North Dakota Preps

Once again there are a few programs in our area that are struggling to get girls out for basketball. As a former head coach for VB and GBB I always had pretty much the same girls out for both programs and usually had good numbers in both, now I see almost every Class B team have 20+ girls out for VB and then see a number of GBB teams struggle to get 14 girls come out. Is this just a problem in my area or is it a problem in other areas as well?

viewtopic.php?f=84&t=14005

I started a similar thread last year.
Two things I think that would help, but don't foresee happening.
1) move basketball back to the fall - probably a 0% chance
2) have a break between VB and basketball seasons.

Flip wrote:http://northdakotapreps.com/viewtopic.php?f=84&t=14005

I started a similar thread last year.
Two things I think that would help, but don't foresee happening.
1) move basketball back to the fall - probably a 0% chance
2) have a break between VB and basketball seasons.

Yeah, I commented on that thread. Seems to me that GBB numbers are getting worse in my area. Almost every team used to have 2 Junior High teams (7th & 8th), now I don't think any in our area do and some have less than 10 girls total in JH. We have a number of HS teams struggling to have a JV because they only have 10 girls out in grades 9-12. (And most of the teams in my area are co-ops already) I do think moving GBB back to the fall would help, but like you said - 0% chance of that happening. I don't know if having a break between VB and BB seasons would help or not. Guaranteed if there was a drop in numbers like this in boys basketball it would be getting a lot more attention.

I don't its all about seasons but its about sports themselves basketball and volleyball require different types of commitment to play the sports. This is my experience with my own daughter when she was in high school she started out playing both sports but over period of time it became volleyball was the sport she preferred. When she first played the sports I believe it was basketball her favorite but because of commitment to play the sport and community pressures I believe it turned her off from basketball. I am not saying volleyball requires less commitment but so far the sport is confined to season and summer camps and some summer playing. Basketball on other hand has become year around sport you have the season and then you move into the traveling team phase after the season and if your really talented then there is big time AU traveling teams that travel from state to state. Then not to mention the camps and summer leagues that you are expected to play in. Also lot of top tier players also get in physical training program to accelerate their speed, quickness, and strength. Now getting back to lot of girls they don't want to go through this and especially if they know their playing time will minimal because of their talent or because pressure to put this type of commitment into the sport. I also don't buy into that boy's numbers are not down either I look at lot of schools in the region numbers are no where close to what they were a generation ago and especially if the schools haven't had much success in number of years. This change in commitment for basketball has I believe led to smaller participation but quality of basketball has improved but I wonder what the long term effects will be on small class b school for future to get kids to come and play the sport.

The reason is .... well I don't know. We all have opinions. Coaches either don't run the program for all the kids and flush kids out... They push kids out they don't want to waste their time with. I know one of the top teams in state this year only has 15 kids out for basketball.... 9-12... and they used to run 25-35 kids....

maddog1971 wrote:The reason is .... well I don't know. We all have opinions. Coaches either don't run the program for all the kids and flush kids out... They push kids out they don't want to waste their time with. I know one of the top teams in state this year only has 15 kids out for basketball.... 9-12... and they used to run 25-35 kids....

Which team would this be? If it's the team I'm thinking of there are reasons.

Senior class has always been small and has only had a couple of girls out for basketball.
Junior class has numbers and athletic
Sophomore class has a handful that are committed to the sport and the rest stepped aside because of interest.
Freshman class only has had small numbers out for basketball since Junior High.

I love how the blame usually is put on the coaches. Parents/Players have a big part. They aren't happy with roles so the decided to stop playing. If their not starting, it's not good enough.

Increased travel time with coops has to be a factor as well. There are coops that require athletes to travel an extra hour a day to just get to and from practice. You do this for 3 sports a year and the burn out rate can be extremely high.

ballernd wrote:

maddog1971 wrote:The reason is .... well I don't know. We all have opinions. Coaches either don't run the program for all the kids and flush kids out... They push kids out they don't want to waste their time with. I know one of the top teams in state this year only has 15 kids out for basketball.... 9-12... and they used to run 25-35 kids....

Which team would this be? If it's the team I'm thinking of there are reasons.

Senior class has always been small and has only had a couple of girls out for basketball.
Junior class has numbers and athletic
Sophomore class has a handful that are committed to the sport and the rest stepped aside because of interest.
Freshman class only has had small numbers out for basketball since Junior High.

I love how the blame usually is put on the coaches. Parents/Players have a big part. They aren't happy with roles so the decided to stop playing. If their not starting, it's not good enough.

I think this is a huge part of it that never gets mentioned. In today's society (where instant gratification is everywhere and in all things) students have no incentive to stick things out if it isn't going their way. Not starting, not the top scorer, not instantly great at it...just quit. I think parents even encourage this now and assign all the blame on external factors like coaches, other players, etc.If they aren't all-region without putting in much work it is easier to quit than dedicating to improving and then parents justify that it is right for them to do and it was the coach or the athletic director or other kids.

Saying Coaches don't have a major part in this is crazy. It is how they run their programs. Like I said... if you run your starting 5 or 6 together all practice and then run a group of the same 5 or 6 girls as the second team... and everyone else just watches... Most of these school have 3 coaches... they should be putting in the same effort with all the players... not just the main 6 or 7 players.
The goal of going out for a team support is to be part of the team. If you are not... well they don't play.
Your statement on the kids not putting in the work is another factor. Not getting asked to participate in summer tournaments or going to those and sitting the whole time. It just tells these kids they are not good enough to play. So they don't.
Granted if I was the coach I would want just 12 players out that are athletic and talented.

maddog1971 wrote:Saying Coaches don't have a major part in this is crazy. It is how they run their programs. Like I said... if you run your starting 5 or 6 together all practice and then run a group of the same 5 or 6 girls as the second team... and everyone else just watches... Most of these school have 3 coaches... they should be putting in the same effort with all the players... not just the main 6 or 7 players.
The goal of going out for a team support is to be part of the team. If you are not... well they don't play.
Your statement on the kids not putting in the work is another factor. Not getting asked to participate in summer tournaments or going to those and sitting the whole time. It just tells these kids they are not good enough to play. So they don't.
Granted if I was the coach I would want just 12 players out that are athletic and talented.

So you're saying that most/all of the programs struggling with numbers is due to coaching? That might be the case in a few schools, but I would venture to guess that would be an exception and not the norm.

Its real simple, its easier to play volleyball than basketball, just by going from the school i'm from, but i'm guessing its everywhere

While there are a number of factors I believe girls are sick of being judged. From the moment they leave their house they are being judged on how they look how they dress and so forth. It’s just not worth it to them to put themselves out there anymore.

maddog1971 wrote:Saying Coaches don't have a major part in this is crazy. It is how they run their programs. Like I said... if you run your starting 5 or 6 together all practice and then run a group of the same 5 or 6 girls as the second team... and everyone else just watches... Most of these school have 3 coaches... they should be putting in the same effort with all the players... not just the main 6 or 7 players.
The goal of going out for a team support is to be part of the team. If you are not... well they don't play.
Your statement on the kids not putting in the work is another factor. Not getting asked to participate in summer tournaments or going to those and sitting the whole time. It just tells these kids they are not good enough to play. So they don't.
Granted if I was the coach I would want just 12 players out that are athletic and talented.

This was not my point at all. Coaches obviously can play a huge role in participation or lack there of but like Schwab said that is the exception not the norm. I don't know many coaches around the state that wake up in the morning and say, "I'm only going to work with my top 7 players today. The rest aren't important and aren't going to do much in practice." No decent coach would neglect their players development to focus only on the current varsity. Now that being said...that is the most important job of the head coach is to focus on that current varsity and prepare them to play that season so naturally they are going to get more focus. Any winning coach will tell you that focusing on kids 8 through 20 in your program is the key to winning consistently.

maddog1971 wrote:Saying Coaches don't have a major part in this is crazy. It is how they run their programs. Like I said... if you run your starting 5 or 6 together all practice and then run a group of the same 5 or 6 girls as the second team... and everyone else just watches... Most of these school have 3 coaches... they should be putting in the same effort with all the players... not just the main 6 or 7 players.

Wouldn't this be the case for all sports? Only focus on those that get to play varsity minutes. Or are girls basketball coaches the worst of all coaches?

When I was telling the differences between basketball and Volleyball I never meant it as knock on basketball coaching. What I was trying to convey is that to play basketball is much more of commitment to playing sport today than in the past or compared to volleyball today. This commitment is like full time job if want to play basketball and be able to play. A lot of kids today don't want to do this for any number of reasons and frankly they have many more opportunities at other things than when I played high school basketball. I would say that I probably wouldn't have played in my day either if we had to play and work out like they do today. I know that my dad would never would have let me have that much time away from the farm and that was one reason I could play basketball because in winter you had time to play a sport like basketball. I would have loved to played baseball in the summer but there wasn't time for it with the schedule you had if you played baseball. So we played softball where we played in the evenings and there was limited practicing because everyone was busy with their jobs. I think people forget these kids do many other things and if commitment becomes to much they just burn out on sports. I think number of the posts above are right there are number of reasons for not playing but putting this on the coaches is wrong.

I have noticed in the last several years in our school that participation has declined in most sports with the exception of Volleyball. both girls and boys basketball numbers have dropped dramatically and even the football program struggles to field a team now. I feel in our school coaching has a lot to do with why but also feel kids do not have the same work ethic or drive as in the past

The coaches that I have respect for is the coach that develops that student to be a better person each day. Build character. Basically none of these kids will be pro's... some will play college.. but I want my kids to become better people... work ethic and responsibility. That is what sports are for.
To build self-worth...

As a former coach I would say it is a coaches responsibility to recruit and keep players. If they don’t make a connection with their kids it is easy for them to quit. A good leader takes on that responsibility and accepts blame rather than deflect it.

maddog1971 wrote:Saying Coaches don't have a major part in this is crazy. It is how they run their programs. Like I said... if you run your starting 5 or 6 together all practice and then run a group of the same 5 or 6 girls as the second team... and everyone else just watches... Most of these school have 3 coaches... they should be putting in the same effort with all the players... not just the main 6 or 7 players.
The goal of going out for a team support is to be part of the team. If you are not... well they don't play.
Your statement on the kids not putting in the work is another factor. Not getting asked to participate in summer tournaments or going to those and sitting the whole time. It just tells these kids they are not good enough to play. So they don't.
Granted if I was the coach I would want just 12 players out that are athletic and talented.

The more and more I think about it the less and less sense this statement makes to me. Ok so you said the problem is "if you run your starting 5 or 6 together all practice and then run a group of the same 5 or 6 girls as the second team." Your varsity (starting 5 or 6) need to play together because you know...they are the varsity, playing a majority of the minutes, focus of that season is varsity competition, coaches are judged by their varsity record. Then there is a group of 5 or 6 (second team) girls who are usually going to go up against the varisty because you know...they are the next best kids, best chance of challenging the varsity, playing a majority of your JV minutes, giving them an opportunity to earn more minutes on varsity, doesn't make sense to run out the freshmen consistently against seniors. I'm confused how you would think that should be run instead. Should we just pull names from a hat for who plays as the "varsity" that day in practice? Should units never play together and instead just mix all together? How would a coach fix that to make it better in your opinion?

Ustacould wrote:While there are a number of factors I believe girls are sick of being judged. From the moment they leave their house they are being judged on how they look how they dress and so forth. It’s just not worth it to them to put themselves out there anymore.

With all due respect, our entire society (everyone included) is about being judged. Grades, job performance, contribution to society, it's all about being judged. The better you do, the more successful you are. I guess you do have a point, if you don't get in the game, it's easier not to be judged. Just not so sure how far you will go in life if you don't put yourself out there. 2 cents.

defensewinsgames wrote:

maddog1971 wrote:Saying Coaches don't have a major part in this is crazy. It is how they run their programs. Like I said... if you run your starting 5 or 6 together all practice and then run a group of the same 5 or 6 girls as the second team... and everyone else just watches... Most of these school have 3 coaches... they should be putting in the same effort with all the players... not just the main 6 or 7 players.
The goal of going out for a team support is to be part of the team. If you are not... well they don't play.
Your statement on the kids not putting in the work is another factor. Not getting asked to participate in summer tournaments or going to those and sitting the whole time. It just tells these kids they are not good enough to play. So they don't.
Granted if I was the coach I would want just 12 players out that are athletic and talented.

The more and more I think about it the less and less sense this statement makes to me. Ok so you said the problem is "if you run your starting 5 or 6 together all practice and then run a group of the same 5 or 6 girls as the second team." Your varsity (starting 5 or 6) need to play together because you know...they are the varsity, playing a majority of the minutes, focus of that season is varsity competition, coaches are judged by their varsity record. Then there is a group of 5 or 6 (second team) girls who are usually going to go up against the varisty because you know...they are the next best kids, best chance of challenging the varsity, playing a majority of your JV minutes, giving them an opportunity to earn more minutes on varsity, doesn't make sense to run out the freshmen consistently against seniors. I'm confused how you would think that should be run instead. Should we just pull names from a hat for who plays as the "varsity" that day in practice? Should units never play together and instead just mix all together? How would a coach fix that to make it better in your opinion?

The topic is why are there low numbers... this is one
Ok... What I am saying is use all the kids in practice at least. Make sure all the kids are being developed. . If kids are not being used... they are not going to play.... why would they?

I don't judge coaches by wins or losses... I judge them by their program....

Personally if I have 15 kids out for a program as a coach... I would love it. Odds are they want to play and want to put in the effort to get better.
But I think these High School programs need to also help build healthy young adults andnot kill their self image or self respect.

I agree that coaches shouldn't be judged by wins or losses but it isn't what happens in reality. At the end of the day community members, parents, administration, and others that say the primary focus is building quality young people still fire coaches that don't win enough or aren't competitive enough on the court. Athletics/coaching is a very impatient profession.

As to your other statement I refuse to believe that there is a varsity coach in the state that doesn't "use" all of their kids in practice. They might not being being "used" in the way they want (going against the varsity, being on the varsity, etc) but it would shock me if a coach walked into a gym and said "you kids aren't going to do anything today except sit on the end-line and watch." The player and parents might not like the role or way their kid is being used but what the heck kind of coach doesn't even have kids participate in drills, go against other jv kids, work on offenses, shoot free throws, etc. What I would venture to guess you are referring to is that the varsity is going live against the next 5 players and some of the freshmen/C squad/lower JV players are doing something else off to the side like running through offenses, working on shooting, or something else; it just isn't what they want to do (which is play on the varsity or scrimmage the varsity). If there is a coach just sitting kids on the sideline and not letting them practice then you are right it is that coach's fault but I really question the legitimacy of the premise.

maddog1971 wrote:The coaches that I have respect for is the coach that develops that student to be a better person each day. Build character. Basically none of these kids will be pro's... some will play college.. but I want my kids to become better people... work ethic and responsibility. That is what sports are for.
To build self-worth...

As a retired coach I congratulate you on your intelligent outlook on HS sports. You "get it"!
Unfortunately there are a lot of parents out there who think their kid is a star and the only thing holding them back is the coach. Too many parents who think that if their kid is the best player that makes them the best parent or they are trying to re-live their youth thru their kid. (I've had kids tell me they wished their parent(s) would stop coming to their games.) We wonder why there is a shortage of referees and why fewer people want to get into coaching? It's not that hard to figure out.