STRAIGHT FROM THE PARENT’S MOUTH – BALANCE IS THE KEY by Elizabeth Kelly
There is no doubt Lila’s skills and knowledge of the game can be directly attributed to nearly a decade in this wonderful Stealers program, but what has mattered infinitely more to us is how her Stealers’ journey has shaped her character and significantly impacted who she has become as a person. Lila began with Stealers as a timid 4th grader, so nervous stepping onto the basketball court that she complained of stomach aches before practices and games. We knew she loved the game, but her “stomach ache anxiety” was so bad at times we could not even convince her to play. The high school senior she is today is nearly unrecognizable: she is energized by pressure, unfazed by intensity, and inspired by coaches—of any sport—shouting in her face. She meets it all with a steady calm, a fierce independence, and a quiet confidence in the decisions she makes both on and off the court. I have four other kids, each of whom has played many other sports in various programs. No other experience has had such a profound impact on one of my children as Stealers has had on Lila.
Early Adversity:
In those early days, I remember her team would get absolutely obliterated. I’m talking about 30-40-50 point losses. She’d get into the car and say, “Coach R was so proud of us that we kept on trying until the end.” or “Coach R thinks that was a great experience for us.” As a parent, I have found there is so much value when the emphasis is not just on winning. If our kids experience rainbows and sunshine every day, what will happen to them when life gets hard? I remember the excitement of those first couple of years when Lila would say, “We only lost by 10!!!” The growth itself was the focus. That became the win.
Playing Up:
Thanks to her height, she got to play up a bit in 6th grade. For her, the opportunity to play with the “big girls” felt like she’d won the lottery. Coach R would throw her in for a few minutes, and I remember the other girls celebrating her and treating her like a legitimate part of the team. There is nothing on this earth that can boost a young girl’s confidence more than this kind of experience. As we all know, “playing up” at any level means facing competition that is better, faster, and always much more physical—for her, these experiences became a powerful catalyst for learning, resilience, and growth. The anxiety dissipated and was fully replaced by a desire to compete.
Balance:
There are so many programs where the focus is strictly on basketball. Coach R manages to “teach the game” with the absolute best of them, but he places just as much emphasis on the development of the whole person. In other programs absences are punished and the program must come first. Coach R essentially operates in an opposite manner, specifically telling his players that school sports come first, make practice if you can but there have been no punishments or negative impact if Lila had other commitments. This has been imperative for her. Lila is a lover of many sports and this has allowed her to play 3 sports in high school along with being highly engaged academically and enjoying other hobbies like year round fishing. I’ll speak for Lila and say her true love is basketball, but lacrosse, golf, fishing and the occasional game of tennis are incredibly important to her in their own ways. As a parent it has been a beautiful thing to watch her cultivate all of these interests. The concept of balance too often gets lost in what has become our youth sports culture, “i.e. as early as possible, specialize in one sport and obsess over it.” As parents, we have to step back and ask ourselves along the way: is this really the right thing for my child right now? And don’t get me wrong, for some kids that mentality is the perfect fit. And this route is possible within the Stealers community! In this program there is no one-size-fits-all, Coach R offers and facilitates so many paths. But for Lila a laser focus on basketball alone was not the answer. There would have been so much lost. She has the type of personality where she wants to do it all, and Stealers has shown her that she can. And Coach R has been highly supportive of her approach throughout the years.
One more word on balance – there is a bittersweet parent exercise where you close your eyes and imagine your child in the later years of their lives long after you are gone. Ask yourself, what hobbies will bring them joy in those years? For many of us, the best time to experiment and discover those interests is in childhood.
Choosing a college:
Lila was honored to receive a number of Division I offers over the course of high school. She thought long and hard about some of these wonderful coaches, teams, and programs, but she kept coming back to her desire for balance. She decided on a few hard stops: she wants to be highly challenged academically, to love her chosen college if basketball were to disappear, to compete hard during her basketball season, and to continue her other hobbies and sports outside of basketball season. She has just committed to play basketball at Washington and Lee University, a Division III school, and she could not be happier. In her words, “Stealers has been such a wonderful fit for me that I was able to envision and look for that exact same fit for college.” As a parent, nothing could make me happier.
The Stealers Community:
We all know Coach R has fostered a program that extends well beyond his players. His few but clear instructions to parents (don’t coach from the sidelines, cheer them on, and otherwise be nice, etc!) have created such a healthy parent community. In other settings, I’ve seen such embarrassing adult behavior—I know we all have. I have never seen this sort of thing from a Stealers parent. Because of Coach R, the program continues to attract the nicest of families. The ending of Lila’s last tournament had me in tears—it was a Louisville Run 4 Roses tournament WIN in July, for the record :)—but the emotions for me went far beyond the victory. I feel such sadness knowing this chapter of Lila’s life is coming to a close, and knowing that my own time on the sidelines alongside these wonderful families is ending, too.
