Hey, Coach! ch. 16

"As soon as we got to the playground Sheila started chasing me. 'Peter's got the cooties! Peter's got the cooties!' she yelled." – Fourth Grade Nothing










You can tell fairly quickly that some fifth grade basketball players were born to play the game; others don't always have their shoes or socks on.  Scottie's team mostly consisted of this last bunch, Scotty being the main representative of the first bunch.  The eighth grade coach could see this right away as Scotty virtually sliced through any defense put up against him in drills, while the other boys made wild yowls to each other, or galloping instead of running.  Randall was still in school clothes, barefoot, because he didn't know if he was on a team officially. Carl remembered shoes, socks, and even shorts, but his main problem was that he forgot a shirt. His thick woven sweater, though, kept him quite warm he informed everybody else as he scooted around the low post with his hand up, "open, open, here, here."  Will and Trent were getting there.  They had seen a basketball before -- this was helpful to recognize the difference between a medicine ball and a basketball for all the standard reasons, the main one being that the medicine ball would not have bounced and very difficult to shoot all the way up to ten feet.  Really, though, the problem right there in the beginning, that very first practice, if it could be called that, was the boys were clearly convinced that they were still right outside on the pavement court for recess, running, jumping wildly, hands up, yelling, slinking off for a drink when thirst arose.  Scotty hoped for a better showing.  Without an adult somewhere out there helping, there was no way to get a team up off the ground.  He thought The Girls might have thrown them off the court by now, making the argument that this was a complete waste of gym time for her own team.  Well, as for the other handful of girls on the eighth grade team, the only look they gave out was one that had a question attached to it, and it was most likely thought by each of them: 'when do we get out of here, how do I plead with dad that I can no longer play his favorite sport.' The wheels were turning.  Chaos comes in many forms, but the concoction of fight grade boy and eighth grade girl might take the entire cake.  The boys still had one foot left back in fourth grade; the eighth grade girl was counting her days to high school, which meant driving a car and getting as much space between them and little boys.  The coach could see there was no answer, there was only patience and endurance, with a pile of hope thrown in for good measure.  Matt and Tyler had faded off to the corner of the gym throwing basketballs at each other's legs, for fun.  The eight grade girl walked over to the boys and, as legend would some day have it, took them each by the thin collars of their t-shirts (yes, t-shirts, a proud moment indeed), and yanked them back to the low post blocks. "You're on this team now. The basketball court isn't the playground.  If you want to play schoolyard ball, stay home.  If you are here, we'll play basketball." Everybody who heard this, of course assumed this would come off as a welcome invitation to take off, head home, yell, cuss, scream, jump around. It had the opposite affect. Matt and Tyler's chins drew down into their necks, their eyes drooped a quarter of an inch. Somehow, as if by magic, they found those basketball stances which must very well be so ancient that even the unskilled novice knows the 'triple threat' position.  They formed two lines, mixed boy / girl, and drove in to shoot layups.  One boy even made one.