Lake City Basketball has gotten off to a better-than-expected start.
Organizers were surprised when 120 signed up and administrator Blair Haddrell said it’s fantastic.
“It just shows that there was a need for it. That kids want to do it,” said Haddrell.
The players have responded well to coaching by working hard and have shown skill, said Haddrell. He has seen some good kids in the camp and said coaches have focused on the fundamentals. They want to improve the talent so they can compete with others.
Darsh Sidhu, coach of the U15 boys, was happy with how things were going with his group of 12.
“When you put them in the competition, when you put them against people they want to play, you can see it in their eyes they want to get better,” said Sidhu.
Chris Terris, co-director of Lake City Basketball with Dustin Hyde, said in the initial stages of the program they put on sessions with drills and scrimmages, which allowed the players to “showcase” their abilities.
Coaches had team lists on which they took notes. The information was shared and discussed with the coaches for each team, who will ultimately make the roster decisions. Players who weren’t selected for teams were asked to be alternate players allowing them to practice with teams, but not play in tournaments or games.
“We’ve told the kids, this may mean that even though they have the ability to play on the higher level team, rather than being the fourth or fifth option on the top team, we feel he or she may benefit from being the first or second option on the development team,” said Terris. “Another example may be with regards to positions: in other words, rather than being the third point guard or post on the higher level team, he or she would develop more as the first option at that position on the lower level team.”
The U13 girls team was the first squad to play a game. They defeated the Schooners 23-22 in Kelowna Minor Basketball Association play. Kayci Loewen led Lake City with eight points, while Sophie Brooke had four.
“As a team, the girls head manned the ball really well leading to a number of really nice fast break opportunities,” said coach Laurie Hudson. “Defensively, we’ve got some work to do. We’ll be focusing on boxing out and forcing opponents to their weak hand.”
On Wednesday, the U15 and U17 girls are taking on the UBC-O Heat at Pen High at 4:30 p.m., 5:45 p.m. and 7 p.m.
Lake City Basketball, a not-for-profit venture, is seeking local businesses who may be interested in their “Sponsor an Athlete” program as a few families have expressed interest but their participation has been limited because of costs. Businesses interested in getting involved are asked to contact lake.city.hoops@gmail.com.
Free throws: When asked about the name of the program, Hyde said they wanted something unique.
“We wanted something that kind of reflected the geographical area of Penticton. We were just throwing ideas out. We wanted something that would reflect Penticton as a beautiful city with lots of lakes. Have some basketball mantra in it.”
