BCAM June 2014 Monthly Report Tom Hursey – Executive Director FROM THE EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR: Things have been so hectic around the BCAM office this past month, I am just going to bypass my article (I know this will make some of you happy) and list all the items that affect our association. Most are good things but some are not so good. THE 2014-15 BCAM “YEAR” HAS NOW BEGUN: If you have not already renewed your BCAM membership for the next school year, do so now. We give last year’s members a grace period until July 15 to renew their memberships, but on that date you will no longer be able to login to the BCAM website, or receive our Monthly Reports. This includes Lifetime Members—you too need to renew your contact information with our office, or you will also fall off the mailing list in July. Go to www.bcam.org and click on JOIN BCAM at the top of the homepage. You can also print a paper form to mail instead (under FORMS). BCAM CLINIC COMMITTEE LINING UP TOP NOTCH SPEAKERS: Here are a few of the coaches we have lined up for the Annual Fall BCAM Coaches Clinic: Tom Izzo (MSU), Kim Barnes Arico (U of M Women), Jeff Tungate (Oakland Women). More information will follow. You will receive all the details in a mailing in August. Make plans now to bring your staff to the clinic October 10 & 11. Best Western Plus in Lansing. NO COACHES VS CANCER GOLF THIS YEAR: We are sorry to announce that the C vs. C Golf Outing will not take place this year. The American Cancer Society has withdrawn its assistance to this event (hosting website, collecting fees and securing big name sponsors). BCAM’s board realized that without the ACS’s backing, this event would struggle to be successful. Whether or not this event will reappear is hard to say. BCAM is happy that we have been able to raise over $60,000 in past events. BCAM will continue to support Coaches vs. Cancer by promoting the Suits and Sneakers fundraisers in the basketball season. Note: BCAM is making a donation to the Wes Leonard Heart Team. The goal of this project is to put Automated External Defibrillators (AEDs) in every school. For more information go to: http://www.wesleonardheartteam.org/ IN CASE YOU MISSED IT: Great video about LEADERSHIP featuring 7 of this country’s top college basketball coaches - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GAJqw7QVv4Y RE-CHARGE THE TEAM by Greg Mitchell (BCAM Board Member & Clinic Chairman) Hopefully as May comes to a close, your coaching engines are re-charged and you’re gearing up for the opportunity to work with your teams in what typically is an extremely busy and important month of June. This month traditionally ushers in basketball camps, summer leagues, team camps, shoot-outs, individual skill development sessions, etc… all golden opportunities for team and program development. This is the time to get a jumpstart on next year and preview what puzzle pieces are going to be on the table in November. Before diving in with both feet, take a moment to reflect on your season this past year and delve into what worked as well as what didn’t. Take an honest, introspective look and ask yourself some questions: ----Did your team underachieve or overachieve? Why or why not? ----Were you able to get your players to genuinely ‘buy-in’ to the team concept and reach their collective potential? If not, why?! ----What do you have to instill in your team to get them to beat the toughest team on the schedule next season? ----Regardless of your team’s record, were you proud of how they represented you? Your school? The community? For many of us, finding answers to questions such as these can be often difficult and frustrating. It goes without saying that in order to make real headway and progress, a plan needs to be cultivated and receive unwavering commitment. If not, improved results can’t be expected when the ball is tipped in December. The month of June certainly is an ideal time to start. If you believe that many of those issues/questions above hinge on getting your players to put the TEAM before the INDIVIDUAL, then you will really enjoy Alan Stein’s outstanding tribute to the San Antonio Spurs. If you haven’t seen it, I encourage you to take a look. It is here that we can find a great model of what TEAM basketball looks like. It’s often emphasized in the NBA that teams need ‘The Big 3’ in order to win a championship, Coach Popovich seems to do it with ‘The Big WE’. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-6NbJMq-QfU (from Alan Stein’s STRONGER TEAM YouTube Channel) Enjoy a great summer of basketball. BCAM IS TEAMING WITH BOB TAYLOR TO BRING BASIC FUNDAMENTALS BACK TO OUR YOUTH BASKETBALL: Dear BCAM, I am excited to be a part of BCAM again. After a 25 year coaching career, I have become entrenched with youth coaching and training. I don’t think it is good for youth basketball to be playing against pressing defenses, zones, traps, and gimmick defenses and offenses. The youth would be better served if skill development was stressed which is what the high school coaches want. Teams play more games than they have practices, and the majority of their practice time is spent working on tactics and combating tactics, while skills, instincts, and fundamentals take a back seat. Athletes are slotted into positions that fit their size and ability at young ages, so many are not practicing the basic fundamental basketball skills that they will need. The most fundamentally skilled players get passed by at an alarming rate because skill level is not mandatory in a pressing, trapping game. Youth coaches are often focused on winning at grade level as opposed to developing future varsity players with a high level skill set. Our culture has focused on how to be exposed vs. how to be the best player. I feel spending 25 years coaching at the higher level has allowed me to see what the varsity coach would want and how to help the player to get to the varsity level. I am proposing a series of shoot-outs where skills are the focus instead of tactics. These will be small, 4-team per level per gender, with rules in place that will key on player development instead of tactics. I believe these will go a long way to making basketball in our state stronger. Short clinics for players and coaches would precede the shoot-outs, giving the youth coaches a clear picture of what our high school coaches want to see in our youth development. BCAM members can help take the lead and stress to youth coaches that player development is the real key. Please contact me with your thoughts, ideas, or concerns. Yours for better basketball, Bob Taylor 989-513–0117 [email protected] (Bob is a former BCAM Board Member and longtime college coach) MHSAA REP. COUNCIL DOES NOT APPROVE GOING TO 5 DIVISIONS: Sean Schroeder (Stevensville-Lakeshore) presented the 5-division proposal at the May Rep. Council meeting. Even though it did not get approved, the BCAM Board will be discussing whether we should pursue this issue or not. The following are basketball related issues dealt with during the May Representative Council meeting: Basketball – Motion by Kris Isom, supported by Carmen Kennedy, to not approve the Basketball Committee recommendation to conduct the MHSAA Basketball Tournament in five equal divisions. Adopted. (No change.) Also provided was a document that demonstrated the small changes that would occur if the MHSAA Boys and Girls Basketball Tournaments were to be changed from traditional classes (A, B, C and D) to four equal divisions (1, 2, 3 and 4). Also provided were documents tracing the past 25 years of enrollment trends in Classes A, B, C and D that demonstrated the shrinking difference between the largest and smallest school in each class over this period of years. • Regulation I, Section 12(C) – Motion by Vic Michaels, supported by Orlando Medina, to make the all-star participation penalty more sport-specific by allowing students who have completed their 12th-grade season in a sport to participate in one all-star contest in that sport, subject to specific conditions, without loss of remaining interscholastic eligibility in other sports. Participation in a prohibited or a second all-star event in the same sport results in a loss of eligibility in all sports for up to one year. Adopted. • Regulation II, Section 6 – Motion by Alvin Ward, supported by Fred Smith, to add Illinois to Interpretation 189c and rewrites of Sections 6(A) and 6(B). (There is no mileage limitation for competition occurring in and involving schools exclusively from Michigan, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Wisconsin and Ontario.) Adopted. • Note: Any event with eight or more teams exclusively from Michigan, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Wisconsin and Ontario must still be approved by all state associations involved; and regardless of the number of schools involved, if the event is sponsored or cosponsored by or titled or co-titled in the name of a non-school entity or individual, National Federation sanction is also required. Beginning this fall, international students on either F-1 or J-1 visas, in order to be immediately eligible for athletics, must meet a residential exception or have been placed in a school through an Approved International Student Program (accepted for listing by the Council on Standards for International Educational Travel {CSIET} and approved by the MHSAA).