U9 girls game today on a field that was quite muddy. There were 2 big puddles, one right in the middle of the goal mouth. The home team won 4-2, it would have been 6-2 but twice they had sure goals stop right in the puddle of water.

Second Practice

2009-04-21T21:39:00.003-05:00

We practiced again tonight, despite a light rain off and on, cold (upper 40's) temperatures, and a soggy field.

We worked on our juggling. Brooke earned her OYSAN patch and Nathan came really close. Once everybody arrived, we ran 2 big laps to warm up and then did some dribbling. We played a game of "Sharks & Minnows", where minnows, each with a ball, try to dribble across the field while the sharks defend and try to steal the ball. When a minnow loses the ball, they become a shark.

Unfortunately due to the missing practices, I had to review a few basic concepts today. One was that the left and right positions do not need to stay on the left or right side of the field, but to stay to the left or right of the player next to them.

Next we discussed the responsibilities of the defender, as presented in Premier Soccer by Michael Parker.

Intercept the ball
Don't let the player turn
Stay between the player and the goal
Force the player outside

We then formed 2 lines, offense and defense, and worked on these concepts.

Finally, we worked on scoring, taking the ball into the corner and crossing it into the box. I want the middle player to stop at the top of the box and wait for the cross, and I want the cross to be directed behind the defender.

We ended up right around 8 PM, a 1-hour practice.

First Girls Game

2009-04-17T22:23:00.003-05:00

Our girls team had our first game tonight. It was a home game against Firelands. We got the early lead 2-0, both scored by Dejah. The game was looking good!

But Firelands scored the next 5 to take a 5-2 lead at halftime, on their way to a 6-2 win.

Not much to say as we have only had 1 practice and that was over 2 weeks ago. Spring soccer in Ohio is quite difficult. A few girls were ready to play but many were not. The frustraing part is that we could have beaten them.

Third Practice Cancelled

2009-04-07T21:41:00.002-05:00

Due to snow!

Luke, Brooke, and Rachel all had games on Saturday and practice on Sunday for their AASL/NOGSL teams. Luke and Rachel each played a half at goalkeeper and each shut out their opponent for their half. Rachel also scored a goal! Brooke's team played their best game of the indoor season but lost 5-4.

Luke's practice was first on Sunday. During the girls' practices, Luke and I worked on the juggling for the OYSAN Skills Patch. The 6 2-touch alternating feet above the head was the most difficult but eventually he achieved it and earned the patch!

Second Practice Cancelled

2009-04-03T18:21:00.002-05:00

As of last night there was an 80% chance of rain all day. Besides the rain, temperatures in the low 40's and high winds were expected. So I cancelled practice for tonight (I sent out the email last night).

Our next practice is supposed to be on Tuesday but the forecast is even worse. Snow, wind, and 30's. The following Friday is Good Friday so it looks very much like we won't practice again until April 14. The girls team has our first game that Friday on April 17!

I did go watch my son practice last night with the Cleveland Kickers. He's not playing on a team as they do not have a team his age, but he is going to attend the practices and raise his skill level.

They did some running, and then some volleying practice, where 1 player would toss the ball to the other player, who would kick it back to the server with a specified part of the foot. After that they scrimmaged. All of these are drills I have done with my team (admittedly probably without the same quality demonstration).

First Soccer Practice Of The Year

2009-03-31T21:13:00.003-05:00

Tonight was our first practice of the year. We have 25 players on the 2 teams (U12 coed and U12 girls) and 23 of them were present tonight. The only 2 missing were my own kids (who are with their mom tonight).

We started with a warm up, 1 lap dribbling followed by 1 lap jogging.

Next we did some more dribbling warm ups, right foot, both feet, left foot, inside of feet, outside of feet, etc. Dribbling across the field, when I blew the whistle they had to stop and touch the ball with their knee, then both knees, then knee-knee-head, then knee-knee-head-chest, then knee-knee-head-chest-butt.

After that we did some juggling, we are working on our OYSAN Skills Award patches this season. There are some video examples on youtube. Of the 23 players, 13 made the first goal tonight, 6 1-touch kick & catch.

Next was dribbling at a standing defender (coach or a cone) and making a move to go around it.

Then we worked on passing, with an assistant coach we had 6 groups of 4 and we played 3 v 1 keep away. We kept rotating and did this for about 10 minutes.

We then did one more fitness activity, "Recovery Runs" where we jog out in a straight line until I blow the whistle and then turn around and sprint back (as if the ball was stolen from us and we have to get back on defense).

Finally, we played "Full Field Keep Away" with 2 teams (orange and blue). Each team got a point for 5 consecutive passes. They also could earn 2 points by passing from their own half to a goalkeeper in the opposite half. This was too complicated for our first practice, as nobody completed a pass to the opposite keeper.

Two Indoor Games

2007-11-03T23:00:00.000-05:00

We've played 2 indoor games, losing both of them. Our first loss was 13-3. Our opponent was a rather successful competitive team. (We have a mix of competitive and recreational players, including 3 girls).

Our 2nd game started out almost as bad, 7-2 at halftime. We played better in the 2nd half and the final score was 11-7.

We're not playing bad, especially since we have 13 kids who were on 5 different teams in the fall. We definitely need to be more aggressive. We have 2 more games to play in this session.

Indoor Soccer - Session 1

2007-10-26T10:05:00.000-05:00

Our team is playing indoor soccer at Gameday Sports Center in Oberlin. The games start this Saturday and getting our schedule was like pulling teeth!

Registration was supposed to close last Saturday so they should have known at that time how many teams they had in each division and how to set up the schedules. I stopped in on Tuesday evening and the schedules were not ready. I was told they would be emailed out on Wednesday.

On Wednesday evening I phoned in and the schedules still were not ready.

On Thursday afternoon around 2:30 PM I phoned again and was told they would be emailed in less than an hour.

On Thursday evening around 5:30 PM I phoned again and was given the time for our first game on Saturday (about 42 hours away). Then about an hour later I finally received the full schedule by email.

This process really should not be so difficult. I realize they are trying to make money and accept as many teams as possible, but once registration closes, the schedules should become top priority.

Soccer players come from busy families and advance notice of gametimes is really necessary.

Fall Season Ends

2007-10-16T10:00:00.000-05:00

The fall season is over, the coed team finished at 2-6 while the girls were 1-7. The girls team is new and they actually had the lead in 2 of the games they lost so they were more competitive than the record indicates.

The coed team is a borderline A / B team and was in the A (upper) division this year. Last time we were up in the A division we went 0-8 so that is an improvement at least!

Indoor soccer will be starting in a couple weeks.

Update

2007-10-03T15:26:00.001-05:00

Our coed team has played twice since my last post, losing 5-4 and 3-2. The 5-4 loss was a game where I gave a newer kid a chance to play goalkeeper for a half, or we probably would have won.

And with less than 5 minutes to play in the 3-2 loss, the score was 2-2. I switched keepers because my best scorer was playing keeper. Shortly after the switch, we let up a goal. If I hadn't switched, maybe it would have been a tie?

Meanwhile the girls team also lost twice, 3-2 and 4-2. Lots of close games this season but unfortunately we usually seem to be on the losing end.

The coed team is 1-5 and in serious danger of getting bumped back down to the "B" division. Which will probably lead to a very successful year against less-talented teams.

The girls team is also 1-5, but they are showing some significant improvement. The recent 4-2 loss was against one of the top teams in the division.

At practice last night, we played freeze-tag, where everyone who wasn't it had a ball and had to dribble around, and anyone who got frozen could only get un-frozen by having a teammate dribble a ball through their legs.

Next we did a goalkeeper agility drill. One player stands on one leg, while his partner tosses him the ball. The player on one leg has to catch and throw the ball back, all the while standing on just the one leg.

Then I took the boys group over to scrimmage against a team of U13's, and we lost 4-0. It wasn't a bad showing, all in all. Meanwhile Coach Tom worked with the girls.

The coed team has a game this Thursday so that was our only practice of the week.

"Prove It"

2007-09-21T08:49:00.000-05:00

"Prove It" is our new slogan for the rest of the season, for our coed U11 team. I got tired of hearing the kids talk about which teams were better and which teams were worse, so I explained that who we think is good or bad really doesn't matter, we need to "prove it" on the field during the match.

Our opponent last night did prove that they were better than us. We scored first but they led 4-2 at halftime and 8-2 at the end of the game. They are now 5-0 with 3 shutouts so for us to score 2 goals against them is a decent accomplishment.

Leighton scored his 3rd goal of the year and Dejah scored her first on this team, so now we have 6 different players scoring goals in our first 4 games.

Week 3 Games

2007-09-19T07:30:00.000-05:00

We had 3 disappointing games last week, but there were bright spots in each one.

The girls played on Thursday. We got behind 7-0, but we did come alive at the end and score 3 times to make it a respectable 7-3 score. The 3 girls that scored were all girls that play on both the co-ed team and the girls only team, Dejah, Corinne, & Shelby.

On Saturday, the girls against the other team from our community, probably the best team in our division. We quickly fell behind 4-0 in the first 15 minutes, but we actually played decent from there on out. Lauren scored her first goal on this team. That gives us 5 different players that have scored on the season.

Then later that afternoon, the co-ed team played against a team I feel we match up well with talent-wise. Jason scored first to make it 1-0, but the other team then scored 7 straight goals to make it 7-1 at halftime. Our goalkeeper made a few mistakes that didn't help, he took a goal kick with nobody protecting the net and didn't clear it far enough out, the other team intercepted and scored easily. Then twice the other team had a breakaway and our keeper never came out to challenge, he just waited back for the shot and was unable to make the save.

We did improve in the 2nd half, Leighton went in at keeper and had a shutout half while Luke scored twice.

The girls team is now 1-3 while the coed team is 1-2.

The coed team has an extra game this week, against the top team in the league, then both teams play winnable games on Saturday.

Talking Trash

2007-09-11T08:04:00.000-05:00

I refereed a game tonight. It was a U8 game. Pay was $17 for an hours work, and I had to drive the boys to their practices anyways.

The game was at 6 and practices went from 6:30 - 8:00 so I had some time after the game was over. I was going to go sit in the van because of the mosquitoes, but I noticed one of the trash cans was full. So I went over and pulled the bag out and dragged it to the dumpster.

I went to the equipment barn and got a handful of trash bags, figuring there were probably more cans that needed dumping. By the time I was done I had emptied no less than 8 trash cans.

This job included fighting off bees that had been attracted to the trash, including one particularly ornery group at a trash can near the parking lot.

One of the coaches saw me and asked, jokingly, "Is there anything you won't do for this league?"

I'm not sure whose job it is to empty the trash, but I had some free time and I was glad to be able to "pitch in."

Sunday Soccer

2007-09-10T12:35:00.000-05:00

Luke and Nathan are on an advanced team that plays on Sundays. I don't coach this team but I thought I would write about it here anyways.

Luke was with his mom, and 2 other boys were absent. So we had just 9 players for an 8 v 8 game. The other team had 14. Luckily they have small fields (the game was away) so we didn't get too tired. Our team won easily, the final score was 8-2.

Nathan was on the bench at the start of the game, but he went in after about 5 minutes and played the rest of the half. He also played the entire 2nd half, all at right-defender.

The park was surrounded by woods and the mosquitoes were horrible. Thankfully several people had OFF! and were willing to share.

The game started late because (for the 2nd time in 3 weeks) the referee was late. I had just walked over to the coaches and volunteered my services, but the other coach had been on the phone and knew that the referee was on his way.

Week 2 Games

2007-09-08T23:30:00.001-05:00

The girls team played first today. We played another new team and we won 2-1. Dejah scored both of our goals. We really dominated the game, we (still) just need to get better at scoring. And we need to find a 2nd goalkeeper besides Nicole!

Then our coed team played. We played last year's league champ, but they are missing a few players this year. We played an awesome first half, leading 5-1, but then in the 2nd half we didn't score and let them get back into the game, ending up with a 5-3 lead.

Nick wore football shoes and had to cut the toe cleat off so that he was allowed to play. Luke and Brooke were both absent. Chase scored twice in his first soccer game ever. Jason also scored twice, and Leighton kicked one in.

Before the games we had pictures, and then we also had the kickathon. It was a very busy day!

Fall 2007 Intro

2007-08-29T10:40:00.000-05:00

Well I have neglected this blog for long enough.

My co-ed team from Spring 2006 has become 2 teams. We merged with the remnants another co-ed team (2 players) and also a girls team (4 players). We also picked up 3 new girls, and (most helpful of all) an assistant coach!

We now have 26 players on the 2 teams. There are 16 girls on the girls team and 10 boys on the co-ed team. Four of my more experienced girls (Corinne, Dejah, Shelby, & Brooke) are also playing on the co-ed team.

We're practicing on Tuesdays & Thursdays. On Thursdays, 4 of my boys (Luke, Nathan, Jason, Leighton) practice with Coach C's advanced team.

Both teams had their first games last Saturday. The co-ed team went first and played the 2nd place team from the A division last year. We finished 2nd in the B's and were moved up to the A's for this season. The halftime score was 4-3 them and then we came apart in the 2nd half, losing by a score of 9-3.

The girls game was similar, but with less scoring. The score was 2-1 them at halftime, and the final was 5-1. Our only goal came off an indirect free kick where Dejah tapped the ball and Hannah M. knocked it in!

We have this weekend off and our next set of games on September 8th.

No Practice

2007-04-08T18:18:00.000-05:00

We had Tuesday off this week because of the Wednesday footskills. I had to work delivering pizza so I didn't attend the footskills and don't know how many from our team were there.

Thursday it was in the low 30's so I canceled practice. This week coming up doesn't look much better, with temperatures forecast in the 40's each day, with the possibility of mid-50's by our first game this Saturday.

Hopefully we will get at least 1 practice in this week!

Soccer Practice Begins

2007-03-30T15:11:00.000-05:00

We had 2 practices this week. The weather was nice, the fields have some soft spots but are starting to dry out.

We have 1 new player and 13 returning players. The new player is named Leighton and has played soccer before. It looks like he will be a good addition to our team!

Thursday's practice was led by our new director of coaching, Coach Kelly. He has several years of experience as a semi-pro soccer player. He did alot of fun stuff with the kids and I think they learned a few things!

Only 7 players made it to both practices, 6 made it to one or the other, and 1 player needs another phone call to make sure she got the message when practice is starting.

Hot Shot Competition

2007-03-01T21:10:00.000-05:00

Well after an 0-8 season we finally had some positive results. We had 7 team members compete in the Kellog's Junior Olympics Hot Shot competition tonight and 5 of them placed!

In the Boys 8-9 division, James was 1st (10 pts) and Chris was 2nd (9 pts). Noah (2 pts) and Damon (1 pt) also placed 4th and 5th respectively.

In the Girls 8-9 division, Brooke was 2nd with 1 point.

And in the Boys 10-11, Luke was 1st (15 pts) and Nathan was 2nd (10 pts). Great job kids!

By placing 1st, Luke and James both qualified for the regional competition coming up this summer.

Cougars 25, Eagles 13

2007-02-26T16:07:00.000-05:00

We lost our final game of the season on Saturday, giving us an 0-8 record.

James fouled out, we got 2 technicals on our bench and an assistant coach was ejected. The referee was awful and I wrote a 5-page letter to the supervisor at the Parks & Rec department who oversees the program. But I don't want to get into that stuff here.

At halftime we were trailing 12-8 and were still in the game. Nathan played great, rebounding well, shooting well, and helping on defense. Nathan had 5 points. Damon also played a good game, pulling down several rebounds.

Jacob did a good job as always at point guard. Jacob ended the season as our high scorer with 20 points. He could have scored alot more but he is a very unselfish player. (And he doesn't drive to the hoop enough!)

Luke played terriffic defense. We had 2 players absent and another fouled out so Luke ended up playing the entire 2nd half and guarded their point guard / main scorer that entire time.

Chris had 2 baskets for us and Noah helped play point guard when Jacob was not in the game. Both did well this season for 3rd graders and should do even better next year when they are older.

Our top 4 scorers on the season only scored 2 points today. Jacob had 2, Raymond was absent, Luke didn't score, and James fouled out without making a basket. That says alot about the balance on our team.

I called 3 time outs and in 2 of them we set up plays for Brooke, since was the only player without a basket. The 2nd play worked great and she got a shot up that rolled across the rim but fell off.

Brooke was fouled again with less than 10 seconds to play but was injured and did not shoot her free throws. Nathan made 1 of 2.

Regardless of the final record, I'm proud of the kids, they all worked hard and improved alot.

Final High Scorers (8 Weeks)

2007-02-25T01:39:00.001-05:00

1. Jacob - 20 pts
2. James - 19 pts
3. Luke - 13 pts
4. Raymond - 12 pts
5. Nathan - 11 pts
6. Chris - 10 pts
7. Damon - 6 pts
8. Noah - 4 pts
9. Imani - 2 pts

Shooting Contest

2007-02-22T14:49:00.000-05:00

Our community is participating in the Kellog's Frosted Flakes / Junior Olympics Basketball Skills Competition next month.

Tonight is our last practice and I am going to give the kids a chance to practice. Basically they get 45 seconds to shoot. They have to get their own rebounds. They get 1 point from the blocks, 2 from the wings, 3 for a free throw, and 5 for a 3-pointer. They can't shoot from the same spot twice in a row.

After the 45 seconds are up they get 2 more free throws to add to their score.

It should be fun for the kids, and it will give them a slight advantage over the kids from other teams that have not practiced this.

Mustangs 28, Eagles 18

2007-02-20T09:18:00.000-05:00

This was really a pretty good game for us. The Mustangs came in undefeated. We practice at the same time as them so we have scrimmaged them a few times, and they are a very quick group with a couple of very good players.

We were missing my 2 boys, Luke and Nathan, as they were playing in a dodgeball tournament on Saturday morning.

Noah got the first basket of the game and at the end of the first period (we play 8 periods of 3:30 each) we were tied 4-4. We stayed in the game and had a few leads, I think we were ahead 11-10 just before halftime.

The Mustangs got rolling in the 2nd half and ended up beating us by 10, but I was proud of the kids for the way they hung in there. Jacob had another 4 points but the man with the hot hand was James, scoring 11 points including 3 of 4 from the free throw line.

We have 1 more game left and I really think we have a chance to win it.

High Scorers after 7 weeks:

2007-02-20T00:38:00.000-05:00

1. James - 19 pts
2. Jacob - 18 pts
3. Luke - 13 pts
4. Raymond - 12 pts
5. Nathan - 6 pts
5. Chris - 6 pts
7. Damon - 4 pts
7. Noah - 4 pts
9. Imani - 2 pts

Gators 20, Eagles 17

2007-02-13T09:59:00.000-05:00

On Saturday we played the Gators. This league represents a fairly large community. The 10 kids on our team attend 7 different elementary schools. So I usually know on average 1 player on any opposing team that we play.

Well the Gators were very familiar. They have 1 kid that lives in our neighborhood, 1 kid that played soccer on our team 2 years ago, 1 kid that plays soccer on Luke's indoor team, and a girl that we know from church. Their coaches are the parents of the neighbor and 1 of the soccer players. So this was one of the games we were looking forward to.

Again we started the game with only 6 players but 2 more arrived before the end of the 1st quarter. I knew 2 of our players would be absent so we were at full strenght (8) for most of the game.

The Gators are a well coached, disciplined team. On defense, they pick up their players around the 3-point line. This helped us, some of the teams we have had trouble with were teams that attack our point guard as soon as he crosses half-court.

They run a high pick and send the dribbler to the basket. A very common play in this league and one we are learning to defend.

And we were getting our shots from a little closer to the basket this week, and we were getting a little luck. We had leads of 9-8, 13-12, 15-14, before eventually losing 20-17. They got their last basket in the last half-minute so up until that point it was a 1 point game and we had a chance to win.

This was by far our closest game, and it was fun to watch and to coach. We've got a very balanced team, no real superstars but everybody can make a basket. Everybody has (in a game) except for Brooke. We have 2 games left, and I am going to make sure the guys try extra hard this week to get her some shots.

One thing I have noticed is that almost every week, our team has a different high scorer:

Game 1: Luke (3 pts)
Game 2: Raymond (2 pts), Imani (2 pts), Noah (2 pts)
Game 3: Raymond (6 pts)
Game 4: Nathan (6 pts)
Game 5: Jacob (2 pts), Luke (2 pts), Raymond (2 pts)
Game 6: James (6 pts)

High Scorers after 6 weeks:

2007-02-10T23:05:00.000-05:00

1. Jacob - 14 pts
2. Luke - 13 pts
3. Raymond - 12 pts
4. James - 8 pts
5. Nathan - 6 pts
6. Chris - 5 pts
7. Damon - 4 pts
8. Imani - 2 pts
8. Noah - 2 pts

Practice - February 9th

2007-02-09T12:48:00.000-05:00

Our basketball team had our weekly practice last night. We had 9 players (1 absent). We worked on right-handed layups. More than half of them still don't have the proper footwork and are not jumping off the correct foot. We worked on this for a long time, probably 10-15 minutes.

Then we worked on 1-on-1 dribbling and defense, with the defender trying to make the dribbler turn.

Finally we divided into 3 teams of 3 players each, and scrimmaged. At the start, the rule was, you could not dribble once you crossed half-court. That was too make the kids learn to pass.

Next we allowed dribbling, but only if someone set a pick for the dribbler. We actually had a few picks set during that phase of the game.

Falcons 23, Eagles 6

2007-02-05T11:09:00.000-05:00

We lost badly again this week, but I really don't think we should have.

We had a 9AM game, and until partway through the 2nd quarter, only 6 of our 10 players had arrived. Including zero point guards. Had our team been there, we could have played even with the team we were facing. But without our 2 best ballhandlers, we got behind and got discouraged, allowing the other team to gain confidence at the same time.

Three more players arrived during the 2nd quarter, but by that time the game was getting out of hand, and we never seemed to get going. We did rebound a little better.

We had the ball out of bounds on the side late in the game, I called time-out to set up a play. This play required 3 passes to get the ball to an open player coming off a double-screen. The player was open but we only made 1 pass. First player who got the ball either forgot or didn't understand where he was supposed to pass the ball. And this was immediately after a time out where I drew and explained the play, including what each player was supposed to do. Very frustrating.

High Scorers after 5 weeks:
1. Raymond - 12 pts
2. Jacob - 10 pts
3. Luke - 9 pts
4. Nathan - 6 pts
5. Chris - 4 pts
6. Damon - 2 pts
6. James - 2 pts
6. Imani - 2 pts
6. Noah - 2 pts

I notice that I never wrote about practice. This week we mostly practiced defensive positioning, including boxing out, help defense, fast break defense, and general positioning on the court (depending if your man is 1 pass away from the ball or more than 1 pass away.

Buckeyes 29, Eagles 16

2007-01-29T12:15:00.000-05:00

We lost again, 29-16. Several good things happenned in the game.

First off, the 16 points is the most we have scored yet. Not only that, we had 5 different players score, and our 2 high scorers, Nathan (6 pts) and Chris (4 pts) had not scored at all in the first 3 games.

Second, assistant coach Mike quickly recognized that we were getting beat by a high-post screen, so at half-time we quickly worked through a drill where the player guarding the high post stayed a couple steps behind the offensive player and was ready to help on defense when the dribbler drove around the pick. Several of our players picked up on this quickly and our defense improved significantly in the 2nd half.

We have an offensive play but the kids never run it. I'm at a loss as to how to get them to execute the play in the game situation.

It is nice to see the players sharing the ball. In 4 games, 9 players out of 10 have scored at least 1 basket. I think that is remarkable at the 3rd & 4th grade age group.

I didn't count the fouls for the entire game but at one point we had 9 fouls and our opponent only had 2 fouls called on them. I don't know what we did to get on the officials' bad side on Saturday but it sure seemed like we were, which is frustrating. One of our best players, Jacob, fouled out at the end of the 3rd quarter. He was upset but he handled it pretty well.

I challenged the kids to try to score 20 points in our next game. (We've scored 7, 6, 14, & 16 in our first 4). Hopefully that will motivate them.

I haven't decided yet what we will do in practice on Thursday but I am considering spending the entire practice focusing on defense & rebounding.

Basketball High Scorers (after 4 games)

2007-01-27T19:13:00.000-05:00

1. Raymond - 10 pts
2. Jacob - 8 pts
3. Luke - 7 pts
4. Nathan - 6 pts
5. Chris - 4 pts
6. Damon - 2 pts
6. James - 2 pts
6. Imani - 2 pts
6. Noah - 2 pts

Basketball High Scorers (after 3 games)

2007-01-26T11:25:00.000-05:00

1. Raymond - 8 pts
2. Jacob - 6 pts
3. Luke - 5 pts
4. Damon - 2 pts
4. James - 2 pts
4. Imani - 2 pts
4. Noah - 2 pts

Basketball

2007-01-26T11:07:00.000-05:00

This basketball season is frustrating so far. We just don't have enough time to practice.

First off let me say that this league is the best recreation league of any I know of or have been involved in, at this age level. We have 10 kids on our team and play 7-minute quarters. Each team plays 8 games and everybody makes the playoffs.

We get a gym for 1 hour for practice each week. Games have 2 referees and use the entire gym. We don't have 2 games running sideways on the small hoops simultaneously like many programs do.

However, at the 3rd and 4th grade level, 1 hour per week is just not enough. These kids are so raw, we could spend each practice on fundamentals (ballhandling, passing, shooting, defense), and that would be best for the kids development.

But we have a game each week and if we just work on fundamentals, the kids won't be working together and the game becomes a series of one-on-one match-ups and the best individual players will dominate the game. So we have to try to put in some kind of offense with a basic play or 2 that the kids can understand and know how to run.

We had 3 Saturday practices back in December (before Christmas). Then we were off for 2 weeks for the holidays. After New Years', we started back up with a weeknight practice and then our first game. We lost 21-7. The good news was, 3 different kids (Jacob, Luke, & James) scored for our team.

The second week we had another practice (our 5th) and another game. We lost again, 21-6. The good news was, again 3 kids scored and they were 3 differnt kids than scored the first week. And we did have more passing than we did the first week. So in our first 2 games, we had 6 baskets and a free throw, scored by 6 different kids.

I think that shows that we have a balanced team. Unfortunately, like I said before, when the kids don't execute a set play, at this level, it becomes a one-on-one game and the team with the best individual player will win. And we just don't have any dominant players on our team.

The third week we had yet another practice and then our Saturday game. At halftime we were behind 18-4. I challenged the kids to forget the score, start over at 0-0, and go out and win the 2nd half. They actually began working together a little and outscored the other team 10-8 to win the 2nd half, but the final score of 26-14 meant we are 0-3 on the season.

Four different kids scored, including one that hadn't scored yet, so in 3 games we have gotten 7 of our 10 players to score at least one basket.

We had a pretty good practice last night and hopefully on Saturday the result will show that we have continued to improve.