Snow Day

Well it’s a snow day here and that means no practice tonight. Love it as a teacher, hate it as a coach. So this means we are once again losing practice time. It really is adding up at this point and I grow very concerned about our longer term prospects.

The big question, then, is who to start, and what kind of rotation I want to do, for Sunday’s game. Jack M, Jack P, Scott, Tom, Dante, and David all can make a legitimate case for starting. Of that group, in some ways I want to bring Jack P off the bench, since he’s the most versatile of that group after David, who I am obviously going to start. But I still think Jack could be our third best overall player. How do you sit your third best overall player?

If, instead, I went based off of skill that would lead to Tom sitting. However, I don’t like how that leaves us for subs. Brian and Lucas are going to each see minimal playing time, most likely 3 or 4 minutes in each half. I basically want Lucas playing the 4 position, for reasons previously mentioned. Brian, is an unknown. Before his injury I’d had him penciled in as a starter. Now, besides not having a real feel for how I want things done (not the biggest minus considering we play just a step above organized chaos) , he’s still getting his feel for running, jumping, shooting, etc back. The kid has spent, essentially, the last 3 months with a broken ankle on one of his feet. It’s got to have an effect on his body if not his psyche.

With Noah not being there, that leaves Gordie and one other player as my main substitutes and Gordie is essentially only good in the guard positions. Despite the fact that the 3 spot is nearly a guard on our team, he doesn’t seem so comfortable with it. The problem is that at some point, Dante is going to need to rest. When he does I will need a center and that leaves me two choices, basically, Jack P and David. Both have their pluses and minuses. Jack P is serviceable there, but since he’s inside more he ends up with higher percentage shots (he took a whole lot of shots at our last game). David can man the position better, but then again he can do most things better and so limiting his touches of the ball seems counter productive. Perhaps I’m over thinking the whole thing, as if they’re doing the offense right, which they won’t, even the center is on or near the perimeter a fair amount.

One could make an argument that having David, as point guard, Tom, as the other guard, some combination of Scott and Jack P as forwards, and Dante as center is our best unit. In fact, I would be willing to make that argument. However, I just can’t bring myself to not start Jack M. First, he earned it by how well he played last week. Second, considering how well he played last week, it would have an especially damaging effect on a player who is somewhat delicate to begin with. So Jack gets the start. Further, having Jack bring the ball up means Jack is less likely to take a silly shot when he gets the ball, so it makes sense for him to play point, rather than David who is our best point guard.

As I would like to use Tom more as a guard and less as a 3, I think Scott will get the start as the three, Jack as the 4, and Dante as the five. As I like to remind the team, it’s a long season so I will have time to play around with that. This is one of those times that writing things down has helped to clarify my thoughts. And while it’s perhaps not my favorite starting five, I do think it will be our best starting five.