Conference Play

Tuesday was the 3rd conference game played by our Varsity team against Averett. The team played a tough, close game that went all the way to the end. We lost the game making the conference record 1-2 with a ranking of 5Th in the conference. There are lots of reasons or excuses we could have had for losing but, the reality is that Averett just worked harder than we did. We only had one day to prepare and as coaches we felt that we did not prepare our team well enough. I have learned that preparation is a big key in any sports, but what it really comes down to is execution in the end. As a coach I have learned that you learn a lot more about yourself and your team when a lost is experienced. Many teaching points come from losses, of course no coach wants to lose but the loses make a team stronger in the end. We might of thought that we were ready for the game but one thing you learn about a team is that everyone has to be on the same page, people have to stay focused and one can never assume that a person is going to "show up". Motivation plays a big role on any team and one of a successful coaches job is to keep the players motivated. I think that coaches are just like managers because in a job setting managers have to do the same thing to get their employees to work at the best of their ability. We have a lot more time to prepare for our next game Monday, we will see what we have learned from our loses and if we are able to get the best production from the players.

Holiday Weekend

Well it has been a long weekend for me with the celebration of MLK day on Monday and all. Saturday started things off for me and I had a varsity game to attend. This would be varsity's 2ND conference game, we played Ferrum College and we played well. During varsity games my main job is to keep track of what the other team is running, this is the 1st time that the basketball program has had the luxury of having 4 coaches on the staff, so it has been nice to have extra pairs of eyes around and people to lighten some of the load. Like you can imagine game time is hectic, but that is why we practice, to prepare for the game. Basically I scout what the teams do against us to help the team better prepare for them the next time. When conference play starts we play everyone at least twice we will play some schools a third time as well, so the more we scout, the better prepared we are. We were very prepared for Ferrum and I am happy to say that we won the game moving Methodist to 1-1 in the USA South Conference. This was just the start of my weekend we took Sunday off to enjoy the playoff games, but by Monday we were back to work. Varsity practice in the morning and my last home Junior Varsity game at 7 p.m. against Louisburg Junior College. The Junior Varsity team and I both had to pull double duty. We had to be at the Varsity practice at 9:30 a.m. to go over the scouting report for Tuesdays game against Averett University. I told the JV's to use that opportunity to warm-up for their game later on that day. The JV's have been helping with the scouting report since the spring semester began, so as a coach I adapted and used the scouting to our advantage. Junior Varsity had gotten used to running other teams plays so, before our game against Louisburg I told them that we would be running all the plays that we had been learning from the beginning of the semester. Needless to say the JV's were just fine with that idea and they showed it with their play. We played so well, you could see the progress we made as a team from the beginning to now our last game together. We won the game and improved our record to 4-6, 2-0 in 2008. That would be my last game as a Head Coach but the experience will always stay with me.

MU Basketball

Wednesday, Jan. 16 was the first conference game of the men's varsity season. The atmosphere was just as electric as I remember from my playing days. The transition from player to coach has taken a lot to get used to. The coaches and staff have made the transition very comfortable, since the beginning of the 2007 academic year I was no longer a fellow teammate, I was introduced as one of the men's basketball coaches. As a member of the coaching staff my duties where clearly defined. I was put in charge of coordinating the study hall program by monitoring student-athletes and receiving progress reports from instructors every other week. I was also put in charge of coordinating all junior varsity practices. I designed all JV practices and implemented all drills under the supervision of my coordinator, Assistant Head Coach, Tim Ryerson.
For the fall semester I was strictly the JV coach, I attended some varsity home games and was on call if they needed a van driver. I was given the opportunity to head coach my own team. The JV season started on October 24, 2007 in a exhibition game against the Army travel team, I was finally put in the position that I looked up to all my basketball career. Now I was the one the players came to, the one they wanted attention from and the one who controlled all their hoop dreams in the palm of my hand. Of course my supervisors Coach Ryerson and Head Coach, David Smith prepared me before I took on such a task. We would meet every Monday and Wednesday at 11am to talk basketball and discuss the things that the MU basketball program were trying to accomplish for the up and coming year and beyond.
The JV team had 8 games scheduled for the fall, 3 of those games away. Such intense coaching and going to school was indeed difficult, but it taught me many lessons in the importance of time management, player/people management, organization, communication, discipline and preparation. I learned that in coaching much like everything else a person never stops learning and a coach has to be able to control their emotions because the team takes on the personality of their coach. By the end of the fall season my team which consisted of mostly freshman and players needing more development ended 2-6. Some would look at the record and think that was bad but, my team overcame many obstacles and grew as I grew, ultimately becoming much better players and even better people. The fall JV season was over but my coaching experience was only just beginning.
I was now required to attend varsity practices and games. Since the fall JV season ended on December 5, 2007 I had the whole Christmas break to jump right into the varsity swing of things. Varsity is a lot more fast paced the JV of course but being a former player I adjusted very well. Again meetings with Coach Ryerson helped me adjust and stay on page with what was going on with varsity and I also talked with Coach Smith on a daily basis. Although this is Division III sports, I have learned that the major schools have some of the same issues that any other school may have, their is just a lot more money involved.
Now, I am not completely done with the JV, one of the issues we have been dealing with is retention in the program. To help with the problem Coach Ryerson added 2 more games at the beginning of the Spring semester. The first game scheduled was Future Academy on January 12, 2008 and the next game Louisburg was scheduled for January 21. We won the game against Future Academy and we have been preparing for Louisburg coming up this MLK day (Monday). I will definitely be posting soon to talk about that one, but right now varsity has another conference game Saturday @ 4 pm against Ferrum College, so we have been focusing on that game but I still have to prepare myself and the JV team for their game on Monday. Stay tuned because the ball is just beginning to bounce and I will return with a lot more exciting things to talk about after this very busy weekend.