A Basketball Blog Entry

So a few of you may know of my love for playing basketball. However, ever since the glory days of the back-to-back-to-back stake young men’s basketball championships of the Livonia Ward, I have found it hard to find my niche on the few teams I’ve been on. I’m not a consistent enough shooter, and it’s harder to find quality opportunities to impress people with my speed because I’m not a good enough finisher and big people always seem to be able to block my layups. Add the fact that I never play consistently enough to get over that first game where you can’t make even a single layup, and I find myself not contributing very much to any team that I play on (though, usually, I have a pretty good plus-minus, even though I’m not directly contributing to the score. I’m just saying.)

So, after having moved to Shoreline, I finally decided that I needed to start playing ball again, now with the old men in the ward. The fact that I currently weigh more than I ever have may have influenced this decision.

I showed up last Tuesday and shot a little. One guy from the ward came to shoot as well so we had a little 21 action, where I destroyed him. I was fast and was making layups, and he wasn’t using his body well enough.

So my confidence was a little better for last Thursday’s game. That was a mistake. I turned the ball over like no other, missed a couple of easy layups, and we got killed by the best team in the league. I got bruised up and, being out of shape yet running around, was pretty wiped out after the game.

So it was with a little trepidation that Torrie and I showed up for basketball last night (she watches, I play). Mostly different people showed up for our team, so perhaps I didn’t have the stigma of the game before. We started and I played the second quarter. I played fairly well, including getting fouled on a breakaway and nailing my two free throws, but I did get a little tired at the end of the half and we were still down by about 5.

The 3^rd quarter was played with our “A” team out there, and at the end of the quarter we were still down by about 5. They were playing well, but I knew that the other team was getting tired. I went back in the game about halfway through the 4^th quarter, down by 3.

It was a little frustrating because there were a couple guys who weren’t passing and kept losing the ball on their drives. Luckily we played some good defense, got a couple to go in, and we were down by 1 with about two minutes left.

We brought the ball down and I guess the guy was tired cause he passed me the ball near the 3 point line on the left side. I saw an opening and drove with my left, switching to my right as I went to lay it in. To my dismay, it ringed in and out. However, my momentum allowed me to get the rebound. I passed it away, and a couple of passes later I found myself with the ball in the same situation. I drove again, knowing that I could beat the guy guarding me. This time the layup went in, and we were up by one. They brought the ball down and tried to pass it around. I doubled up on the guy with the ball and he put up an ugly shot, no good. I grabbed the rebound and we brought it up the court, taking our time. I passed it to one of the big guys and set a pick for him. Beautiful pick, and then I went for the roll straight towards the basket, nobody in my way. To my surprise, my teammate saw the opportunity and sent me a beautiful pass, which I gathered in and put in the basket. Up by 3!

The other team would drive down, get fouled, and make a couple of free throws, but we were able to hold the ball long enough for time to run out. A comeback victory!

I felt much better afterwards, and while I still have plenty of room to improve…maybe I won’t give up on basketball after all. At least until I’ve started losing some weight.