ymca basketball

For the last 10 weeks, Sydney has been playing basketball every Saturday morning. She was on a team, the Tigers, with all boys except for her and her friend, Abigail. Sydney did an awesome job. I was very proud of her. I think the skill I was most pleased about was her gusto to go for the ball. She played mostly against boys, but she ran after the ball and would fight for the ball even if 3 other boys were also fighting for the ball. It seemed like most of the other girls she played against were more shy when it came to that. Her shooting needs improvement but I love it! She would shoot the ball as if she was throwing a pass overhand. It would hit the backboard so hard and bounce way back to the free throw line. But, many times it actually went in. Abigail's mom and I coached the Tigers. We have lots of funny memories with this experience. Since only close friends read this, I think I can share one particular story of me sticking my foot in my mouth....not an unusual thing. The first practice I thought there were 4 girls and 4 boys on the team. Perfect, we can break them off into two groups. To my embarrassment I called the girls over to Sydney and Abigail side of the court to practice some skill only to have a mom scream to me, "They are boys not girls." ummm......yeah two boys who both have long hair (longer than Sydney), earrings, and cute little faces. OOPS. Having been a teacher, I should've remembered not to make any assumptions. I'm not the only one who thought they were girls, I think every team we played against, the other coach referred to them as "she" or "her". Sydney seemed to have lots of fun and I think she learned a lot about herself and the game too.


Jump ball
Me, Sydney, Elaine, and Abigail