Day 29 - June 27th

The morning got off to the usual early start and everyone walked over to the cafe for breakfast. Following the meal, each group went their separate ways as some went to the main gym while others went to the courts used by Intramurals. The campers are used to the walks between gyms but yesterday brought some really bad weather. My age group hustled through some rain to the main court before the downpour ensued. Another group was able to bus to their gym, as the site was a further walk from the cafe.

Before starting the 5 on 5 games, we had stations. As a result of there being more teams than baskets, most half courts had 2 coaches instructing. Our station was ball handling, one of my favorite drills to teach. I think I enjoy working specifically with this station because I know the importance of being able to handle the rock. I didn't work on my handles as much as I could have growing up and I don't want kids to make the same mistake as I did. Afterwards, we jumped on for our morning game and things just clicked. The game was never close as the aggressiveness and intensity were there from start to finish. My team improved to 2-3 with one game remaining.

After lunch, we had another guest speaker. Byron Mouton, a member of the 2002 Maryland National Chanpionship Team spoke to the campers and showed them a couple drills that they could do on their own time. We also worked on some transition offense/defense prior to the afternoon games.

Instead of talking about the game in this next paragraph, I'll just say I thought we set a camp record for the biggest loss. Turns out someone lost by 52 last week and we fell just short of that. I told my team before this game that I thought we were talented enough to win a championship but could also easily lose quickly in the tournament. Call me crazy but I thought even after getting absolutely demolished, we still had a shot.

As it turns out, the play-in games 7/10 and 8/9 were played and we somehow avoided the trip to "Dayton". My team was stoked when they found out we locked up the #6 after winning a 4 way tie-breaker. The bad news came when the #3 seed was announced as the team we just played. Some coaching changes were made and instead of applying pressure at half court, we packed in the defense as tight as possible. The game plan was to force them to make jump shots and we were successful for the first 15 minutes or so. Unfortunately we didn't have the depth to maintain our position in the game and were eliminated from the tournament.

After camp ended, we meet as a staff to discuss the following day's plan. Maryland basketball staff has been very hospitable as they provide pizza, drinks, and snacks to the coaches. This is much appreciated, especially when dinner is eaten 5 hours prior. For the final night, the great hospitality continued with a coaches social at a local bar. I know I enjoyed this time as I'm sure many others did as well. It was nice to talk and get to know one another better, outside of a basketball setting.

Day 28 - June 26th

I apologize for any spelling or grammar mistakes as I used the voice recognition to "type" this blog. I hope all mistakes were fixed but with no wifi, I had to be creative rather than just typing it up. 

The campers were woken up at 7:45 and we met downstairs shortly after for breakfast.  After we finished eating everybody, walked over to the Xfinity Center for the morning stretch. Today, it was led by Coach Cliff Warren. The noteworthy part about that is that two years ago, Coach Warren was the head coach at UNF's crosstown rival, Jacksonville University.  He is now an assistant coach for the Terps. Prior to playing our first set of games, the 100 campers were divided into 10 teams.  It just so happens to be that I was told three of the worst players in the league were on my team. If you read yesterday's blog I mentioned how last night served as the evaluation period but I was not yet with this age group.  The coaches got a good laugh but we decided to wait and let the kids play before making any trades.

It was about 15 minutes into my first game when the league office placed a call to me (not literally).  My team was down 25 points right off the bat and a trade occurred with the team I was playing.  The game was paused to trade one of my least experienced players for the other teams third or fourth best player. It's amazing how the rest of the game was even and I knew I got a great player.  As it turns out he is a top-five player in the league of 100 kids when he is aggressive and takes the ball to the hole. The camper is 17 years old and is built like an ox. However when he settles for mid range pull-ups he shoots about 10% and isn't a top-five player on just my team. Therefore, I encourage him to be aggressive every single possession. I don't know why he doesn't realize this on his own as he is unguardable in the paint.

On day 1, the entire camp learned the "camp offense". Each coach was instructed to teach the same half-court set, which I thought was a great idea. I had never seen this before but it is amazing how much smoother and more organized the 5 on 5 games were. The set begins with the ball handler at the top the key, 2 wings and 2 players on the blocks.  The two wings down screen and from there it varies by coach. Sometimes, my team will cross screen while other times it sets a stagger screen on the weak side. Either way, it helps the game flow rather than just coming down and playing 1 on 1 off zero passes.

The second game was much more competitive. The back-and-forth contest was flowing right up until the last rotation. As it turns out, half my team became friends with the trainer as they dealt with cramps, rolled ankles, and tweaked hamstrings. The bench shrunk and minutes increased for everyone else, but that was a factor down the stretch. We had a six point lead with one minute to play and we absolutely blew it. I don't really believe in holding the ball or stalling in camp so I called for the camp offense to be run. The defender jumped the passing lane and laid the ball in to tie the game with 5 seconds remaining. TIME AND SCORE!!!! You always need to know both.  A player on the other team thought they were still down 1 so he intentionally fouled my player with two seconds remaining.  I didn't want to call the foul and have our first win come like that but fortunately the other ref did. My player headed to the line for 1 and 1 but missed the front end. The rebounder stepped out of bounds after corralling the board and we had 1 second remaining on the clock with a chance to win.  The inbounder faked a pass to the middle, drew extra attention, and passed the ball to the short corner, where my player nailed a 15-footer. Ball game.

The final game of the night came after dinner and the players were absolutely exhausted. Maybe I should re-word that and say the players and their coach were absolutely exhausted.  I'm actually writing this post this morning because I tried to write it last night following the staff meeting and room checks but I fell asleep with the computer on my lap, only one paragraph in. Day 28 man. I still found it in me to give it everything I had as the final game of the night would complete day two in College Park because these campers deserve my best effort from start to finish. We ended up losing the game but I was really tough on my players. I coach these kids at every camp as if they are on the high school team, regardless of their age (unless it is the really small guys).  These kids happen to be 14 to 17 but at most other camps I've had 11 and 12-year-olds.  After the game, one player's father came up to me and thanked me for doing a great job. I had no idea who he was before he introduced himself or which one was his son but he wanted to know how old I was and where I was from. He was shocked when I said 21 and not 31 because he had never seen someone that young "say all the right things".  He then recommended that I pursue coaching... LOL. It's only been my dream for the last six years and I have been blessed to learn from such great people at North Florida these past three years. There is SO much more to learn and I look forward to continuing to grow as a coach. 

Day 27 - June 25th

The staff meeting for Maryland Basketball Camp was not until 1pm and I took full advantage of that. I was able to catch up on some much needed sleep by not having an alarm go off until 9:30am. It took me 30 minutes to drive under 10 miles, but I was able to meet Chris Ramos, a former FGCU manager, at Chipotle for lunch. He is now living in the D.C. area working with Team Takeover, an elite basketball program. I met Chris this past season and couldn’t be happier to see him following his dreams!

I arrived at the Maryland campus 30 minutes early as I always leave ample time in case things don’t go as planned. It was very fortunate that I did this because construction caused a couple detours and I had trouble getting to the arena. Upon arriving to the meeting, Coach Nima Omidvar, Director of Basketball Operations, gave me a good laugh while he was taking attendance. He came right out and told everyone I was the “World Tour Guy”. After asking me what number camp this was for me and I said 8 of 9, the other coaches were in awe. Most of them just finished working this past Maryland camp and some were exhausted at the start of camp #2. An interesting part about going from camp to camp is how refreshed I feel on the first day at each new spot. Yesterday, I was dead tired after finishing up at NC State, but today I felt great as I arrived in College Park, Maryland.

The campers arrived between 3-5 for registration and each camp coach was assigned a responsibility for this process. I was asked to assist the trainers with paperwork but they told me that they would be able to handle everything between the two of them. I jumped over to the picture area and helped out a friend I made working at NC State camp. I had no idea he too was coming to College Park. The campers were able to take a picture with the Maryland players as they were decked out in some neat Under Armour jerseys.

Once camp began and the staff was introduced, we split into our assigned age groups. I was put with the Big 10, which consisted of 8-10 year olds. To be perfectly honest, I wasn’t initially thrilled about it but the two guys in charge of the age group are absolutely hilarious. They have been working this camp for years and both work in the education field. As it turns out, we had 6 coaches for 22 kids and the other age groups were short a couple coaches. They asked two of us to switch groups and typically I would be the first to raise my hand. I like working with the oldest kids possible because that is where I can do the most teaching and the least amount of babysitting. I can’t believe it but I actually thought about staying because of the amount of fun I knew I would have with that staff. In the end, I decided to jump age groups starting tomorrow morning.

After walking back to the dorms, the campers were able to purchase pizza, drinks, and snacks at the camp store. Just like at NC State, they take care of the coaches and supply pizza at no cost. Right after walking up and down the halls for room checks, we met as a staff and discussed the agenda for tomorrow. Bits and pieces of the NBA Draft have been watched, but truthfully I just want to get some rest. 

Day 26 - June 24th

The final day of Mark Gottfried Basketball Camp had arrived and the 366 campers came ready to play. The vast majority of the kids wanted to start the 5 on 5 single-elimination tournament right away. Prior to the games being played, we had the preliminary rounds of the individual contests (free throw, hot shot, 1 on 1). By 9:40, or about an hour after arriving to the main gym, the tournament was underway. My team had earned the #11 seed of 18 teams with a 2-2 record. We were the underdogs in the first round matchup and that was evident early. Once again, we went down big early on, for the fourth time in five games. 3 of our best players were on the court, but they just couldn’t get stops. What fired me up on the sidelines was the lack of focus defensively. I can deal with a kid not executing screen the screener action, but I can’t deal with my best player not willing to be locked in and get stops against arguably the best player in the age group. It wasn’t until I got under his skin that he started defending and we found our way back into the contest.  Although we lost the game by one possession, I was incredibly proud with the team’s effort and enthusiasm all week.

After lunch, the tournament really started to heat up. Multiple games were coming right down to the wire and the contests were very intense. One court was rushed after clinching a birth in the semi-final game, which made no sense but the kids loved it. At the end of the day, camp is about the kids getting better and also having fun. Some coaches need to be reminded of that as they took the games way to seriously. I have no problem with enthusiasm and intensity if you are coaching your kids, but to be all over the court complaining to the officials is immature and uncalled for.

The camp concluded with a game called “Cut Throat”. I loved their idea of ending the session with a game involving every camper rather than 90% of the campers sitting and watching a championship game.  The 3 on 3 game is of high intensity and fast pace as the campers have multiple rules offensively and defensively. For example, each defender must start on the baseline and closeout to their man while pointing to them and yelling out the score. The offensive team must have every player touch the ball and get a paint touch before attempting a shot. Each day, new rules were added, and the kids really enjoyed it. I would definitely bring this game to another camp down the road!

Just prior to the camp’s award ceremony, there was a loud crash in the back of the room. NC State’s leading assist man “Cat” Barber made an embarrassing mistake. Leaning a bit too hard on the table, down he went. The funniest part about his incident is apparently another coach warned him 45 seconds earlier not to do that because a coach fell the day prior. Well, if you didn’t read yesterday’s blog, that was me.

After camp, it was time to move out of the dorms and get on the road. I snuck in a quick shower and was in my car by 6:15. The 4.5 hour drive didn’t seem too bad other than the fact that I had a full day of work in the books. Like usual, there was an insane amount of construction and I didn’t wind up getting to Washington D.C. until after midnight. With my next camp being in College Park, Maryland, I was able to spend the night at my sister’s place, less than 10 miles from campus. The best part of the drive came when I took a wrong turn and ended up right in front of the Washington Monument. It was great to see my sister as I hadn’t done so in 6 months. She picked up dinner for me and even offered to sleep on the couch to let me have a good night’s rest in a bed. I owe you one sis! Day 26 is complete and I’m already 2.5 hours into Day 27. Time to get some much needed sleep!

Day 25 - June 23rd

The 6:55am alarm was set once again for the morning craziness. Whistles were blown early and often as I paced down the hallway on the fourth floor. Amazingly, some kids came out laughing while I’m sure others tried to sleep through it. Even if some tried, I assure you they were unsuccessful. After walking over to the main gym, Coach Gottfried ran a rebounding clinic for the campers. He covered offensive rebounding/finishing as well as defensive rebounding/outlets, both things that were taught in our station yesterday. Just like every coach in America, he preached two hands, two hands, two hands. At our station today, we worked in greater detail on offensive rebounding and finishing around the basket. The kids enjoyed it because they were able to shoot the ball, but we encouraged proper technique and footwork.

After a break for lunch, we returned to the gym for the 1 on 1 competition. It is very similar to King of The Court. In this format, the offensive player only has three dribbles and must score on the first shot attempt to stay on. The three dribble rule is a great one because it teaches the campers to play North and South rather than East and West. As we transitioned into the 5 on 5 games, I knew we were in bad shape. Campers were arguing with each other in warm-ups and not running the plays properly that I asked them to practice. Just as I predicted, this translated over to the game and we suffered tremendously. It was only a 4 point deficit at halftime but that increased in the 2^nd half. Nothing is more frustrating for a coach than losing every single 50/50 ball. I can deal with missed shots but lack of effort is something I simply don’t tolerate.

Shortly after returning to the courts following dinner, the evening games were underway. The way it works is half the teams play while the other half watch. For the staff, you are either coaching your team or officiating if your team is not playing. My team had the second game and by the time the 1-2 Hawks took the floor, a small crowd of parents had formed.  Better yet, I agreed to terms with Terry Henderson to join the staff as an assistant coach. The NC State player was absolutely incredible with the kids. It is neat for them to have a player sit on our bench but the way he interacted and helped coach the kids was awesome! (He even set up “Four Corners” to run out the clock in the final minute) Maybe it was Terry’s presence, but the kids came out to play right away. Instead of going down 10 early, we started the game on a 10-0 run. The ball was picked up at half court every possession and the campers suddenly remembered the offensive sets. It was unreal how magically everything came back together. One of the refs asked how the team wasn’t undefeated; I laughed. My favorite moment in the game came when I called for “box” to be run. The first couple times it was ran incorrectly but I had discussed it with them at the previous stoppage of play. I might have been at half court with a bigger fist pump than Tiger Woods when he won the 2005 Masters when the play was executed and we scored a wide open layup. Usually at the camp level, one screen is enough to get open. When you run screen the screener action, it’s guaranteed to work. Getting your kids to be in the proper spot is the only obstacle in having success.  The highlight of the game believe it or not wasn’t even that play but rather what happened a few minutes later. I am very passionate and enthusiastic on the sidelines and for whatever reason, I decided to relax just a little. I leaned on a table to catch my breath and I guess I leaned too hard. The table collapsed, the clock fell, and I went tumbling. How less than 10 people saw this embarrassment is beyond me but sometimes you just have to laugh at yourself. The loud bang occurred and I was flat on the floor dying of laughter. In the end, the 2-2 Hawks earned the 11 seed of 18 in the single-elimination bracket tomorrow.

After camp concluded, we met as a staff to discuss tomorrow’s events. In addition to the awards such as Mr. Hustle, MVP, and Coach’s award, each camper will receive an evaluation. Basically, we are asked to grade each of our players in the categories such as on-ball defense, court vision, rebounding, and being coachable. If you have read any blogs up to this point, you would know that last category is my favorite and the most crucial. To no surprise, every single one of my campers received an excellent grade in being coachable. They did a great job listening and executing to the best of their ability.

I also want to mention what a great job Jeff Dunlap (Director of Operations) and Ben Asher (Graduate Assistant) have done putting on this camp. It is not easy running a camp with almost 400 kids and they have done an outstanding job being organized and running a smooth operation. Of course things are going to happen that you can’t plan for, but from there it is all about M&A, monitor and adjust. Huge congrats to Ben Asher on his new gig at Siena, Director of Basketball Operations. They made a great hire!

Day 24 - June 22nd

Things got off to a loud start this morning. At most camps, the staff recommends that you knock on doors and make sure the campers are awake and moving at the appropriate time. Here, they literally told us that we could turn this place into a circus, as there were no residents of the building around. Although I was half-asleep myself, I walked into the halls and started blowing the whistle VERY loudly. The Fox-40's don't disappoint. After breakfast, we walked over to the gym and had stations. I was assigned to the rebounding drill with another coach. We decided to work on fundamental rebounding where we encouraged campers to get the ball at the highest point, jumping off two feet and grabbing the ball with two hands. It's amazing how these fundamental things that are taught at camps to the youth are the same things that are taught to division 1 basketball players. After grabbing the rebound, we had the campers work on their outlet passes. It is important that as a great rebounder, you can pass the ball ahead to a teammate quickly.

After lunch, the campers headed to the gym for the first regular season games of the week. Right before we were to play, each coach had 30 minutes with their team. Each squad had 15 minutes of on court time while the other 15 minutes could be used for anything the coach wanted. I spent my first 15 minutes with a pen and paper where we drew up 2 offensive sets and 2 out of bounds plays. When our court time became available, we practiced those sets in hopes they would work in the game. It was now go time! Unfortunately, just as we had last night in the exhibition, we went down 10 early. I don't know if it is my fault with a bad lineup or if the players just don't come ready to play from the tip. Either way, it is extremely frustrating to see players get beat off the dribble and play no help-side defense. Layup, layup, layup. We coulnd't buy a stop. We went on a nice run ourselves, 13-0 in the second half to cut the deficit to 1. Unfortunately, the last rotation didn't get the job done as we suffered a 6 point defeat.

Right after dinner, campers returned to the gym for the evening games. Each team would have one additional 5 on 5 game. My team played another winless team and battled extremely hard. I was proud of their effort for the most part, but there was definitely one frustrating part. An under out of bounds play "Box" was called by me from the sideline. The play was not executed properly and after just getting the ball in, I called a timeout. I took out a piece of paper and drew up once again each player's responsibility. When the players executed after the timeout and converted the play for a wide open layup, I jumped twice as high as my previously recorded vertical leap. I tried to explain to them that I really didn't do anything magical, but that the most impressive part was that they were being coachable. They finally listened. (It was a simple screen the screener play that I saw a team run at Tennessee Tech Team Camp) We notched our first tally in the win column as we defeated the opponent by five points.

After the commuters got picked up at 8:30pm, the overnight kids had the option of shooting around or watching the NC State players run pickup games. The vast majority decided to watch the Wolfpack battle. Cat Barber and BeeJay Anya were definitely the crowd favorites. 45 minutes later, the campers were dismissed back to the dorms. Almost all of them attacked the camp store immediately, where pizza and snacks are sold. When I walked into the camp store, there were about 40 campers and 1 poor woman, who was collecting payment. I jumped in and handled all the pizza requests as she looked like she needed some serious help. Another fun but long and exhausting day in the books!

Day 23 - June 21st

I want to open today's blog by wishing all the dads a Happy Father's Day! Dad, I know you've settled into being my 2nd biggest fan as mom would be upset if she wasn't #1. Thank you for everything you have taught me as I wouldn't be the man I am today without your love and guidance.

A special shoutout to Coach Driscoll, who sits at the top of the leaderboard for the most comments as well as the best comments for the blog. To answer his most recent questions...
Total Miles Driven: 2,600
Total Gas Money: A LOT
Total States Visited: 8
Total Dunkin' Donuts: 0 (uh oh...)

The morning was off to the usual early start. I grabbed a quick bite at the hotel's continental breakfast before heading to the Dail Center for an 8am staff meeting. The meeting basically took us into registration, with the first campers checking in at 11. My job for the following two hours was to be around the main parking lot and answer questions/direct people to where they needed to go. Truthfully, I wasn't the best person for this job as I knew 0 answers; I just arrived on the campus for the first time three hours prior. After a few questions in which we didn't know what to say and standing in the blazing heat for five minutes, another coach and I moved to the registration exit door and figured how we could be of assistance. We reminded each family leaving that they needed to check into the dorms for the overnight campers as well as directing them to the gym for a parents meeting. It was pretty neat that I was paired with Nate Laing, who happened to be the first person I conversed with this morning. His dad was the head coach at Campbell for 10 years and one of our assistant coaches at UNF, Coach Bobby Kennen, was on that Campbell staff. It's a small world.

Once camp got underway, the kids were divided by age group. I was assigned to the "NBA" with 11-12 year olds. My camp philosophy is pretty simple: the older the kids, the more teaching I can do and less babysitting. I wan't to have an impact on each and every kid whether it is making them a better basketball player, better teammate, or better person. Although I didn't have the oldest age group, I was happy to have older kids than I did last week. We lined the kids up by height and split them into 18 teams. Yes, there are almost 175 kids just in that age group and 366 total campers. We spent the next few hours simply evaluating; the campers went through drills, 3 on 3, and 5 on 5 as we watched with one goal in mind: make the teams as even as possible. I liked what the NC State staff did as they assigned us each a team early on but told us that wouldn't be our team for the week. They did this and encouraged us to make as many trades as possible to make the teams balanced. After evaluations were done, they assigned us to a new team at random.

You can usually tell what kind of team you are going to have just by completing your team roster. At every camp, it is typical to write down each campers' first and last name as well as a contact number. The kids that are going to cause problems don't wait and try and trick you but rather start misbehaving immediately. I set the ground rules right after I saw some issues and told them I was with 8-10 year olds last week. I wasn't trying to babysit this week but rather help them become better basketball players. We stepped onto the court after dinner for our first 5 on 5 game, although I believe it was technically an exhibition. I had this new team for a grand total of 10 minutes and I had no idea how good or bad my team was. It turned out that I had 10 players and coming from UK camp, the two platoons would be utilized for substitutions. I tried to make the two groups as balanced as possible but I was really just judging a book by its cover, exactly what they teach you not to do. I had no other option at that point.

Things turned sour very quickly. Just a few minutes into the contest, our team (Atlanta Hawks) was trailing 14-4. The situation was worse than what the score portrayed. My team was hopeless on offense and couldn't stay in front of their man defensively. At this camp, they grant you two timeouts per game. I called my first at that point and sat all 10 guys on our bench. Half of them looked like they were going to cry and the other half didn't even want to look at me. I let them know right then and there that they had two options: they were either going to take my coaching or I would trade them immediately. I really have no problem if you are at camp because your parent's force you out of the house or you just want a fun experience but I expect you to do one thing and that is to listen. If you are coachable and give me your best effort, then that's all I can ask for. It's amazing that at the end of the game, those 6-7 players that for sure wanted to be traded mid-game but didn't have the courage to say so no longer wanted to be traded. We won by 4 as we somehow learned to defend. I was dripping sweat by the end. As you all know, I don't care about wins and losses but you won't find a camp coach more enthusiastic and into the games than I am. It's a weird combination because typically the ones that actually coach their campers are the ones that want to win but for me, I'm just very passionate and love teaching the game. One of my favorite parts in the game came when a sub for the other team was literally yelling for 5 minutes straight at me to get back into my coaching box. Sorry man, but I was on the other side of half court encouraging my guys to get in a stance and move their feet. I teach the kids the same things at every camp and it's amazing how such basic ideas work. The concept of passing and cutting to the basket is the easiest thing in the world, but every kid would prefer to pass the ball to player B and then stand there and scream player B's name until they pass it back. I'm excited for day 2 as I'll learn which players truly want to be coached and which guys are just here for a good time!