Month: December 2017 (Page 2 of 2)

One more piece of the weekend that requires its own entry.

L began her basketball season on Sunday with two games. We missed the first game, but we we landed I had a couple texts from the head coach and another parent letting me know that we lost by six and did not play well. We rolled into the gym a few minutes after the tip of their second game. Maybe we should have skipped it. It was pretty brutal.

We were playing a team that had no one as tall as our four biggest players. Yet those little girls knew how to set screens, go to the basket, and convert layups. They kept killing us at the top of the key because we never taught our girls how to switch on defense. There’d be a big pileup at the free throw line with like four of our girls crashed into each other while a girl from the other team went to the hoop unguarded.

Our girls – and us coaches too, to be honest – struggled with the move to “real” basketball. In the league we played in the past two years, we always had a chance to matchup after every substitute. In this league, you’re expected to check in, go to your spot, and be ready to play. For roughly two-thirds of the game our girls had no idea who they were supposed to be guarding. That’s mostly on us coaches, and I’ve been tasked with coming up with a better way to make sure everyone knows what position they’re playing and who they’re guarding.

The worst part of the game was our girls could not rebound. We didn’t track numbers but I would imagine the other team out-rebounded us at least 2–1. Not only were we taller than them, but our girls all kill each other in practice going for the ball. Not sure if they were timid because they were playing against strangers, just out of sorts because they never knew where they were supposed to be, shutting down because most of the game us coaches were yelling “WHO ARE YOU GUARDING?!?!?” or what. One possession we finally got three offensive boards in a row, but couldn’t convert any of the follows.

We have exactly two inbound plays, one from the sideline, one from the baseline. We’ve practiced these for at least two weeks. In the game, no one did either one right. Players that were supposed to cut left cut right, running into the girl behind them that was cutting forward. Girls who were supposed to set screens moved, and those who were supposed to move set screens. Worse, several times the inbounding player smacked the ball and called “BREAK!” and our girls just stood there and stared at her.

I think playing two games hurt the girls, too. L was freaking wiped out after the second game. One of our girls, who is normally crazy high-energy, was walking around like a zombie during the game. Might need to get better nutrition in them all on game days.

Another thing that killed us is we have 11 players. We knew that was going to be a problem coming in, but it was even worse than we thought in a game situation. We were never sure whether to sub five-for-five or a few at a time, and kept losing track of who needed to get into the game. That was all compounded by the girls bugging us at every dead ball, “Can I go back in?” The team we were playing only had seven players, which, what a shock, seemed to make it pretty easy for their coaches to figure out subs. Our plan had been to just run teams to death with our depth. That works better when the players have an idea of how to play, I guess. Again, some of this will hopefully be fixed before the next games in two weeks. Pretty sure I’m going to be holding a clipboard to make sure we sub correctly.

Anyway, we lost 26–4. And it really wasn’t that close. L hit one shot[1] and nearly had the play of the game. We were inbounding under the opposite basket with three seconds left before halftime. You can’t press until the final three minutes of the game, so we had her stand right on the half-court line and wait for the pass. I told her take two dribbles and shoot. That’s exactly what she did, and her heave from 30 feet hit the front of the rim and bounced away. Sad that our best play was a miss.

But other than that we sucked.

Which I pretty much expected. We’ve focused on fundamentals and haven’t put in any offense, other than going to a certain spot on the court depending on your position. Us coaches are all a little flummoxed at how to teach the girls what to do, mostly because every time we explain something, we get 3–4 girls who have half a clue and the rest of the team just stares at us. The league we played in the past two years was very low key. Dribbling was optional, there weren’t many fouls called, you couldn’t steal on the dribble, etc. In our new league you can’t double players outside the lane or play zones, but everything else is like real ball. We all knew our girls would struggle early on. But getting smoked by a team of shorties was a little hard to take.

The league plays every other weekend, so we have four practices before our next set of games. Hopefully us coaches can get our acts together and, in turn, help the girls be better prepared.

We had ourselves a good ass weekend in San Antonio! Here’s a rundown of what all we packed in.

We flew down Thursday, getting in late afternoon. We went down with one of S’s partners and her husband, and met a friend of theirs who was in from Colorado for the conference. After checking into our hotel – the Grand Hyatt on the River Walk – we changed and hustled out to grab an early dinner. We went to Casa Rio, the first restaurant built along the modern River Walk. We enjoyed some fine tacos and margaritas while sitting outside in the perfect air.

That perfect air was the highlight of the weekend. I know it gets hot as balls in SA in the summer, and there are stretches of the year where the humidity can be nasty. But, man, it was freaking perfect all weekend. Always in the low-mid 70s during the day with almost no humidity. Evenings remained warm well past sunset, so dining al fresco didn’t require a jacket.

There was an interesting mix of folks at our hotel. Lots of docs in the for conference. There were lots of people in for the Rock n Roll marathon. And there were all these middle and high school mariachi bands in for some kind of competition. Friday and Saturday evenings we saw the kids heading to and from their events in their amazing outfits. Lots of bold colors, girls in big hoop skirts, etc. It was a lot of fun to people watch in the hotel bar.

Friday the ladies got to learnin’ so the other husband and I went out to explore the River Walk. I’ve never heard anything but good things about the River Walk and all of those were confirmed through the weekend. It’s really a fantastic place to hang out. Tons of restaurants and shops, lovely scenery, and this weekend not too crazy. We had lunch at County Line barbecue, which was very solid. A couple Shiner Bocks made it a real Texas meal.

After the ladies were done for the day, we all retired to the hotel pool. It was a pretty meager pool, more of a lap pool than a splashing around pool, so we mostly soaked up some rays. Since it wasn’t a big pool like the one at the Biltmore in Scottsdale, where we went two years ago, that also meant it wasn’t overrun with crazy kids.

For dinner that night we decided to hit the happy hour at the Tower of the Americas, which was right behind our hotel. We rode the elevator way the hell up, grabbed a nook in the bar, and ate some tremendous appetizers as we watched the sun set from 700 feet above ground. Following that was another stroll around the River Walk. As a Midwesterner, it’s always a little odd for me to spend time during the holidays in a warm climate. I loved how the River Walk was decorated, though. The river is bordered by all these huge Bald Cypress trees. Rather than being draped in lights, the trees had long light strands hanging from their upper limbs vertically toward the ground. The lights mimicked the natural tendrils you see on some southern trees. It was really nice.

Saturday I put in a long, photo walk in the morning. I managed to log nearly nine miles. I covered every path of the River Walk, toured the Hemisfair Park around the Tower of the Americas, and mingled around the Alamo, where a 5k/10K was being held. I didn’t cross the highway to tour the Alamodome, but it in sight of our hotel so I bowed in its direction to honor the events that took place there on April 7, 2008. Everything I had ever heard about the Alamo was also true: it’s pretty damn small. I also enjoyed the irony of how celebrated it is for its role in American history when San Antonio is an overwhelmingly Hispanic city.[1] Seriously, when I walked up to the actual building, they were organizing kids for the children’s run and I swear there wasn’t a white kid in any of the groups.

That’s the big takeaway from spending a few days down there: San Antonio really is a hybrid city. It feels both very American and very Mexican. Spanish is spoken everywhere, but you also see people who look like they are from Mexico who speak with a Texas accent. It helps that the Mexican government has a cultural office in Hemisfair Park, there is a UNAM extension, and the park is filled with art donated by Mexico. I’ve never been to Houston so can only compare with Dallas, which feels uniquely Texan with a dash of Mexico. San Antonio is a much more even mix.

Saturday afternoon my college buddy E-bro drove down from his home in Austin to watch the KU-Syracuse game with me. We hadn’t seen each other since my wedding over 14 years ago, although he, another college buddy, and I text each other almost every day. It was also the first KU game we had watched together in nearly 20 years. We found a table at a bar with a ton of TVs that were mostly tuned to the SEC championship game, got one switched to the KU game, and did our best to catch up while watching the Jayhawks win and under the din of the CBS broadcast which did its best to down out all conversations. It was great to spend a couple hours together.

I met the ladies at the Ruth’s Chris in our hotel where they were wrapping up dinner. I grabbed a quick bite, had a couple more Shiners, and that wrapped up our trip.

We were off early Sunday, which was kind of a mess. The Rock n Roll Marathon was starting about three blocks from our hotel, so our Uber driver struggled to reach us. Fortunately it’s only about 15 minutes from downtown to the airport and we got there in plenty of time to get through security and grab some breakfast before it was time to head home.

All in all a really good weekend. I highly recommend San Antonio, provided you time your visit properly. Avoid the summer heat. Locals told us the River Walk can be packed shoulder-to-shoulder with people in the winter when lots of northerners come down.

Crap. I had an awfully nice playlist put together and then realized I can’t figure out how to share Spotify playlists using the WordPress mobile app. You see, the Mrs. and I flew down San Antone way yesterday so she can further her medical education over the next couple days. Expect details from the tip on Monday. Without Spotify music, these two vids seemed appropriate.

I’m off to check on the basement at the Alamo…

November 2017

• Ryan Adams – 36

• The War on Drugs – 32

• Lydia Loveless – 25

• Frightened Rabbit – 21

• R.E.M. – 20

Complete stats available at my Last.fm page