Week one of the 2013 DreamTeam Youth Basketball season is in the books. We had a good night of practice on Monday and the boys seemed to have a good time playing their game yesterday.
As to be expected at this age, the boys struggle with spatial awareness. The basketball serves as a magnet sometimes and what starts as a basketball game quickly turns into a rugby scrum with all ten players within 5 feet of the ball. Only having 45 minutes to work with the boys, our focus has been exclusively on fundamentals such as dribbling, passing and shooting at this point so I wasn’t surprised to see them struggle with spacing.
The competition is getting bigger and faster as well. We’re starting to see teams who have played together multiple years and in multiple sports (similar to what we’ve done) but it’s clear some of these teams have already started to differentiate, getting selective which players they invite to stay on their team.
It took all of one week to see what’s wrong with youth sports on display. Some parents on one of the opposing teams were “working the official”. Keep in mind officials in 2nd grade YMCA basketball programs are usually teenage boys or girls who are just learning the art of officiating. It takes everything I have to not react when I hear parents and sometimes other coaches get on these young officials. Clearly, they’ve never been in this young person’s shoes.
