Game summary - OJR

Well at least we did not get shutout. They did score a bucket full of goals.
My wonderful wife of 28 years came to watch the game yesterday. She has seen many of the SPX games in my 9 years here. This was her first view of us this year. She was appalled at the way we played. That is putting it mildly.
Her answer was simple:
OJR came to play - we did not. TRUE.
OJR wanted the ball - we did not. TRUE.
She also said that she saw only a few players that were playing hard. She could not believe the number of times that we jogged to a ball and of course we got beat.
She asked "Why do they do that?"
She thought that the referee was going to eject me when I asked the bench "Does anyone want to give me 100% when they play today? Is anyone ready to play that way?"
She was stunned that the bench just looked and no one responded.
Well - yes one did respond. Eggplant (O'Conner).
A freshmen JV player.
He had the guts to say "yes coach, I'll play".
A freshmen, a JV player that was the ball boy at the time.
And play he did. Duckey (DeLeo) give him his varsity jersey and Eggplant went in as a defender.
Yes - he made some mistakes, but you know what? He played his little heart out and ran hard every play. He did a good job. Thank you O'Conner. Nice job. I'll remember that.
Wow.
Imagine that for a minute if you will. Draw that mental picture.

I moved a JV player up to varsity permanently yesterday - DeGregorio. Ball skills are not the best - but he tries his hardest on just about every play.
He plays with desire.
Another freshmen.

I moved another JV player player up about 10 days ago - Sein-Lwin. Good player. Nice shooting skills. Needed confidence. Backed away from larger players. Guess what he fixed and now gets a good amount of playing time. He is in my top 4 go-to players when I need one. Sure he makes mistakes and is learning to play his POSITION.
He plays with desire.
He is a freshmen. Loves the game.

One more thought .... ah.... Question.

How come no one listens when a sophomore talks? Talks on the field?
Please help me understand why no one listens to him and does what he he tells you to do. He is absolutely correct most of the time.
Is anyone else taking a leadership role on the field?
This same player (Reilly) tries to do it all, gets tired and then starts doing cheap stuff like playing the body instead of the ball. Reilly - this cheap part has got to stop too.
He is trying to do it all. Is anyone helping him?
When are we going to start playing with heart? Desire?

District play is fading away.........

Players of the day: Venezia, Sein-Lwin. Honorable mention: Strawley (for being honest about the way he was playing), Reilly (mr. cheap) and Kelly(for the 2 assists). Thumbs up to DeGregorio and O'Conner (No O'Conner your not varsity yet).
L 7-2. Game grade F. Overall record: 2-6. pac10: 1-5. We are at the halfway mark for the season.

JV Game:
Not bad. Need support in every sense of the word - meaning there is just about none.
Most of the players truly played with desire. The effort was there.
Some players held the ball too long (Chesney). Others seems to want to get rid of it quickly (Copley).
Please get the arms out and use them for balance and space. (Gama, Syrylo, Nester, Schival)
Thumbs up to Logue, Rapp, DiDonato and I have to learn how to slide Shoemaker.