Mandatory AAU Basketball Spring 2023 Rant - Weekend #4

 This weekend was just a Millie weekend as we stayed local and went to the Electric City Madness.

Yes, that Electric City

To be honest the tournament was quite large, taking up the other AAU teams three court practice facility, plus seven other courts around the Scranton area.  It will be noted that the host program has two or three teams in every age group, both boys and girls, but teams came from as far away as Newark, New Jersey, and out AAU team came out in force as well.  

I swear each year is the last age group with the crappy facilities, but somehow sixth grade was shoved into two undersized courts side by side at a local rec center.  You know the type, the ones where you can straddle and touch half-court and the top of the three-point line, or better yet the space between the three-point line in the corner and the sideline can't fit and adult shoe.   Barely okay for younger kids, but for a team the focuses on run and gun and three-pointers, it caused a few difficulties adapting.  

The first team was the other AAU team's 6th grade "A" team.  It will be noted that they played in the same Spooky Nook tournament as us, won their weaker pool, but somehow they ended up in the top 5 Mid-Atlantic rankings while Millie's team much more impressive effort was ignored.  

In a hot, muggy gymnasium with no room to move, a 23-11 halftime should have been enough proof that those rankings were wrong.  Credit to the other team, as they did not stop playing and actually dropped the lead to 8 by the buzzer, but that involved Millie's crew playing their worst game of the year, half the field goal percentage and double the turnovers.  

The second game was against a small town rec team up along the New York border.  They had seen some success in tournaments in update New York, including a championship in Syracuse. 

With only half the girls finally getting comfortable, it was a 59-6 blowout. 

The win secured a 1st or 2nd place spot in the A pool, and a chance to move towards the championship.  We all had great interest in placing because our beleaguered 5th grade team had not only played up to 6th grade, but ran wild in the B pool, netting 1st place on criteria.  Unfortunately, Millie's team 8-point win against the Scranton "A" team and maxed out point differential of 15 points for the blowout win was less than the 2-0 Scranton "B" team that won by 15 and 13, respectively. 

This meant their 2nd place A Pool team (Millie's 6th grade) would play the 1st place B pool team (5th Grade). 

It was a slaughter 62-16, just like most of their joint practices are.  It's a shame, because I believe 5th grade could have beaten any other team in either pool (Maybe not Scranton A, but they'd hang in there).  I really wanted their Cinderella story to come to an end against us in the championship game, just like our 5th and 6th grade teams did in last Spring's tournament. 

As a reward for suffering through the tiny courts, they sent the advancing teams to a different site with (A) a full-sized regulation court, but (B) no parking and road construction anywhere.  

Since we knocked the Scranton A team out of contention, Millie's team had to play the B-Team in the championship.  With open space to move, and not needing to tiptoe corner threes, there was a total team effort, and a 45-17 win. 

Another championship and 90 minutes less driving time each way?  A+ weekend!

School Ball:  No "official" news announcement for the new Varsity coached, but somehow Maja was informed last minute of a Friday "Meet the Coaches" for just the returning players where the new coach introduced herself, the JV Coach, and a no-show Freshmen coach.  No word on the Junior High coach, so we might have to organize some e-mails to see if there's no word on the off-season and summer programs.