Daniel's Game

My oldest son (11), though always big and strong for his age, has never found a team sport that he really liked or, to be honest, was very good at.  He loves the water and is a strong swimmer, so he's been off and on our local YMCA swim team.  But he doesn't really like competing, and I have no experience to offer in competitive swimming.  He is very bright and also an excellent musician, so his competitions now consist of 5th-grade quiz-bowl and piano contests.  I'm quite proud of him and, at least with quiz-bowl, can offer him tales from my high school quiz bowl accomplishments.

My younger son (9), however, is more of an athlete than I'll ever be.  He could climb a rope 20 ft by age 5, something I have never been able to do.  We had him in gymnastics for a year or so, just long enough for him to master a back handspring, before he wanted to move to more competitive team sports.  I've always assisted with his team sports, either officially or unofficially, until his YMCA basketball team needed a coach.  This was the first (and likely last) time I've taken on the head coaching duties for my kids' teams.

We were woefully outclassed by every other team--we were a combination of young and not-very-good basketball players.  My son, the oldest and easily most athletically gifted, was by far our best player.  The first game, I have him at point guard, but have no choice but to have him play defense (man-to-man is required in the league) on the opposing big man, who is, I kid you not, a good foot taller.  My son took that challenge and ran with it.  He fought for every rebound, fouled hard when he needed to, got a plethora of floor burns, and took several elbows to the face--and that's all on defense.  On offense he scored all of our points, even though we got easily doubled up in scoring. 

By the end of the game, he was so hyped up, so adrenaline filled, and so emotionally and physically exhausted, that after we got into the pickup to drive home, he just had to cry for a few minutes to let it all out.  This was one of the most intense efforts I've ever seen on the court, and it was by my 9 year old son.  I told him how proud I was of him, and then I said you go ahead and cry.  I was very nearly doing the same myself.