Little World Blog

My high school basketball team has been heavy on my heart recently, because they taught me that it truly is bigger than basketball

I knew from the time that I was on my third grade travel basketball team that I wanted to be successful in the game of basketball. During the same time, my mom had began coaching the varsity girl’s team at our local high school. Being a coach’s kid and always being around her team, I knew I wanted to “be like the big girls”. Little did I know that everything I learned by being around them ultimately came from my mom, she always said that you must love on your players more if you want them to give you that trust & love back.

After many years of watching them play, it was finally my time as a freshman to do all the things I had dreamed of when I was a little girl…only if it was that easy. I was nervous for the first day of practice, worried the upperclassmen would run me over. Instead, they took me under their wing and picked up my weight when I couldn’t carry it. I knew from then on that I was going to be the role model for the players under me like they had been for me.

Fast forward 3 years later and it is officially my senior year! My mom, still coaching our varsity team, knew that this would be her last season coaching once I graduate. We prepared all summer for this moment, but I never cared about filling up the stat sheets during my senior year. I wanted to do something bigger. Even though it may have went unnoticed to anyone else, I was going to be the best leader and role model I could be. There was a group of underclassmen (whom I call my babies) that had taken up with me during this year, I drove them to and from games or practices…like any good team mom would do. I was hard on them from time to time but they knew I loved them at the end of the day.

At the end of my senior season, we had taken some pretty tough losses. I remember sitting in the locker room after losing the last game of the year, not shedding a single tear. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve always been an emotionally driven person and never took losses lightly, but something in me had changed. I was at peace with the way my high school basketball career ended. I never scored my 1,000th point nor did I break many school records, however, we did accomplish one thing during my time in a G-Girl uniform: we created a strong team chemistry that would run through the upcoming players for years to come. I oftentimes look back on how things could have went differently, then realized I grew more as a player than ever before. I needed those babies more than they ever could have needed me and I am forever thankful for that. They allowed me to lead them…even when they may not of wanted to hear it haha. I am thankful for being able to love on them and watch them grow as players. The teammates that have turned into family are the ones I come back to when time gets tough.

Now I am back to being the little fish in the big pond, but that doesn’t stop someone from being a good teammate or leader. At the next level, I get to be one of the “big girls” my younger self idolized. I get to connect with young players in the community that have the same dreams I did at their age. This photo is why basketball is bigger than the sport itself. I will always come back to the teammates that have come during seasons of your life when you needed them most…and may not have even known it. Here’s to the little girl that had socks to her knees and overly baggy shorts, wanting to play like the big girls….you’re doing it girl.