Mandatory Basketball Rant 2021-22 Week 10

 As these final days of winter ball are grinding by, my faith in most of humanity evaporates, but let's talk mostly about the basketball.

Millie's Travel Team: They got to the championship game late.  Not physically late, but athletically late.  The favored Freeland team jumped on them early and all seemed lost at the half, down 20-10, but corrections were made and the defense locked down.  Unfortunately, the deficit was too much and they fell 23-18.  

Yep, they only allowed 3 points in the 2nd half. 

The team has two more showings in local tournaments before they get mothballed till the fall.  We don't know where they're going to play in the winter because.... 

The Local Rec League:  Is a mess.  The weather cancellations (or lack thereof  when there was ice) has resulted in extra games promised by the milquetoast president, when there is zero room for extra games.  So I put out the first week of the playoff schedule.  Surprisingly, the usual suspects (3rd and 4th grade) are fine with it, the rest of the divisions are losing their minds.    Throw in Biddy Divisions still lingering due to their own cancellations, and there's zero extra practice time for the coaches looking for it.  

Millie also missed her rec league game, to play with her AAU friends.  I still haven't heard the whole story, but the only other guard on the team fouled out in the first half, the coach got a technical... and almost tossed out.... and everyone is sworn to secrecy about how bad the score was... against the previously winless worst team in the division.  Single elimination playoffs start today, and I hope a quick end to the season.

AAU Winter League: This league has always been a bit of a variety show, with girls grades 4-7 playing, with skills levels from beginner to elite sharing the court.  The drafted teams always seem to be thrown out the window, but the actual pick-up games seem much more balanced.  AAU tryouts are today as well, so it should be fun to see who comes out and who actually makes the team

Maja's School Leagues: League and District championships come around very shortly, to time is limited to reschedule all the postponed games due to weather, COVID, or anything else I forgot about.  

Since the last update, Maja's had FOUR Freshmen games, going 3-1.  The lone loss was by three points, and they turned the ball over with 1.8 seconds in the game.   

Maja's whopping 1.7 points per game has been under attack during this run.  She scored 4 points versus Pittston and was shut-out in the last three games.   She's essentially 1's across the stat sheet (save blocks), but she gets a ton of situational playing time and situational substitutions.  

She's not afraid to face-guard the toughest girl in the league AND draw the charge.

There's one more game for them next Wednesday, and here's hoping the team can finish the season 13-2.  

7th Grade:  The 7th Grade team remains undefeated.  I missed Maja's game last weekend, but the Power six put up an early lead, and no one looked back.  The 7th graders who didn't make Freshmen play most of the game, with the other rotating in.   We did have one make-up game last night, where they dismantled the opposition 33-5 in another strange game where Maja didn't score, but there were 5 rebounds, 4 assists, and a block.