There was snow on the ground, briefly, here in Indianapolis today. Which means its time for what the Hoosier state does best: high school basketball. The girls season kicked off last week, and I had two games.
I lukced out and got to see both the teams that are probably our best and which are coached by my favorite coaches.
Thursday I had our biggest school, CGHS. This is a school that is very good in almost every sport. But for some reason their girls basketball team is never great. Part of it is playing in a brutal conference. Then, if they get through sectionals, they almost always run into one of the 2-3 teams that are favorites for the state title in a given year in regionals.
Anyway, they have a very talented but young lineup this year and were facing an inferior opponent Thursday. They got out to a 14-2 lead and that was pretty much that. They won by 22, which was a solid start to the year. Two other wins last week have them at 3-0 going into this week’s county tournament.
I like their coach because he talks a lot, so I can ask him a couple questions and get plenty of material to pull quotes from. Plus he is always super friendly. When I walked up to him Thursday he greeted me with a big smile, Hey, man, how are you? Great to see you!” When we were done he asked if I would be doing anymore of their games this year and again said it was great to see me. I’m sure he’s like that to everyone, but it’s nice to get that treatment when a few of our other coaches are about as terse and impersonal as can be.
Friday I had ICHS, a 3A school that features the best player in the county. She had scored 37 in their opener and did not disappoint in game two. She had 34 points, 12 rebounds, and five steals. She only missed three shots from the field. I’ve been watching her for four years, and it’s been fun to watch her grow up. She was really good as a freshman and has gotten steadily better each year. She’s already committed to a small D1 school and is trying to win the county player of the year award for the second-straight year. ICHS has a really good team again this year and coasted to a 29 point win. They did lose to a 4A school Saturday, though, so go into the county tournament with a loss.
My stat keeping was a little rusty, and this was my first basketball game on the iPad so I had a few moments of panic when my stat spreadsheet wasn’t doing what I wanted. But the stories got filed and hopefully the rust is gone.
As I did last year, I’ll be keeping track of the Total Margin Factor of my games; basically the cumulative margin of victory or loss by the teams I cover. You may recall I was deep in the hole last January but a few big blowouts in February left me positive for the season. I start the 2012-13 season with a nifty +51, which won’t change this week as any games I will be doing will be between county teams at the tournament.
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