At the beginning of this summer, I had asked Judy if she wanted to
think about coaching together sometime in the future. She was just
about to graduate from Scranton University (Nursing), and she said she
would eventually be interested.

Apparently one of my other eight siblings overheard, and he talked
to one of my many Aunts, who then talked to one of the parents who was
actively involved in the St. Denis (my grade school) basketball scene.
A week later, I come home from work and my dad says to me: “Hey
Coach, come here a second” with a big goofy grin on his face.

Meh? I don’t get it? “What?” I asked him, confused as all hell.

“Oh,” he managed to squeeze out between laughs, “Aunt Barb called.
You and Judy are coaching a summer league.”

WHAT?! We weren’t ready for this! We had no coaching experience,
and Judy didn’t even know what her schedule would be like. She wanted
to ease into a coaching job. I called Judy and told her the
(untimely) surprise. It wasn’t that we didn’t want to coach – we
weren’t READY to coach. But I guess sometimes getting thrown into
something is the best way to tackle it.

And it was. We loved our team. We were coaching in the Holy Child
Summer Basketball League, 5th and 6th grade St. Denis girls. They
were all so adorable! Well the games flew by, and just last
Friday we had our last of eight games. And now we are wishing we had
more. From the get-go, we started losing games… but by a very
slight margin. We played to have fun, we played every girl an equal
amount of time – or at least that was the goal. We tried to have
practices (and even had a pizza party and, last Friday, an ice cream
party at Dairy Queen). It was so great to feel like we were giving
back… and it kept reminding me of the Friday night “Pizza and
Basketball” nights that Mr. Zabel used to have in their yard – and
through which I learned how to play basketball at a very young age.

We finished the season either 2 and 6 or 3 and 5. Clearly, since I do
not know the record, we really didn’t even have a focus on that aspect
of the game. While Judy and I really despise losing, that’s not what
this was about. It was about the girls, and teaching them the
fundamentals while having fun! And apparently they did, as evidence
by one of the (several) emails we received from parents:

Brian and Judy,

You guys are the best. Julianne absolutely loves playing for you. She said
last night that even though the team didn’t win, she really feels like she
is learning a lot – and that is the most important thing.

My youngest daughter Jodi told me last night that she hopes you two will
coach when she is in 5th/6th grade. She’s only going into 3rd so you’ll
have to stick around for a couple more summers!!!!

Thanks and have a great 4th of July!

See you Monday night.

Eleanor G******

It really was an awesome experience, and, schedules
permitting, we are going to try and do it this winter as well (and for years to come). The problem is, we don’t want to lose *this* team. They are great. And they have improved soooo much since the first game (last game we won 32 to 4!). It was
too cute when the girls were asking us if we would be their winter
coaches — if we would follow them up a level when the move on, and so on. And, last Friday,
they all signed a card for each of us and gave us gifts – for a summer
league! No one does that for summer league coaches! They really shouldn’t have, but it was so awesome. They are really the best girls.

I
love basketball, and this is such a great way to spread my love for
the game.