The girls are smiling, big cheesy smiles with each good play they executed. There The Hub was from the bench saying "good job. Now wipe the smile off your face and get back to work!" As we wrapped up the 3rd period we still had the lead with a nice 11-3 sitting on the board. My sweet Bball Girl took her 4th personal foul way too easily. Despite her dad's screams from the side to back up and just let the opponent make the layup, BBall Girl wasn't having it. There she was charging in, and slam! Catching the foul. Now at the risk of fouling out for the game, we are in the 4th period and The Hub calls a time out. From the opposite of the gym I could see The Hub telling her "stay away from that girl. DO NOT foul out of this game!" Bball Chick shook her head yes. She's got the game plan under control.
We start the 4th quarter and our defense lets the other team catch up. The score is 11-9 and what do you think happens? Bball Chick fouls out. It could have happened in slow motion; we all saw it coming. There she was racing down the court towards the girl with the ball - not her man to defend, mind you - and sure enough charged right at her. The ball was NOT going to go anywhere near the net apparently. So there you go, Bball Girl has fouled out of her first game. Not what the team needed with 40 seconds on the clock and a one basket game. Gulp. Needless to say the grin on my face has turned into more of a stricken look. I'm starting to feel sick and my blood pressure is begging me to just go sit in the car.
The opposing team scores a way-too-easy basket and the score is tied. Overtime it is. Bball Girl is still on the sidelines, looking quite distraught I might add. Two minutes of overtime and we score in the first 30 seconds. Thank goodness. Now if we can just keep them still. Not to be. They answer with a bucket of their own and we are at 13-13. My goodness. I really can't take this kind of pressure. We get all the way down to 6 seconds on the clock and one of our players makes a jumper from way too far away. She misses. They get the ball, dribble down, there's a pass to a chick right under the basket. She shoots, she misses and she shoots again. At the buzzer she scores the game winning basket to end it 13-15. Unbelievable.
I can't wrap up this update without giving a shout out to Black #4. Last year she and Bball Girl were on the same team and they were a dynamic force. She's tall and stocky and plays tough. She would be the girl with the ball that little old Bball Girl was trying to knock off, only to find herself fouled out of the game. When these two get to high school basketball they will be a force to be reckoned with.
But here we are at the buzzer, poor Bball Girl was devastated. I quickly rallied around her to remind her it's just one season of basketball and there will be many more. And, good news (I hope) is the losing team plays again on Saturday against whoever loses the late game playing after us. The look on her face was priceless. "Really mom? I should be happy about that? Loser plays loser. Wow..." I decided to let her have her moment of supreme sadness. I was in shock myself. And The Hub? Well, I knew we were going to have a hard time putting this one to bed. He didn't sleep at all last night, tossed and turned, amidst nightmares of bad passes, missed jumpers and wild layups. This morning again we had to relive the play-by-play of his frustrations and what went wrong. He finally wrapped it up by saying his health couldn't take all this roller coaster riding. "That's it for me," he says, "no more coaching." Yea right. Youngest starts football in August.
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