What are we doing?

Last weekend, many of our teams played in one of the many spring AAU tournaments.  This one was different.  This one was at SpookyNook Sports, “the largest indoor sports complex” located in Lancaster County, PA and the third grade team was especially were excited.

Going into the tournament, this group of 8&9 year old boys expected to play at least three games and have a pool party back at the Next Play house, an Air B&B farmhouse located about 10 minutes away.  Most of the parents had no idea to what to expect.

As one arrives for the first game of the day, one can see a single file line of cars driving slowly to the rear of the massive 700,000 sq ft building. Picture people flocking to see the Iowan Field of Dreams but getting ready to park at Disney World.

This massive facility hosts all kinds of tournaments each and every weekend for all sports, basketball, baseball, soccer, field hockey and more. The rumor has it the owner built the complex with profits of Auntie Anne’s pretzel business.   

In typical fashion, our third grade team again drew the 8:00a game.  Some parents drove out on Saturday morning, and some players like Teddy arrived on Friday.  Teddy had talked about “SpookyNook” for weeks. The boys may have been too excited to play as the frenetic pace caused us a 12 point at the half, an unusual scenario for the boys.

While linked-up in our halftime huddle, (each player connects by grabbing the others shirt or shorts) the Next Play coach calmly reminded the boys work together to trap, to keep their heads up and make the extra pass.  In pretty dramatic fashion, these tenacious boys clawed their way back to win by 11 points, a 23 point turnaround in just 16 minutes with all ten boys contributing.

While it was a lot of fun to be a part of the turnaround, the other team was flummoxed. After using all of his timeouts and watching his players unsuccessfully try and dribble through our press, their coach began screaming “What are we doing?” The question didn’t help his team but it did make us think.

We were playing the Next Play way, team ball, with a focus not on the past, but on the Next Play.  As coaches we were challenging a bunch this group of nine 3rd graders and one 2nd grader (who prefers to take jump shots instead of layups in transition) to play better competition and test our metal. These boys were forced to not focus on the score, but the Next Play.

While this was the only game that they won, it wasn’t the only thing that they won. They boys made improvements throughout the games and. 

The boys celebrated the victory back at old farm house on Saturday afternoon. In fact, all of the teams were invited back to the farmhouse to hang out and get to know one another. We even celebrated a few birthdays with birthday cake thanks to multi-talented Coach Meg! The third grade team, they took partying and having fun to another level.  They partied until the cows came home. 

To answer the question, what are we doing at Next Play?  We’re creating great memories.