7th Grade-Week 3

I am very pleased and proud of the efforts and the attitude displayed this weekend as we did well and fought hard in all our games. For the tournament team this last weekend's victory is the sweet reward for all the hard work that we've put in and losses that we had to grow and learn from! To win your 3rd tournament and first in D-2 is very impressive! You guys need to take that intensity and spirit into your school seasons and also bring it back with you in January! As for the comp team you guys played hard and well for your first tournament, don't let the scoreboard trick you into feeling bad because I guarantee that you've never played as high a level of basketball as you did this weekend.  Even if you are an AAU vet the difference between 6th and below and 7th & up is significant. We performed well and will continue to improve in all phases of the game. I want to cover each player briefly to discuss your strengths and what you should improve while your off playing middle school ball (& if not then, Yay! you get to come back and continue to play for me). I have seen a tremendous amount of improvement for the brief period of time we've been together.

#0 Adam- Your athletic ability, rebounding, fearlessness, & defense are your strong points right now. You have to develop your left hand and dribbling skills.
#0 Ryan- Your shot, passing and defense are your strengths. You need to develop your left hand & must dribble with your head up better.
#4 Cole- Your desire, defense, dribbling and attitude are your strengths. You need to keep your head up better and work on going left.
#5 Matt- Your driving ability, speed, and attitude are your strengths. You need to keep your head up and improve your ballhandling.
#6 Monty-Your low post game, court vision, & rebounding are very strong. You need to cut down your turnovers (better decsions) and need to find the rim when finishing.
#9 Jacob- Your Defense, fakes, hustle, and attitude are your strong points. You need to improve your left hand in particular, dribbling overall and see the court better.
#14 Tanner- Your dribbling, driving, basketball IQ, & shot are all solid for your age. You need to cut down on your turnovers & work on going to the basket instead of sideline to sideline.
#20 Garret- Your Defense, court vision & awareness, and attitude are your strongest attributes. You have to work on your lefthand dribbling, lefthand finishing and dribble with your head up.
#22 Daniel- Your Offense, intelligence and attitude are your biggest strengths. You basic issue is the lack of actual basketball experience, everything is basically just a matter of playing more and working at getting better.
#23 TJ- Mr consistent, you are solid in all categories from Defense to dribbling, your strength is your versatility. Your weaknesses are that you need to tighten up everything offensively: dribbling and lay ups, shooting, and passing.
#24 Josh- Your strengths start with Defense, but your dribbling, shot, & attitude are all very good. You need to work on your aggresivness to the rim and attacking defenders and defenses, and you have to use different passing angles.
# 32 Kyle- Your strengths are your shooting, right hand, & defensive work. Your left hand has to get better and your concept of offensive basketball is already improving.
#41 Joseph- Your strengths are your shot, your defense, and your athletic ability. You are the classic case of a late starter for basketball in the new millenium, once your experience level raises you will be a very good basketball player with the work.
Gage- Your strengths are your shot, and finishing at the rim. Another case of a late start and very little formal basketball experience, again you will be a good player when your experince level rises.

I gave you this information as a guideline as to what to improve and what to take advantage of, don't waste this knowledge! Use it to improve & do your best on the court! I will miss the guys that make your team, and will be taking it out on the boys left.  :)

I believe we will be having a comp game for the kids that are available. I will put out the info when it is finalized.

I had a great month with you guys and can't wait to coach ALL of you again in January!

Coach Adam 

8th Grade-Week 3

Xtreme Tournament team Sat Game 1

On Saturday morning , September 25 the YBA Xtreme Tournament team squared off against the Lodi Flying Tigers in their first tournament game.  Lodi proved to be a formidable opponent displaying aggressive full court defense and quickness to the basket for easy scores still YBA kept the game within reach through out the first half of play behind the outside shooting of Ishkhan Oganesyan and Zachary Green and the inside play of Justin DiRuscio.  The second half saw a better conditioned and more athletic Lodi team pull away for a victory but the YBA team showed great heart and competed until the final whistle.  In the end YBA simply turned the ball over too many times allowing the opponent to score easy transition baskets, did not get back quick enough in transition defense and was largely out rebounded at both ends of the court.  Overall for the first game as a team and with only 2 official practices under their belts the tournament team showed a lot of potential and saw positive things happen when they controlled the tempo of the game and ran the offensive sets with solid ball movement instead of settling for the first available shot.

YBA Xtreme Tournament Sat Game 2

On Saturday afternoon , September 25 the YBA Xtreme Tournament team squared off against the Davis Hotshots in their second tournament game.  The game began with a frenzied pace and YBA gave up some early transition baskets that allowed Davis to build a small lead.  YBA looked more comfortable running their offensive sets yet appeared a bit flat and lacking energy in the first half.  In the second half the YBA team showed better energy and made some positive things happen on the offensive end with solid movement without the ball and effective ball movement instead of settling for the first available shot.  Justin DiRuscio turned in a solid effort rebounding and scoring some baskets in the post area and Ishkhan Oganesyan, Sean Patrick Lallen, Nicholas McNamara and Zachary Diele provided solid efforts at both ends of the court as well.   The difference in this game was YBA’s inability to get back in transition defense which lead to a significant percentage of Davis’s points being scored with uncontested transition baskets.  In addition, YBA was outrebounded on both ends of the floor and had a higher turnover ratio than Davis.  But despite these short comings YBA showed great heart in the second half and showed some positive energy to build on for their next tournament game.

YBA Xtreme Competitive team Sat Game 1

On Saturday morning, September 25 the YBA Xtreme Competitive team played their first tournament game against the Davis Hotshots.  Davis came out of the gates applying an aggressive full court press and was able to attain a sizeable early lead by converting a high percentage of forced turnovers into quick uncontested transition baskets.   After a few early timeouts to reiterate the press break YBA did a nice job moving the ball side to side and getting it to a big in the middle of the court to offset the Davis full court defensive pressure and get into the YBA offensive sets.  Joshua O’Neal and Hunter Konrad contributed some valuable minutes on the boards and scoring some baskets in the low post and despite giving away some inches to their much taller opponents Zachary Farr and Gavin Triplett played a respectable game at the guard positions.  Despite a poor shooting night from outside Sanam Bains turned in a solid aggressive effort at both ends of the floor and Nathaniel Smith showed excellent hustle and nice offense presence of mind to ball fake and get multiple three point plays the old school way by making the basket despite being fouled and knocking down his free throw.  Overall for the first game as a team and with only 2 official practices under their belts YBA put forth a solid effort and showed great potential at times and needs to improve going forward on controlling the tempo of the game, rebounding on both ends of the floor and getting back on transition defense.

YBA Xtreme Competitive team Sat Game 2

 On Saturday afternoon , September 25 the YBA Xtreme Competitive team squared off against the Lodi Flying Tigers in their second tournament game.  Lodi came out with aggressive full court pressure and was able to build an early lead off turnovers converted into to easy uncontested transition baskets.  YBA came out with solid energy against their larger opponents and showed some improvement over their morning game with their ability to set up the press break and get the ball more effectively over the half court line and transition into their half court offensive sets.  Joshua O’Neal and Hunter Konrad who played all four games for YBA Xtreme provided solid play on the boards and on defense and the guard play of  Zachary Farr, Gavin Triplett and Max Cohen was much improved over the morning’s effort.  Nathaniel Smith continued to lead the team in hustle and effort and once again turned in some nice three point plays converting both his shot and free throw and Sanam Bains provided some speed and quickness on the perimeter.  Overall the team still settled for quick low percentage shots on the offensive end instead of making the defense work by moving the ball around and looking for high percentage shots.  Transition defense was still a weak spot allowing the opponent to score a high percentage of their overall total points on uncontested transition baskets and second chance put backs on the offensive glass.  But game two saw some positive improvement in the YBA Xtreme Competitive team’s poise, effort and cohesiveness as a team and the potential is there for great improvement in the weeks ahead.   

Sunday intra squad scrimmage 9, 10 a.m games

On Sunday morning  September 26 the YBA Xtreme Tournament and Competitive team’s squared off in their weekly intra squad scrimmage.   You have to hand it to all players as they showed up at 8:30 a.m. on a Sunday after four sizable losses on Saturday to be blunt about it and they had excellent energy and were determined to get to work and make themselves better so congratulations to all players for an excellent attitude coming off some not so fun losses. 

The nine o’clock game saw great energy and effort by both the blue and white teams with the blue team maintaining a small lead throughout most of the game.  Both sides continued to get familiar with the offensive sets both against man and zone defense and showed great improvement in their cognitive understanding of the various baseline and side line out of bounds plays.  Joshua O’Neal and Zachary Green saw limited play due to wrist and ankle injuries respectively.  Zachary Diele was impressive on both ends of the floor and Sean Patrick Lallen, Justin DiRuscio and Nicholas McNamara showed played solid defensive and showed great floor leadership throughout the game.  Keys for improvement continue to be getting back on transition defense and not giving up uncontested transition baskets, rebounding on both ends of the floor, solid man to man help defense and reducing turnovers.

The ten o’clock game once again saw the blue team maintaining a small lead throughout the game and both teams looked much improved running the “wheel” offense against a 2-3 zone defensive set.   Both sides still need to improve their cognitive understanding of the various side line and base line out of bounds plays as both teams still looked confused as to what they were to do at times.  The blue team showed solid full court man to man pressure and both teams were at times effective running the special pick an roll play called at the discretion of the point guard but improvement in the area of setting solid screens on an actual player not thin air is still a point that will continue to be emphasized in future practices.   Nicholas McNamara showed some nice outside shooting and Hunter Konrad and Justin DiRuscio were effective on defense both recording several blocked shots and giving solid efforts on the boards.  Overall both teams still need improvement in controlling the tempo of the game and not getting into a race horse up and down out of control type game.  Our offense needs to make the defensive work hard and we need to look for high percentage shots by moving the ball around the floor and moving better without the ball.  Again it needs to be said that the effort of all players was very commendable after some lop sided losses on Saturday no one was feeling sorry for themselves and everyone was giving 100% effort and trying to become better basketball players and the coaches will take that attitude over a win any day. 

Deloe Shively

6th Grade-Week 3

Saturdays tournament was a great success.  My competitive players got their first taste of an AAU tournament.  Jonathan Lund, Grant Skowronski, and Carter Smith really put their skills to the test in the first game.  They were rebounding, shooting and defending the whole first game, which led to a nice victory.  In the second game the tournament team pulled together and stayed competitive until the very end, but they weren't able to hold on.  The third game was a hard fought thriller.  All the boys were playing with the skills they have been taught.  This made them very competative.  Logan Begley's defense sprang the team back to life and led them to get the lead back.  Matthew Ortiz also played some solid defense with great rebounding and scoring.

 

The boys did great this weekend! We walked away with two wins and one loss.  The teams came together and played some great basketball.

5th Grade-Week 3

We had our second tournament this weekend playing two games against two good teams. We only had 6 players and were fortunate that Harmon stepped up and played with us.  We are learning to play together as a team and realizing team work, hustle and defense wins games. We need to cut down on our costly turnovers and be ready to catch the ball when it is passed. Rebounding position and blocking out on the defensive boards is a must if we want to stop easy put back points. We are learning as we go that playing uptempo competition requires execution, focus, hard work and sprinting up and down the floor. The boys played hard this weekend and Harmon was a big help on the boards. Lets work hard at practice and keep learning and getting better.  Keep up your awesome attitudes, hold your heads up high, be proud of your teammates, keep listening and learning from Coach Tom, and be ready for our next tournament!        

4th Grade-Week 3

4^th grade Xtreme had yet ANOTHER great week of training, practice and games.  The boys worked really hard in training and had a high level of focus in practice.  We worked on refining our offense and defense this past week, and I think it really shined this weekend.  I will keep adding wrinkles to the mix as the weeks progress.

We played our first tournament game this Saturday against a familiar EDH 5^th grade team.  We got off to a slow start, but finished strong.  We really let the size of EDH affect us in the first half.  Their size along with our inability to just get a couple shots to drop, kept the game close.

In the second half our team began to click.  We started to run the offense and hit our cutters.  Spencer, Josh and Chase really got us into our offense and created some opportunities off the cuts.  Nathan and Julian helped out in the post and hit some big shots down the stretch.  In the end, we turned up the heat and were able to pull ahead for the win.  Great job guys!

On Sunday we had 2 games.  The first game our comp team played the 3^rd grade tournament team.  Noah, Zeki and Garrett played all the minutes they could handle.  Garrett hit some huge jump shots out there.  He was on fire!  Noah seemed to get every rebound in his area.  Zeki played with the same fire we have come to expect.  He was able to run the offense and get to the basket.  This game allowed us to play some of our players out of position.  Vince, Ryan and Sava all played on the perimeter, and they loved every minute of it.  As this team progresses, expect to see more of that.  I’m going to start to play some of these players out of their comfort zones.  I don’t expect them to be perfect when I put them in new positions as we are all a work in progress. 

As a side note to this game, I want to take a minute to speak about our 3^rd grade tournament team.  These kids did not quit. They could have easily packed it in and given up, but they weren’t having any of it.  It’s a testament to each of those players and Coach Lance that they kept playing until the final buzzer.  They deserve a lot of credit for their effort and hard work, and I’m proud of what they have accomplished.

Our final game Sunday was against our BIG brothers, the 5^th grade comp team.  We played well for most of the game.  I asked Coach Tom to have his team press us as much as they could.  This was the first real game time pressure we have had to deal with.  I felt that the boys handled the pressure fairly well.  We will work on it a lot in practice this week.  We made some errors, but for the most part did a great job.  This game was a great learning experience for all of us on and off the court.  We learned a lot about body language on the bench.  The boys learned that they still need to conduct themselves with a high level of sportsmanship on the court and on the bench.  When on the bench, we can’t hold our heads down, complain or negatively react to your teammates, opponents or referees.   These are difficult but necessary lessons to learn.  We were able to pull together as a team in the 4^th quarter and once again, pull out another victory.  I don’t think I have ever coached a team that finishes as strong and determined as this team does.  There is no “quit” in this team’s vocabulary.  I have never been so proud of this team.  They managed to turn what could have been a negative experience into a positive growth situation, and we are a stronger team for it today. 

This was a long and hard week on the kids, and they ALL have responded well to it.  Now that I have a good feeling for the boys’ personalities, strengths, and weaknesses, I will be challenging them constantly.  Each player will be addressed differently whether it is playing out of their desired position, learning a new skill, mental approach, body language, etc.  I have already seen some huge changes in each of the boys this session.  We have a strong group of kids who really want to reach that next level of play, and it is my responsibility to get them there.  Please take a moment as parents to really fill their emotional tanks.  All of our boys deserve a pat on the back for a job well done this week. 

I just know that this coming week will be another good one.  We have more high-intensity training on Monday and another great practice lined up for Wednesday.  I would also like to take this opportunity to let you know that we have been given an official assistant coach; Jayson Price of the YBA family, will be a great addition to our coaching squad.  Jayson is a great guy and very eager to learn and help the kids improve.  We are very lucky to have him.  Please take a moment to welcome him to our team on Wednesday. 

Thanks,

Coach Mack 

3rd Grade-Week 3

3^rd grade tournament team was physically outmatched against the 4^th grade comp/tourney combo team.  While the score may have made the game seem lopsided, the 3^rd grade team made great strides!  They played hard and hustled throughout the game, and they showed signs of their basketball IQ being elevated.  They learned to slow the ball down, to get (semi) set up, and then run a play (one they learned in 15 minutes prior to the game).

They were beat, but not beat down, as they understand that this is just preparing them to be one of the best teams in the area.  A few players short for various reasons, the kids really gave their all.

The coach is excited to see progress each week, and will continue to challenge them to keep getting better as basketball players, and as individuals.