PB Here

We had our last game of the year this past Saturday.  We played a team that we had beaten on two previous occasions.  I felt if we could just get the rebounds and lose balls we would easily win this game.

We we worked hard in practice on that main objective all week.  Saturday, we were completely out hustled and out rebounded.

Plus, our head coach (me) did a very poor job of managing the game.  In our league (3&4th grade girls) you can only play defese once the ball has passed beyond the circle at half court.  We put in a play where one gaurd would bring the ball up the court on the side then pass it over to the point gaurd in the middle.  We did this for two reasons.  One, I wanted to force a defender out there with her to create more space in the lane.  The second reason was so that my pg could hold the ball and fake a pass before putting the ball on the floor hoping to give her an advatage on her defender.

Well, I explained this to the officials before the game so that the defense would not be allowed to cut across and intercept the pass.  Well my first big mistake was actually thinking the refs would enforce this rule.  

During the game they intercepted four passes in the "no defense allowed" zone and made 6 points off of them.  I spoke with the officials again at halftime and they admitted that they made the mistakes and would do a better job in the second half.

My second mistake was not allowing my daughter to continue her three point attempts.  She made two in a row and when she missed her first one I told her no more, simply b/c I didn't want the other parents to think my daughter was a ball hog.  I should have waited until she missed a couple more before stopping her.

At the end of the game we were down by three with 2:19 left.  In our league you are only allowed to press with 2:00 or less.  Well the otehr team would not clear out of the back court, eventhough one official was telling them to.  The other official was holding the ball and all the while the clock was running.  The clock finally ran down to two minutes and they were allowed to press.  We turned the ball over from the press and they scored again.  They ended up beating us by five.

This one will stick with me for a while.  I think I worked too hard at keeping my composure this year and there were times during this game that I should have been out on the court letting a little steam out to get a message through.