There's never a true stoppage in play throughout the year for basketball. It's just the variations in frequencies transitioning from AAU to school ball and back again.
Last Fall, AAU was a mixed bag, with a smaller pool of available players, and an even even small group of elite programs leading to very anti-climatic tournaments, with an upset or two due to the lackadaisical attitudes that regular 40-point wins can muster.
This year most of Maja's (now 8th grade) team decided not to due Fall ball. A few are recovering from injuries, two have moved to other programs for "More Exposure," and Maja and her AA/school teammate Charlie decided 6th focus on volleyball.
Maja's true love might be volleyball. She's a growing student of the game, the coaches love her attitude and work ethic, and never leaves practice without the biggest smile on her face. Her friend Charlie? Well, when you're a nearly six foot tall female in junior high, volleyball is a magical paradise from the pressures of a basketball family. Both will be recharged when I start ranting about the scholastic season in December.
Millie's 6th grade could be argued to be beginning a rebuilding, or a large evolution. The top two point guards have left. Her school pal, the 5'9" Jordyn, took the fall off. Only one new girl joined the squad and she was more built like a nose tackle than the true center the team needed.
The club also decided (wisely) to push the girls away at-age competition. They were entered in the first tournament of the season right alongside the club's true 7th grade team. Both absolutely destroyed the competition on day one.
On Sunday, 6th grade were bad shooting plus two bad refs away from meeting their 7th grade teammates in the championship, losing 25-13. Their opponent had one dominant center who could eventually scored. However to do so, she performed so much free footwork holding the ball that I thought I was at a bad dance competition. She essentially performed a full box step with every rebound, and the refs only called it 10% of time.
In comparison, the same girl in the championship was responsible for 4 points and no less than two dozen turnovers, almost all self-inflicted. 7th grade almost kept them well under control, maintaining the 20-point running clock mercy rule early and winning 40-19.
With that bad taste in their mouths, and the official departure of the twin point guard, no one knew what to expect when they travelled down to King of Prussia this past weekend for tourney #2.
We should have expected the same old story, as they first played a team (Next Play) of largely 5th graders moved up to 7th (no 6th in this tournament). They would have done very, very well in 5th grade, but the girls eviscerated them, building a 25-0 lead before they scored their only points, leading to a 40-2 win.
With a three hour gap before the second game, the girls huddled together and did their team bonding, while I caught some other games.
I kept encountering the Next Play players and families. Unlike a lot the teams that Millie's crew ran roughshod over, while the coach was absolutely aghast at the audacity that the girls did not let up, the Next Play parents understood and appreciated the situation. Their team hadn't met any competition locally, so they came there AND played up. It was a shock, but now they knew how much harder everyone needed to work and play.
I simply compared their play to and adjacent game with our club's 9th grade team playing a Varsity (10+) team. While the 5th graders struggled mightily, they never stopped playing. Meanwhile the 8th and 9th graders were beating a team of largely juniors 56-17. The second half was never close, and the opposing teams players simply gave up. No hustle, week passes the younger grade schoolers would easily intercept, and they never chased down any fast breaks, slowly jogging to inbounds the ball.
To be honest, there was a LOT of disparity in competition for both sexes and all age groups, and those 5th grade girls were a small minority in the way they handled adversity. This is why I seriously dislike fall ball.
I'll revisit the Next Play girls later on, but I will note they took on a prominent program of 5th/6th graders from a prominent program for their second game, at held on till a large run at the end, to lose 30-14.
Millie's second game was against an aptly name "Renegades." I honestly mistook two of the girls as younger parents, and watching their first game I was hoping their rough gameplay didn't violate any of their player's parole. Bad humor aside, that teams bad swagger and bravado walking in worried me, but that was tempered when I discovered Millie's coach had invited one of the club's 7th grade team's players to the be on the roster as an "insurance policy" just for this situation.
She wasn't necessary. Within two minutes, Millie's team was up 12-0 and the other team's coach had already used two timeouts to stall the bloodshed. This larger team also appeared to be either China dolls or soccer player, falling over and feigning unconsciousness with the least incidental contact possible. Unlike the 5th graders from before, these girls gave up early, put up weak shots, and left the court bawling after a 53-10 thrashing. Millie had multiple points, a great three pointer, and too many steals, assists, and rebounds to count.
Sunday was a late morning and a pleasant surprise at the tournament site. The 5th grade Next Play girls had been given reinforcements overnight: three 7th graders from the program who legally filled in previously empty roster spots. With some height and leadership, the 5th responded with fast game play, and more aggressive shots and rebounding, and shocked the Renegades, 32-27.
Right after that Millie's team from the prominent Comets program, with a fantastic coach, but a lot of "diamonds in the rough" that had showed promise on Saturday.
Despite the coach's scouting of Millie's team, there was little they could offer to fight back. Millie scored the second basket of the game, part of a 9-0 run, leading to a 37-9 win.
Some of us "old-timers" had respect for the Comets coach before, she appeared far more knowledgable of the game that just about everyone else in the building, and she coached the team that gave Millie's team their worst loss ever a 45 -13 thrashing way back in 4th grade.
After some of the parents tried to give compliments to the other team's coach after the game, she crudely returned the praise with, "Wait till I come back in the Spring with a REAL team."
To openly insult her own team, and the parents who spend far more money than our team's parent do, is a travesty. We were mistaken that the program wants to develop girls, they simply want to take money from everyone and focus on winning with already established talent. Given a number of their "national touring" teams fell silent this spring, I'm not sure exactly the stand of the organization within the AAU ranks.
With that bad taste in our mouths, after such a great performance from the girls, they had the pleasure of playing the Renegades for the championship. They came out swinging (sports phrase, not actually swining), and thanks to some poor decisions, it was tied 4-4 for a bit. Eventually the floodgates reopened, the fast break opportunities reappeared, and the shots started landing. With a few theatric performances by the Renegades (who fakes a fall after shoving an opposing player.. and stays on the floor for four minutes?), Millie's team pulled through 42-9.
All in all, playing in up in a division, with strong, appreciated, but limited help from one 7th grader, Millie's team went 4-0, outscoring the opposition 174-31 !!!
I'm seriously hoping next weekend brings some struggle. As much as the medals and pictures and accolades are nice, I almost prefer games with the bad refs and opposing center with a soft shoe routine.
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| The girls with their pre-game, midcourt "I Believe That We Will Win" Cheer |
As a whole, the club brought four teams to the tournament, and every team won their championship. After watching the last championships of the day, Maja, Millie, and I jumped in the car and drove to the Compleat Strategist, a mere 0.7 miles from the facility. I've already reviewed the Compleat Strategist here, but let me tell you, in the short half-hour before close we were able to be there, I'll bump it up to five out of five gnomes.
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