today my basketball team played our arch rivals tulpar in a much anticipated rematch from a game early in the where we were destroyed by 20 points. it was the game that caused the former coach of the team to get fired. i was hired the next week.
we went into the game fairly confident having won my previous two games as coach. i had some concerns about our defense and our rebounding (both ongoing problems) but the team "seemed" ready. i was probably a little over confident as i invited a big group of our friends to come and watch and go out for a victory dinner afterward. bad idea on my part.
the national sports palace where we play our games was packed with about 500 people. ok... admittedly most people where there to watch the interpretative dance competition taking place on the next court! but we had a pretty good crowd ourselves with about 150 people. the two courts are divided by a hanging screen and we were forced to listen to a combination of classical music and russian love ballads being blared for the dancers during the entire game.
i would like to blame the music for the way we played the first half of the game. we started very strong - attacking the basket and getting some good looks. we opened up with a press that rattled tulpar. everything was going our way. except for the fact that we missed 5 out of our first 7 shots (most of them layups) and 8 (yes 8) free throws in a row. the crowd moaned each time we missed an open shot or clanked a free throw - to the extent that it really started getting into the minds of my team and snowballing. we should have been up by 10 in the opening minutes but instead we were down 10.
by half we were down by 30.
the team owner and former coach were irate and they both came into the locker room to yell at my team. that isn't really my style - so instead i brought jennifer and olive into the locker room and introduced them to the team for the first time. "see my beautiful family?" i said. "that is what is important. remember that and remember that this is just a game. go have fun.".
my touchy feely speech must have worked as we opened the half on an amazing 20 - 5 run. we started to do the little things that i had been emphasizing in practice. we were well on our way to making an incredible comeback. but we didn't.
things leveled out in the third quarter and we ended up losing by 19. a one point improvement from the first time ak-bars played tulpar. i am not sure that is exactly what the mafia financed team owner had in mind when he hired me. but i didn't end up gagged and in the back of his trunk so guess i will survive to coach another game.
we have another big game against the number 3 team in the league next week so we have lots of work to do.
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