Personal Narrative: A Career As A Coach

he coach blew his whistle and as he let the small black plastic whistle drop from his lips he yelled “Everyone sit down at half court.”

There must be around thirty some seventh grades who had tried out to make the squad of fifteen that would make the team. I actually felt that I had a good chance of making the team. I was one of the taller boys trying out and felt I had a well enough understanding of the game. The tryouts themselves lasted for two nights, and each night of tryouts lasted a grueling two hours of running sprints, shooting drills, lay-up drills, and full court games. Overall my performance was not as good as I would have liked. I did very well with the lay-up drill. I was well trained using the correct technique, which is to
I was teamed up three other varsity basketball players from Gettysburg. Jason Shew, Kevin Lindsay, and Kevin Miller, were all very talented players which translated into more wins for our team. I sparingly got the ball in my hands since my teammates were so talented. I didn’t mind not having chances to score points because my team dominating the opposition. My opportunity to shine wasn’t until I saw Coach Townsend watching one of our four on four games. I saw him watching me play with great curiosity. Coach Townsend’s eyes glared with concentration, his understanding and knowledge for the game of basketball was obvious. I looked deep into the coach’s glassy brown eyes as if I were reading his thoughts, then he nodded as if to tell me to
This time when I was passed the ball I decided to put the ball on the floor. I saw who was guarding me and knew I would have a good chance at being able to get around him if I used the right moves with the basketball. I dribbled once to my right and then to my left, I did this repeatedly switching hands each time the ball went to a different side. I hoped for him to get so use to me constantly dribbling ball from side to side that he would attempt to cheat to one side hoping to either steal the ball from my hands or get me to pick up my dribble. Finally I baited him. I saw his body leaning to right anticipating me to dribble back to that side. Before I allowed the ball to reach the right side of my body I quickly switched my left hand to the opposite side of the orange leather ball. I then was able to explode to the opening to my left and enter the lane in front of the basket. I was only nine feet from the basket but I was not home free yet, as the defense was beginning to swarm at me like a group of killer bees. All I saw were bodies, but I didn’t care, I had already quit dribbling and was taking my two steps for my lay-up. My legs were like pogo sticks as my stride towards the basket seemed to scare off the defense from completely getting in my path toward the hoop. After my second step I was about five feet from the hoop and the defenders were to my right and my left. I