And, of course, my son's team competed in the end-of-year house league tournament. They got the number two seed based on being undefeated (another team was, too - they didn't play each other during the regular season) and having the second-best total scores.
Friday night's game was pretty lackluster and went just as the games had gone all year: my son's team, the "Hawks", won most or all of the skills competitions (2 points awarded per skill competition) to take a commanding 10-0 or 8-2 lead into the game itself, at which point the "Hawks" won enough quarters (also worth 2 points a piece) to win the game.
Saturday morning's game was a bit more frantic, even if the skills competition came out 8-2 in favor of the "Hawks" again. The other team was a bit more aggressive and it took a strong third quarter victory, in which my son and his squad controlled tempo, to secure a victory for sure. That sent us to the championship game later in the day ...
I have helped assist coaching the team most of the year, so I did my best to warn the kids that they would need to keep their composure - whether they did well in skills competition or not. And they certainly were challenged, because, although we won the passing competition (like always), we did not win the lay-ups, short-shot, or dribble relay events (although the dribble relay - the final competition - was VERY close). Losing three out of four skills competitions gave the other team not only six points, but also the bonus points for winning the most events. The score was 8-2 in favor of the other team after skills competition - a big hole to climb out of!
The boys were pretty down. All of us coaches reminded them to keep their heads up and keep playing - to keep their composure. I asked them if they thought I was kidding before the game about it. The team has two squads of four that usually play two quarters each, but we were missing one of our players, so a couple people had to play three quarters in the final game. Ended up working out just fine. We went out and won the first quarter, as the other team seemed pretty confident in their 8-2 lead. That brough the score to 8-4. Then, the second quarter went our way as well, as my son's squad gelled well with the added player they usually don't play with. Score 8-6. The first squad returned to play the third quarter and took it as well, playing very soundly on defense and getting a number of nice shots to go in.
Now, the score was tied 8-8. We would certainly get the bonus game points (2 bonus points go to the team with the most game points as well), so we just needed to tie the quarter to win the game. Well, after a few minutes, my son's squad was down 6-0 in the quarter. It seemed like we would lose the quarter and go to overtime. Then something clicked and a couple of the boys seemed to realize that they didn't want to lose. My son became a rebounding machine on defense, and put up two buckets to cut the score to 6-4. The rest of the squad played inspired defense and kept the other team from scoring with great help defense. A basket by another "Hawk" made it 6-6 with about ten seconds left to go, and a subsequent block of a final half-court attempt gave the championship to our boys!
So proud!
Pictures ... and video ...
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