Congrats to SLD and N.D., who won the BYU Intramurals Co-ed Championship tonight! Their team beat the Care Bears or the Polar Bears or something like that to pick up the coveted intramural championship t-shirst. I appreciate that you blew out the other team so that I didn't have to worry too much about the outcome. Thank you for that...I have enough stress in my life already! :-)
It's been fun watching you play this season. I'm not very good at watching other people play. I'm more used to playing myself, but--given that I've only touched a basketball on three brief occasions since moving to Utah--I'm glad that you're giving me some good opportunities to practice how to be an energetic and enthusiastic fan.
As much as I enjoyed watching you drain outside jumpers, I think it was even more fun to see your passing out there. It made me jealous that I couldn't play too. SLD, you had a particularly great bounce pass to finish off a fast break tonight. You managed to thread the needle on that pass just under the outstretched arms of the defender to hit your teammate streaking down the court for a wide open layup. N.D., you had a great pass as well where you drove the lane, got the defender to commit to you, and then dumped it off to a wide open teammate for the bucket! Those types of plays show that you really understand how the game is supposed to be played.
Congrats also to the Crickmore twins who dominated the paint and yet maintained their grace and poise! I loved cheering you on as well--particularly since you are basically family!
Is it too early to start planning a Three-Peat celebrations? Maybe we better worry about you winning it all again next year! ;-) Good luck on your finals to Team "Los Banditos"!
I never met Will Rogers--who famously declared that he never met a man he didn't like--but I think I came pretty close today. Coach Frank Layden came to speak to our office today and I think it's been a long time since I've enjoyed a speech as much as I've enjoyed his.
Coach Layden coached the Utah Jazz many years ago and has continued as a consultant for the Jazz for many years. As a huge Jazz fan, I was excited to have Coach Layden come speak. He is known for being funny, but I could not have imagined how great his presentation was.
He spoke about his life growing up, his career, and coaching the Jazz. He talked about having having an impact on other people's lives and continuing to educate ourselves. I can tell that he practices what he preaches. Coach is nearly 82 years old, but I never would have guessed that if he had not told us what year he was born (1932). He has a young spirit and an enthusiasm for life that is contagious.
Here are a couple of of my favorite quotes from his presentation:
“Reputation is a perception of who you are. Character is who you really are.” – Frank Layden
“I’ve never been afraid of anything in my life and that includes the Los Angeles Lakers!” –Frank Layden
"Freedom is expensive" (quoting Winston Churchill and the leadership that he showed during World War II)
"A life is not important except in the impact it has on other lives." (quoting Jackie Robinson)
He also said that we were free to quote him one time, and after that, we could do what he always does which is to say: "As I've always said...." That line got quite a few chuckles from my colleagues.
But my favorite quote was the one that reminded me of Will Rogers (who was also funny like Coach Layden). Coach said:
“Everyone I meet, when I walk away, I hope they feel better.”
That is quite a thought and as you heard Coach say it and share a few examples of that philosophy, I knew that he meant it. It's definitely something to shoot for.
Coach Layden, thanks for coming to speak to us today. You encouraged us to have an impact on others, but I appreciate the impact you had on me. Hope to see you at a Jazz game real soon!
Tonight we played in a 3 on 3 tournament at my brother's high school. It was a fundraiser for his high school basketball team. They also had an alumni game and L. played in that too. The original Dyer Straits is an intramural inner tube water polo team at BYU founded by my siblings that has won a bunch of intramural championships. I never played intramural inner tube water polo, but I know my siblings have had a lot of fun on that team.
L., who put together this team, used the same name because there were supposed to be at least three brothers playing. Our team was pretty stacked. Brett L. and I are both 6'3". My brother L. is 6'6" and A. (aka Thor) is 6'9". It was fun playing with those guys because they're all good basketball players and play smart.
Here's a quick video showing our teamwork in action:
Plus, it's always fun to play with my brothers. I was disappointed that S. was a last minute no show because he couldn't get his work schedule changed. Even though L. is tall, he has an outstanding jumpshot:
I also managed to get a shot of L. dunking before the alumni game. He makes it look pretty easy:
I also managed to put down a few:
(thanks to Brett L. for directing traffic out there! :-)
We won all 3 of our games--the first two were blowouts (15-2 and 15-4) and the last was a little too close for comfort. We won by a score of 15-13, but were down 13-9 after they hit a few surprise 3 pointers. We cranked up the "D" and put the game away though.
Here are some pics from the festivities...
Pre-game warm ups.
Brett L. shoots a 3.
A. shows his mid-range game.
My miracle nephew.
L. goes in for the dunk.
Brett L. hits a layup.
L. catches a pass.
L., A., and Brett L., it was fun playing tonight. I'm looking forward to next year! (S., we need you next year too!)
Yesterday was officially the first day of Spring and today was our firm's annual March Madness party. I decided it was time to do some extensive cleaning of my office. I figured that I should take some pictures to document the result. It may never be this clean again!
I'm proud of the door to my office!
It's been a while since this much floor space and desk space was visible
I also got a couple of thing hung on the wall (finally)
The Prayer at Valley Forge - Arnold Friberg
I'm really excited about the Arnold Friberg painting of George Washington kneeling in the snow at Valley Forge. It was a very generous gift from my sister T. T., I want you to know that I saw at least one person at our party today going into my office to get a closer look at the painting.
My first trophy in many, many years!
The other major event last night was that I played in the Coaches Game from the Boys and Girls' Club basketball league that R. and S. played in this season. They just did a schoolyard pick of teams, but there was a referee, a clock, and a scoreboard. We won 96-90. I probably had one of the best scoring games of my life. The basket looked huge and I probably had at least half of our team's points.
I also had a ton of assists and made some really fun passes to my teammates where I threaded the needle just past the outstretched fingertips of the defender. After the game, they awarded an MVP trophy (which was a huge surprise). It was pretty fun. In the parking lot, one of my teammates asked me where I'd played my college ball. Ummmm....I didn't. But it was still cool that he thought that I had. It was just one of those nights where everything seemed to go down and I played way better than I deserved to. It's just too bad that none of my family was there to see it.
March Madness is in full swing now. For the first time in 6 years, my team--the BYU Cougars--are not going to the Big Dance. But they did make the NIT tournament, at least. So their season isn't over...yet!
They played Washington Tuesday night and got only their second post season win in the past 11 years when they didn't have someone named "Jimmer" on their team. But BYU appears to have a new superstar in the making--Tyler Haws.
Teams have to resort to faceguarding to stop him.
Tyler's line last night:
37 points
15-24 (.625 FG%) from the field
6-6 from the charity stripe
6 rebounds
3 assists
Yes, he is a big-time player and he's only a sophomore. So far this season, Tyler (who is among the nation's leaders in scoring (21.4 ppg) and free throw percentage (.872)) has scored 706 points. He is only one of 5 players in the history of BYU basketball to do so. The others? Only Jimmer Fredette (twice--1,068 in 2011 and 751 in 2010), Devin Durrant (866), Danny Ainge (782), and Michael Smith (765).
Not only is Tyler a great player, but he's also a great person. He hung up his sneakers to serve a two-year mission to the Philippines where he learned Tagalog. It makes you wonder what he can do in the next two years now that he has "shaken off" the mission rust from his game.
I love this video about how he and his dad would go practice at their local church. If your kids love basketball, sports, BYU, or any of the above you need to have them watch this short video (I need to have my kids watch it with me again!):
I got a chance to meet Tyler Haws last summer up at BYU basketball camp and he was so gracious and kind to all the campers. He is the type of player that you want to root for and that you want your kids to look up to.
I still remember watching Tyler's dad, Marty Haws, play on some pretty good basketball teams at BYU in the 1980s. I'm looking forward to seeing Tyler continue to lead BYU basketball over the next couple of years! Go Cougs!
I've always liked this song. I didn't know until tonight that it was recorded by The Hollies. Since this post is about my brother, I thought it was appropriate to reference it in the title.
My brother with our nephew
My brother S. came up last night to play basketball on my office hoops team with me. S. and I have always been pretty close and our basketball playing days go back to the time that we would play mini-hoops against each other in the driveway. Maybe longer. I'd pretend to be Hakeem Olajuwon. He was Patrick Ewing. And it would be a dunkfest-slugfest. But it was fun.
S.'s drive to the game last night was probably at least an hour each way, but I love playing with him. It was worth it to have him there because he is such a good player and we can read each other's thoughts without really even thinking. We started the game when I found him in the corner for an open 3 point shot. S., of course, nailed it. That made the score 3 to zip--good guys! :-)
S. played well throughout the game. He has such a calm, steadying influence on the court. We led most of the game, but it was close. With a minute to go, we were down by 2 points and we had the ball. I managed to drive through the lane and score a twisting lay-up to tie the game and we prevented them from even taking a shot to win it at the end of regulation.
We had a tip-off to start the overtime period. I knew S. would be ready and so I won the tip and flipped the ball toward him. S. dribbled up calmly and raised up for another 3 pointer from pretty much NBA range. The shot hit nothing but the bottom of the net--giving us a HUGE three point lead to start the overtime.
Later, with about a minute left in overtime, S. would drain yet another deep 3-point shot to clinch the game for us. I always have confidence in S. when he shoots the ball and I just feel really lucky to have such a great brother and that we get to do fun stuff (like play basketball, among other things) together.
After the game, we messed around a bit dunking and shooting 3's. Here's quick video of S. putting one down.
S., thanks for making the effort to come out and play hoops with us! We couldn't have done it without you!
I had a basketball game Monday night. I thought I'd be sore but the post-race massage I got was money! I felt almost like normal out on the court even though 48 hours before, I had been running on the streets of St. George (including Bluff Street) trying to finish as best I could my first full Ironman race.
On the ride home from the race, my brother challenged me to see if I could still dunk even though I had done the race just two days before. (Sometimes I think that we ought to add some sort of basketball skills competition--three point shooting or dunking ideally--to the triathlon so that I might have a prayer of winning one day!) Generally, doing long endurance-type competitions doesn't do much for the fast twitch muscle fibers that you need to jump high. I'm glad I was able to successfully respond to his challenge.
This headline and variations of it have been making late night comedy rounds. (For example: "NBA Suspends World Peace" etc.)
Unfortunately, there was nothing funny or "peaceable" about Ron Artest's (aka Metta World Peace) elbow to the back of James Harden's head.
Ironically, Mr. Artest/World Peace actually won the NBA's Citizenship Award for 2011. Even at the time, awarding a citizenship award to Artest/World Peace seemed about as dubious as naming the country of Libya to be a member of the United Nations Human Rights Council. So I'm guessing that the award was not for his "lifetime achievements."
This is the same athlete who, after all, famously went after the fans in the stands (literally) in the Pistons/Pacers Brawl in 2004 (see 25 seconds into the video):
Artest/World Peace may be a Laker, but he'll always be a thug to me.
UPDATE: I just realized that this was my 100th post for this blog. If you have taken the time to read any of my 100 posts, thank you. =o)
The NCAA basketball tournament has many nicknames, including "March Madness" and "The Big Dance." I'm a huge basketball fan, so this time of year is always fun.
I can't tell you how many memories I have of watching NCAA tournament basketball games. In many instances, I can remember exactly where I was and who I was with. I remember: going with my former bishop to buy scalped tickets and see Kentucky (with Ron Mercer, Derek Anderson, and Rick Pitino) play in the Huntsman Center; going to another Huntsman Center contest another year to see the Virginia Cavaliers play; buying tickets for my aunt to see UCLA (with Kevin Love and Russell Westbrook) play and then seeing BYU (and Jimmer) lose to Texas A&M; walking through the Wilkinson Center and seeing games broadcast on television; and running out to shoot free throws as a 14 year old kid during half time as BYU (featuring Marty Haws, Jim Usevitch, Jeff Chatman and Michael Smith) lost to UNLV one year...Good times! =o)
BYU is back in the tournament this year. No Jimmer this year, but the team has a #14 seed. BYU will be a Cinderella, underdog team at the Big Dance this year, but at least we're dancing!
The Cougars already played on Tuesday and won in a thriller--setting an NCAA record by coming back from being down by 25 points to win the game by 6.
Noah Hartsock and Brandon Davies
The win Tuesday was a first for the Cougars in that it came in a "play-in" game (also known officially as a "First Four" game). Last year, however, Virginia Commonwealth University started by winning its' "play-in" game as a #11 seed and went on all the way to the Mecca of college basketball--the Final Four! It'd be great if the Cougs could have some similar success.
Speaking of the Final Four, my best friend from high school called me about two weeks ago to offer me tickets to the Final Four this year in New Orleans. Unfortunately, I already have a prior commitment that Saturday (and I'm not talking about General Conference....) I can't tell you what a bummer it was to have to tell him that I couldn't make it. But I'm glad that they're going and I'll have to dream of making it to the Final Four someday.
Maybe if the Cougs manage to keep dancing all the way to the Big Easy, I'll end up skipping my Ironman race to go cheer on them on! =o)
I proudly wore a red Indiana Hoosiers hat and dreamed that one day I would get recruited by Indiana's legendary (and volatile) basketball coach, Bob Knight. I thought that if I were ever a basketball coach, I'd want to be as good a coach as Bobby was.
For the past couple of months, I've been coaching R.'s basketball team. It has been an interesting experience. The league is quite competitive--especially when you consider that the kids are only in the 3rd and 4th grades. Despite the fact that our team has lost every single game, I've been accused of "poaching" by another coach (i.e. stealing a player from his team) and I've tried to teach my players--many of whom have never played organized basketball before--the fundamentals of basketball.
Swish!
Usually what happens in youth basketball is that there is a draft where the coaches get to pick the players for their team to make sure that there is some competitive balance in the league. That apparently didn't happen this year. Instead, the coaches just put their teams together and there were about two teams that didn't have coaches. Mine was one of those teams. We got everyone that was left over.
I was asked to coach after my team had already been "assembled" but I was excited to be able to help because I love basketball (if you couldn't tell from this blog). I told the parents that I personally didn't care if we lost every single game but that my goal was for the kids to be better basketball players by the end of the season.
I admit, it's been frustrating at times. I couldn't believe it when another coach accused me of "poaching" one of his players. I didn't, of course, but I was kind of confused why he wasn't more worried about just coaching the players on his team.
The lack of experience of our players is also frustrating. Last night at practice, for example, we only had three kids show up (even though we obviously need the practice). We spent 45 minutes practicing lay-ups with the team goal of making 10 of them in a row. We couldn't do it! (The closest we got was 7 in a row several times.) That was frustrating, but I credit the kids for staying enthusiastic and for not giving up. And they did get better at making their lay-ups.
But it has been fun to see the kids get better from week to week and over the course of the season. They have a lot more confidence now than they did in the first game. One of our best players on the team had never played basketball before, but had three baskets in our game today. Another one of our kids--who also had never played before--didn't know how to dribble the basketball in the first game. (He just held the ball and walked around the court.) Now he knows how to dribble. Another kid who had never played before managed to nail a three pointer during the game today. It is exciting to see the kids get better.
No One Ever Accused Bob Knight of Being Too Laid Back
Because they've gotten better, my expectations and hopes for them have gotten higher. And that is how I found myself almost "becoming Bobby" today. (I can't take credit for the title of this post. I "borrowed" it from a great post written by Ashley Carter. She has an awesome blog that you should check out if you haven't already.)
We were in a tight game this morning during our weekly game and we even had the lead in the fourth quarter. That's never happened before. Another thing that has never happened before is that we actually ran a play correctly and R. (my son) scored a basket off the play. It was probably my proudest moment as a coach this season.
Also significant was that my son, R., fouled out during the game. That has never happened to him before and he was so sad because he thought that he had done something wrong. Rather I tried to reassure him that sometimes it's good to foul in basketball. Moreover, I was so proud of him because it was the best game that I'd ever seen him play in his entire life. He hustled, played great defense, and made three baskets during the game! I know he's my son--but any parent would have been proud to see him play out there. And as a parent, I felt his sadness that he was feeling at the end of the game.
R. Gets Ready To Shoot a Free Throw Last Year
(It's hard to take pictures when you're coaching...so no pix from this season, sadly!)
And even though I started the season as the "anti-Bobby" in terms of coaching temperament, the excitement of the game (and the emotions) made me want for our team to be able to win. I never got close to throwing a chair (like Coach Knight infamously did during one game) but I thought about throwing my clipboard at one point.
Ultimately, we lost (again), but we have one more chance next week in the last game of the season. And whether we win or lose, I still believe that our team will be winners because of the individual improvement that the players have made this season. And even if it's an exciting game, I promise to keep my chair firmly planted on the sidelines!
