PART XXVII - The Secret of Longevity - Awareness.

These posts write themselves each day.

This past Saturday morning in Knoxville, Tennessee, I got up early to go watch one of our Winston-Salem Stealers teams play. We had four teams playing in Knoxville, two of them I coach; this particular game I wasn't coaching but obviously had a vested interest. I sat down on the court next to the one where our team was preparing to play when another club coach approached me. His team had just finished playing on the court where I was sitting.

He said "Coach, you don't me, but I know you." Of course, my first thought was "Uh Oh, what did I do?"

His name was Kevin Hall (top picture) and he is the head girls coach at The First Academy in Orlando, Florida. Coach Hall went onto say "I follow all of your posts online, and I study your high school game films to try and try to teach my girls how to play the game on and off the court from what you are doing. "I'm inspired after reading each of your posts".

All I could say back to him, at first, was "Wow"!

We talked for about fifteen minutes, he introduced me to his wife and daughters, one of whom just finished playing, and said that he would welcome anything that I could offer to help him or his team improve. I told him that anything he needed to get better I would offer.

After he left and I walked over to my court to coach, I told myself "See, this is another reminder that you never know who is watching; always be aware of that."

That phrase became a running theme all weekend with me as I coached games, watched games or meandered throughout the Knoxville Convention Center.

Following our first game on Saturday (that I coached), the Low Country Ballers from South Carolina played. They were going to use our bench, so once our girls picked up their bags, I hung around just to make sure everything was cleaned up for the Ballers to use. Their head coach came over and asked me "Are you from Winston-Salem, you look familiar"? I told him yes and he said he played basketball at Forsyth Tech back in the mid-1990s. I told him that when I worked at R.J. Reynolds HS as assistant boy's basketball coach from 1994-1998, I would open the gym on Saturdays for Forsyth Tech's head coach David Solomon, so that his team could practice and play. I went on to tell him that they had a really good player who went onto play college somewhere, I think his name was "O.J. or E.J."? He laughed and said "That was me, my name is O.J. Linney. "I went onto play at Charleston Southern."

Coach Linney told me "I remember you would always make sure the gym was setup and the water coolers were out so that we could practice and play. "No other place we went to play would be as organized as Reynolds. "We always looked forward to playing there." I told him thanks and I was surprised that he would remember something like that as I thought was unimportant or minimal at the time. I honestly had forgotten about even opening the gym on those Saturdays for them.

As my teams played over the weekend, I constantly stayed on them about playing hard, keeping good body language and to keep a good attitude. Not everything is going to go their way all the time, but they needed to be reminded of those things because "You never know who is watching you".

Sunday morning came and we are ready to wrap the tournament up. My 10th grade team is losing, by a wide margin, and I am trying my best to figure out how to get them back in the game. At halftime, I talked to them about just playing hard because, again, you don't know who is watching. Forget the strategy, forget the technique; those weren't important at the time... playing hard was.

Shortly after the second half started, Edgar Farmer, an assistant coach at Elon, sat down on our court to watch us play. We were down twenty, but he stayed and watched the entire second half. We had our good moments in that second half, but not enough of them and lost. I talked to the girls and then went over to say hello to Edgar. The first words out of his mouth were "I'm glad you are still the same, win or lose. "We don't pay much attention to the scoreboard as we are just looking for fits for our program. "It was good to see your kids continue to play hard."

Coach Farmer and I met each other in 1996-97 when we worked Forsyth Country Day's Mugsy Bogues Camp together. We spent a lot of hours in the summer sun, the hot summer sun, teaching basketball to countless numbers of kids back then. Coach Farmer went onto coach at East Carolina and other places before Elon. He said "I remember you always being patient with those kids, especially the younger ones, at those camps and I always tried to do the same as I moved through my coaching career".

He told me that he wanted to come by and say hello before I left and that he was impressed but not surprised that our team continued to play hard despite the score. He even mentioned that a couple of players on our team have a chance to possibly pay at their level if they continued to develop.

As I walked over to the convention center for my 11th grade team's final game, I thought about a lot of what had taken place over the weekend.

Every basketball weekend is filled with good and bad moments, wins and losses, smiles and tears. There is always that one person who brings the drama, either within the program or from the outside, and there is always that one person who really appreciates the opportunity just to play basketball and then... a lot in between.

I then thought how lucky I am to be doing what I have been doing for so long. The opportunity to continue to impact lives through basketball is a powerful thing. Every moment in the present may not seem important to me and may not seem like I am getting through to anyone (just like I feel sometime when I am writing these posts) but somewhere in this world someone is paying attention, and these words and actions mean something positive to them.

My advice to everyone starting their careers as a basketball coach in today's environment is to not let the drama, the craziness and silliness deter you from trying to hold yourself and others around you to a high(er) standard.

Your players, your player's parents and those who you come in contact with will appreciate it. Maybe not at the moment, but at some point, they will.

Before you act out, say something inappropriate, quit on your team or yourself, or do something that you'll regret, just remember to:

Have Awareness...You Never Know Who Is Watching.

Yours for Better Basketball Always,

Brian / Coach Robinson

Ps - These posts really do write themselves each day.