…continued from Northeast Community Center: 77-78
| Still UNDER CONSTRUCTION |
We drove in a large PAL club van from Indy to Kansas. The nine players, Lymon Battles, myself and Karen Woodard’s mother who was serving as chaperone.
We had a first round bye and was able to watch some games in the tournament before our game day. The bye meant we only had to win our first game to be in the semi-final round which was an advantage but our opponents would be the winner of a qualifying round for local teams, which meant they were going to already have a game under their belt Whereas we hadn’t played anything other than scrimmages since the Parks Department Tournament. There was some impressive teams in the tournament’s two age brackets. The favorites in our division (18 and under) were Pecks All-Stars and the French Junior National Team.
The we drew Rosemary [Dorian], Kansas, for our first game . We were told they were made up of all high school players and had three Kansas all-staters. They were comparable to us in height with the exception of Karen, I believe they had a six-footer but after that there were a couple of 5’10s like us. It was a pretty even game until midway through the third quarter where we took a small lead for good and eventually won by seven points.
During the postgame handshakes the opposing coach informed me and the referees that he was lodging an official protest over a series of events that occurred at the point where we had taken the lead for good in the second half. The WBAA policy was that a hearing would be held within 24 hours.
As it turned out the hearing lasted just long enough to officially reject the protest. The referees couldn’t remember the events in question and the scorebook showed that none of our players shot two free-throws in the third quarter. This meant we would face the winner of the French Junior National Team and Peck’s All-Stars. Who were playing that evening. Unfortunately we lost almost the whole day dealing with the process. For more on the Protest click here
When we returned to the hotel we were unloading the equipment from the van when all of a sudden I noticed I was by myself. I inquired with one of the bell hops if he had seen where the girls had went and he informed me that he had told one of the girls about Rick James being on the floor below us and that all the girls took off for the elevator. I may have been considered ‘square’ but I knew who Rick James was.
So I threw all the equipment back in the van and went up to the floor below our rooms. The ‘entourage’ had reserved the whole floor but it wasn’t hard to find the girls or Rick James. I reminded the girls that they had to unload the van and that we were having a team meeting in ten minutes and that I expected them all there. ‘Mr.’ James informed me that he offered to leave the girls back stage passes at the will call window for their concert that night and that they were checking out of the hotel room in a few hours and leaving town after the concert. I told him I would get back to him and left. All in all he was polite and didn’t outwardly fit his image, which would become more raunchier over time. Who knew.
I told the girls that I was going to return to the tournament site to scout the game between French Junior National Team and Peck’s All-Stars as we had discussed on the drive back to the hotel and that they should consider attending. If any didn’t want to go they needed to inform the chaperone and remain with her the rest of the evening and it was up to her what they would do. I couldn’t see Mrs. Woodard wanting to attend a loud rock concert.
I was surprised to be informed that they felt the scouting was more important than the concert. I was even more surprised when everyone was ready on time to go to the tournament site. Everybody went, including Mrs. Woodard. When these girls practiced they practiced, but the rest of the time they were always playing around. Running around, never on time and driving me crazy. Nothing bad just teenage girls being teen age girls. Every rest stop on the trip to Kansas, every place we visited, getting them into their rooms at night, loading and unloading the van, changing before and after games, and starting team meetings where all like herding sheep. I had a wife and daughter and thought I knew what I was getting into but this was non-stop pandemonium.
Until then. I don’t know if it was the win over a highly touted, older team or their contempt for the bush league protest of that teams coach. Maybe Mrs. Woodard had a talk with them I’m not sure but from then on they were about winning this tournament. The transformation was scary. Yes they still played around and joked but getting their attention was easy and their focus was obvious. What made it most amazing is that on paper and in reality we didn’t have the depth, size, or experience to even win that first game, yet in every game we went all the way down our bench. Everyone played, almost everyone contributed, and no one had an embarrassing moment or series of mistakes. Canandra and Miranda were always cool and smooth. Monique always had a look during a game that could bust down walls, and Karen Woodard, well she just played. And that was always impressive. The original Northeast girls, who had never played in front of more than ten people, where now playing in front of full gyms with hostile crowds and once again were not intimidated.
If the task at hand was daunting before we left Indianapolis it was scary after scouting that game. Pecks All-Stars were a team with credentials. Several College Freshman and All-State team members from Kansas and Missouri. They had two girls about Karen’s size and a lot of quickness. They were good. They were the tournament favorites. They got killed. They were dominated by the French Team.
This was France’s Olympic Team in training. They attended the same high school in Paris to facilitate training and there were many more players at that school. This was their traveling team.
They were all older than any girl on our team and their two smallest players, their point guards, would have been the second tallest players on our team. They had seven girls over 6 feet and four of them were taller than Karen: 6’5, 6’6, 6’8 and another 6’8. The guards and the 6’5 forward were quick and the other three big girls were not weak sisters. This team played a lot and played a lot together with professional coaches and trainers.
We gave up an average of six inches per player. Karen was giving away at least ten pounds every girl on that front line. Forwards Monique and Paula were going to have to guard and rebound against players almost a foot taller!
 The French Team for more on the French Team click here. |
As we watched the game everyone was kind of quiet. I was taking notes and pointing things out and either the girls were listening or they were scared to death.
On the drive back to the hotel it started off quietly and then Karen started talking about how big and slow the big girls were and how they never left the ground when they shot their jumpers. She was gonna smack their stuff. Miranda started making fun of their uniforms. They didn’t wear ‘boxer’ type trunks like basketball players but briefs. She kept referring to what today we would call ‘muffin tops’. Someone suggested tickling the big girls before rebounding because they exposed their midriffs when they raised their arms. I think it was Monique who commented about how much the big girls perspired and they better not lean on her. It was on.
When we got back to the hotel I pulled the van to the far end of the parking lot and we unloaded. There I put the girls through a team building exercise. Something like those shared confidence games were someone stands on a chair with their eyes closed and is instructed to fall backwards into the waiting arms of the others. It seemed to be a positive exercise but only the girls could tell you if it helped. Read about the ‘Prui’.
I went over the game plan with the captains after breakfast and then we conducted a walk through practice back in the parking lot. The captains liked the game plan and everyone soaked it up at the walk through. In coaching sports, adults, boys, girls etc. I never had a team execute a plan as well as this team did that day. It probably paled in comparison to most game plans but it proved that excellent execution of a mediocre plan was better than lousy execution of a great plan.
The game plan:
Offense: We really didn’t change our offense for this game. We knew it well and it served us well. They played zone the whole game against Peck’s All-Stars, a 2-1-2 and a 1-3-1. Naturally we were going to push the ball and run. Speed and quickness was our strongpoint and after their guards and one forward we felt we could get numbers on them before the big girls got back and set up. As always the perimeter girls were to look inside-shot-back inside-rotate. When inside everyone was to look shot/rebound. When looking shot no one was to pass up an open one. We couldn’t afford to be passive. Monique, Canandra and Miranda were to penetrate at every opportunity and when Karen touched the ball she was to get her shot. We felt there size couldn’t match our speed and we could get them in foul trouble even though they had so much depth that their would be little drop-off if we got them in foul trouble but we felt the bonus and psychological effect would help.
Normally we liked to attack zones from the point with the one of the low post popping up to the free-throw line or the point penetrating and dumping, but we felt that the French teams zones shifted too slowly so when the ball went to the wing Karen [or Rocky or Kim] was to flash from the weak side low post to the ball side, high or low and Miranda or Rocky was to flash to the area that Karen didn’t. Monique or Paula were to roam the weak side and look for position on the weak side rebound.
Defense:
We felt that we gave up too much playing man to man. They could post up anyone they chose and if they went at Karen, while she or Miranda could of played anyone of them one on one in the post they had endless size to throw at us and it would just me a matter of numbers before we got in foul trouble.
There coach played them in typical European style, everyone including the big girls had a perimeter shot. They liked to penetrate and kick it back out with two big girls in the corner, two guards on the wing and the 6’5 forward running the base line and popping to the free-throw line for jumpers. They would routinely rotate it down to the corner and look for a big girl take the outside shot or drop it down to another big girl flashing in the post or the 6’5 forward in the key.
- We felt that the guards would kill us with their outside shooting and their penetration. But they tended to shoot set shots and when they penetrated they weren’t particularly good in traffic. They tended to beat Pecks guards with a big first step and when the defense collapsed to help they kicked it out to the big girls in the corner. So priority number one was stop the guards out front. In the walkthrough we changed our normal 2-1-2 zone to a 2-2-1 with Karen under the basket. None of our players had played a 2-2-1 before so I instructed the guards and forwards to play it like a 2-1-2 but their areas would be about 2-3 feet higher than normal. Karen was to simply stay in the lane and protect the basket. When the French teams guards had the ball out front our guards were to play ‘hit and recover’. In shooting their set shots all the French girls ‘stepped into’ it. We felt that we could play off of them to keep from being beaten by that first step and whenever they started to step into their shot we could jump at them to disrupt their rhythm and recover to be where we could ‘catch’ that first step.
- The big girls like most European centers tended to have outside shots [but not nearly as good as their guards]. The drawback of this is that they tend to favor it over playing inside. Just look at all the European seven-footers who have come into the NBA as highly touted players only to fail because they never adjusted to inside play [DN being the exception but he wasn’t a center anyway] . Everyone wants to be a guard at heart. At the time international rules had a three point line and the percentage these girls shot from the corner might have made their shots acceptable, but that percentage for a two-point shot makes it a bad shot. These girls were used to playing international rules and weren’t making the adjustment to the lack of a three point line. We were comfortable giving them that low percentage shot in the hopes that they would neglect their inside game, which we felt they could hurt us with in so many ways.
- Our third defensive priority was stopping the 6’5 forward. We felt by giving the big girls the corner shot we could stay in and pick-up the forward when she popped up. At the same time, by ‘hit & recover’ we could keep the ‘key’ congested.
The Game: click here
