Looking back on my freshman year of high school, I mostly remember playing C-team basketball.  I remember how the season was very long.  The season was close to five months, but I enjoyed every second of it.  We weren’t always serious when we played, but we always seemed to have fun.  Our team was by far one of the better teams because we had a special connection.  We won several games throughout the season because of this connection.  Winning made the season fun, too, but even when we lost we always seemed to have a good time because of the special bond we had.

I remember always looking forward to practice after school.  Our coach, was Mrs. Moreau, and she was a very fun coach.  She didn’t mind that we weren’t always serious when it came to practices or even games as long as we still worked hard.  Everyone had to work very hard if they wanted to win games because we didn’t have much size on the team.  We had to be faster than the other teams and out hustle them.  We needed to tire them out so we had to be very conditioned.  This didn’t mean we wouldn’t have fun, but that we had to work hard.  Practices were always fun because everyone always seemed to have a joke to say or would do something funny.  There were several times that Mrs. Moreau would even join in by referencing jokes that were said in earlier practices.   
One of the inside jokes Mrs. Moreau and I had was yelling, “Marissa” if I air balled a three.  We would yell this because on the first practice of the year Mrs. Moreau made me shoot threes.  I didn’t want to shoot threes because I was a post and never practiced them and I didn’t want to embarrass myself.  She wouldn’t take no for an answer so I shot them.  I later air balled one and told her that it wasn’t my fault but instead my right arm, in which I named Marissa.  Later in a game I air balled a three and Mrs. Moreau remembered what I had said at practice. She then yelled, “Marissa!” so I replied with, “She’s not listening Moreau.”  From then on we would yell this back and forth every time that I would miss a shot.  By having this joke, it made the games more fun because I wouldn’t get embarrassed if I messed up, but instead I had a way to laugh it off.  A simple joke like this really made me close to my coach and I will really miss having her as a coach in the years to come.
There are several things we did that I will never forget.  One of these memories was during a close game.  My coach took me out of the game for a,” quick breather.”  Soon after I took my spot on the bench, one of my teammates hurt his ankle.  Coach Moreau quickly yells,” Cam go for TP!”  My teammate, Tyler P., was struggling to get off the court while I check in.  I then yell out,” TP you’re out!”  It was obvious that I was going in for him because he was hurt I needed to make him laugh to try and make him feel better.  After the game I asked him how his ankle was, and he assures me that he’s fine. I then repeated,” TP you’re out,” to see what his reaction would be.  He simply shook his head and laughed.  I still occasionally say this to him and we still laugh about it.

Some of my favorite memories of playing C-team basketball happened during practices.  At the beginning of practice, we would play blitz.  The game was four on four and the purpose was a fast paced warm-up.  The teams were freshmen and sophomores on one team and juniors and seniors on the other.  By playing this game some of us freshman started to have friendly rivalries with the upperclassmen.   Tyler P. had a rivalry with Brett S..  Noah R. had a rivalry with just about every senior.  And I had a rivalry with Peter E.  These competitions started by us matching up with a senior to guard.  Later on we would naturally match up with the same senior.  As the year went on we would get very competitive against the seniors and they would with us.  Most of the time the seniors would win these competitions because of their size and experience during blitz but we occasionally won.  This made the game much more competitive and more interesting.  By having these rivalries, we began to get better, But most importantly I made some friends during the process.

There were so many freshmen on the team that we had to have a rotation.  This means that every player didn’t go to every game.  This made games much harder to win because some games we would be without our main point guard or would have no size on the team.  With no size on the team it was very hard to get rebounds so we couldn’t afford to miss shots.  This was a challenge that we had to face, but was merely one of the sparks to make us work harder.  We would have to practice harder and play harder.  That is the main reason that we were a good team.  There was one game that we could only have a total of eight players compared to the normal 12-13 players.  We knew going into the game that we were playing a bigger school than us so it would be a hard win.  If we wanted to win we couldn’t be lazy.  We knew going into the game that we weren’t going to get many breaks.  We would have to put every ounce of energy we had into the game, and we did.  Even though we played our hardest, we still lost.  I wouldn’t trade this day for anything though.  Even with the loss it was a great day because I got to know some of my best friends even more.

   My team had a special bond with each other.  This bond was created by playing together since third grade.  Over the years of playing together we started to get to know one another much better.  This resulted in us getting very close to one another.  We knew each player’s strengths and weaknesses.  We knew who should handle the ball in different situations.  If someone was in a slump, we knew how to get them out.  We could get each other out of a bad mood and their head back into the game.  Because we a had the combination of working hard and a very special bond, we were a good team.  Other teams worked hard too, but they didn’t have a bond like we did.  Having a bond like this put us above other teams 

Throughout the season there were many sparks to make us want to work harder but the main one was losing.  We all hated the feeling of losing, so we worked as hard as we could to minimize the losses.  Most of us would put time in outside of practice and games like going to open gym or putting in the time at home.  This was also a major reason we were very successful as a team.  By putting in extra time, we improved our skills.  It didn’t take just skills to win games.  It took a mindset and that’s where having a special bond with your teammates comes into play.