Basketball

A sequel to the Blog I made yesterday. Because I can't even consider writing about sports without remembering the one that started it all: Basketball.

When I was about seven, I got a basketball hoop for Christmas. I was the happiest person alive! And then I tried to shoot and it didn't even touch the net. What could make that even more pathetic was the fact that it was only eight feet high, not the standard ten. But I fell in love with it anyways. I practiced every day after I got home for an hour, and I spent many a recess shooting hoops. I started to get really good at making baskets when I was nine, and then we adjusted the height on the hoop when I turned ten. My dad started teaching me how to do layups, guard zone and man-on-man defense, all the fundamentals. He was a BALLER, yo. By the time I was eleven, I was able to beat a fourteen-year-old guy who's been playing basketball in a game to twenty-points. I think that was the highlight of my life for a few years. =)

I joined my first league team when I was ten, and I've started on teams ever since. I started on my middle school team all three years, and we turned out to have even records. We didn't have any standout players in basketball. It was me and two of my other friends who could handle the ball really well and one awesome defender. On league teams it was the same deal. I started off playing forward, and then center for a little while until everyone grew to my height (early bloomer xD). Now I play more guard and forward. This year I'm trying out for Junior Varsity. I'll never forget the year when I was on a league with a plain lazy team, and we were playing the best team in the league, but I had a blast. The girl I was guarding had a big time attitude, and she got so mad at me the parents heard her swearing at me from the stands and I think she fouled out. She was talking trash the whole game and I was just grinning. We lost, but that was one of the funnest games by far.

It makes me sad that I find there's almost fewer girls who like basketball than softball. Although we've made great progress for girls getting into sports, I still see many cringe at the word "run" or "push-up." Maybe that's another Blog?

But like other people have said about their respective sports and like I was saying about softball, there's a magic with basketball too. And when I step out on the court again, I start to wonder if softball is really my favorite sport anymore. My softball team this year was full of clicky little snots, only three girls liked me. They were tough on the field, but lacking in compassion off the field. I might not even try out next year, because softball is a big part of working together. But basketball has always been a T-E-A-M sport with me. I never feel more connected to any other sport because of that. And then there's releasing all that pent-up anger, which is a part of almost every sport. Sometimes my mom gets me angry during a game because I perform better when I'm pumped up. Basketball is probably the funnest sport for me out there, because I'm used to playing every position and I know the game like the back of my hand.