5 - 0 on Mother's Day Weekend

It was a big sports weekend for my daughter Lizzie. In addition to playing spring soccer with the WYSL U14 Travel team, she is playing AAU basketball with the Westchester Hoopers. The Hoopers entered a tournament in Queens, NY -- their first and second rounds were played on Saturday in Jamaica, with the finals schedule for Sunday afternoon in Rosedale. This meant Lizzie had soccer practice on Saturday morning and then had to rush to make it to Queens in time for the first basketball game.

I was returning from a business trip to Houston on Saturday and landed at LaGuardia around 1pm. My cell phone received a text as we were taxiing into the gate: "First game 48 - 22. We won. Lizzie played great!" The car service driver met me at the curb for the 20 minute drive to Jamaica -- the next game started at 2pm. I arrived around 1:30pm to find the girls lounging in front of the church taking in the beautiful sunshine. The afternoon game was a rough one. A lot of pushing shoving and hard fouls. Our girls never backed down and won the game by 17 points. By Saturday evening, she was 2 - 0.

Our soccer game on Sunday morning was against Rye. It was Mother's Day and many of the moms were none too happy to have a game scheduled on their special day, but there was nothing we could do but to make it a worthwhile experience for them by winning. The team had been in a bit of a scoring slump, having scored only 1 goal in their previous 3 games. Karl had worked exclusively on scoring in practice. The Armonk Angels won the game 3 - 0 and Lizzie scored all three goals. She worked hard, put herself in good positions and the ball just went her way. What a start to Mother's Day!!

The semi-final basketball game started at 3pm in Rosedale, NY in a tiny gym with room for chairs only on one side and also at the end up on a stage. Shortly after the start of the game, it became obvious the referees were in the tank for the home team. We were literally playing 7 on 5, but our girls were relentless and never lost composure. We led the entire game and, in spite of the refs, beat them by 12. On to the finals at 7pm against the Royals. We went out to a diner for some dinner and rest. When we returned, the tournament director apologized and informed us that she had gotten rid of the two early refs due to there terrible officiating. By the start of the game, the gym was packed and, other than the 9 parents and our players, everyone was cheering for the home team. The refs were completely balanced, but the competition was much better and we led by only 8 at halftime. We stretched the lead to 10 with about five minutes to go, but then the Royals started a comeback. With 3 minutes to go, we led by 5. Then with 2 minutes to go, we're up by 3 with the ball and get it to our best player in the low post, but her shot rims out. The Royals race the ball to the other end and one of their guards let fly a monster 3-pointer -- I'm talking an NBA-type 3 -- and it's nothing but net!! Game tied with 1:05 left.

The crowd goes crazy and rushes onto the court in their excitement. The clock is still running on the made shot, but our girls can't inbound the ball because of all the people on the court. The refs stop the game, clear the court, reset the clock, but now the Royals are able to set up their full court trap. We inbound the ball to our point guard Ashley who passed up to the 3, Alia, who moves the ball across half court and gets fouled on the dribble. We are in the double-bonus, so Alia gets two free throws to break the tie; there are 42 seconds on the clock. Alia is our youngest player -- she is only 11 playing with 14 year-olds because she such a good athlete she dominates in her age group. So here is this 11 year old with a chance to break the tie with two free throws and the crowd is heckling her mercilessly. She misses her first shot which sends the crowd into a frenzy! Calmly, Alia steps up and hits her second shot. We're up by 1 point.

We press on the inbound play and their point guard tries to split our defenders at half-court but Alia steals the ball!! She passes to Ashley breaking down the right wing who drives for the layup but is fouled hard by a Royals defender and goes to the line to shoot two shots with 25 seconds on the clock. Ashley is a wonderful foul shooter and in spite of an apoplectic crowd, she makes them both. We're up by 3. The Royals inbound the ball, our press makes it difficult for them to get the ball up court and they don't even get a shot off. WE WIN BY 3. The crowd goes silent and I think we might need to hurry out of town. However, the host team was gracious and congratulated us as did most everyone in the crowd as we left the gym. I am very proud of how well these girls played in hostile circumstances and winning the tournament was a fantastic. Lizzie went 5 - 0 for the weekend -- Happy Mother's Day!