Carmen on the Court

By Bob Howitt

From a front row seat, I saw every regular season loss unfold. The mixed pre-season record proved to have no positive bearing; in fact, it might have fed a positivity which was delusional. The unique writing style for the games of both this year and the preceding season reflects the fact that the initial audience was a single individual on the team and there was no desire to otherwise publicize the writer’s written thoughts. That person has given permission to publish this book. In all likelihood, she had previously shared some of the write-ups with certain teammates and the coach had become aware of my thoughts.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Bob Howitt
• Release date: Apr 21, 2024
• ISBN: 9798224780914

Bob Howitt

Bob has had a varied career: partner of a respected Wall Street firm, Executive-Director of a well-known youth agency, initial funder of what became Uncommon Schools, board member of a longstanding non-profit organization, and leadership of the WKBJ Foundation. WKBJ has assisted over 250 financially challenged young people to attend college. The diversity of both his books and the subject matter of his essays is indicative of the breadth and depth of his interests.

Book preview

Part One

The Lost Season

Introduction

The year 2021-22 saw me getting my journalistic feet wet trying to understand the Centenary University women's basketball team and its dynamics, while recognizing that some players would be departing and there would be replacement recruits for the following campaign.

Previously published, The Lost Season chronicled the debacle known as 2022-23 and additionally included write-ups from the preceding year. From a front row seat, I saw every regular season loss unfold. The mixed pre-season record proved to have no positive bearing; in fact, it might have fed a positivity which was delusional. The unique writing style for the games of both this year and the preceding season reflects the fact that the initial audience was a single individual on the team and there was no desire to otherwise publicize the writer’s written thoughts. That person has given permission to publish this book. In all likelihood, she had previously shared some of the write-ups with certain teammates and the coach had become aware of my thoughts.

Centenary 62—59 John Jay

October 31, 2021

In the first quarter, #3 asserted herself offensively, helped by finally being positioned down low, with her back to the basket. She made a conventional and a reverse layup from that area on the court, plus a jumper from along the baseline.

Shortly after she made a well-designed home run pass to break a press, she apparently was showing some blood so needed to get bandaged. CU pressed the pressers, typically a good strategy. On the negative side, too many out-of-bounds passes by CU go to a teammate in the corner, where the boundary line acts as an additional defender. In addition, everybody still needs to look up and to remember that a pass is faster than a dribble.

This writer believes that when CU’s big center and #3 are low calling for the ball, it should always go to the latter as she can either make a move or a productive pass. The former does not have good hands and is not a skilled passer either. Her advantage is purely size.

A nifty pass by #3 led to a missed layup attempt and two free throws. When the second one was missed, #3 grabbed the rebound and put it back up for a bucket.

A contested left-hand layup off a breakaway steal was missed by #3, who may have been looking for a foul call. She probably should have stopped quickly near the hoop and gone up. After a missed jumper, the half-time score was 35-30.

John Jay is an urban school and it showed in terms of their players’ grittiness and a willingness to be physical; several of them also carried the ball when dribbling, also a city trait.

#3 for CU seems almost too quick in her movements for there to be a foul called on her opponent.

In the third quarter, she had a missed jumper and a missed layup, plus a make of a contested layup. She mishandled one pass because she was mentally already re-passing the ball to an open teammate.

The third quarter ended 50-47.

For John Jay, #14 was the best player; when, in the fourth quarter, she hit two straight jumpers from the top of the key, the CU coach lifted #3, reportedly told her she was not playing good defense and sent her to the end of the bench. Very childishly, the coach did not speak to #3 for the rest of the game. Showing equal peevishness, #3 sat four empty seats away from her teammates.

This scenario was difficult to comprehend, given that #3 is a starter and is entrusted with taking the ball out, which means she is entrusted by the coach with making decisions.

CU hung on for a 62-59 victory; to a certain extent they were lucky as John Jay had at least ten close shots which rimmed out.

Ramapo 86—53 Centenary

November 13, 2021

Some people put little weight in how a team looks warming up. Being located at R’s end of the floor, I could not help but notice that they seemed to be good shooters.

I was not exactly surprised therefore when R quickly jumped out to a 5-0 lead, then extended it to 10-2. CU’s #3 hit a driving left-handed layup off a break, but that burst of energy and overall team effectiveness was not maintained.

Instead it was some missed shots by R that enabled C to close the quarter down by only a point, 17-16. In the second quarter, C’s defense fell apart completely; when person A had lost contact with their opponent, the latter was left free—nobody shifted to take the open shooter. R went on a 15-0 run.

The half ended at 40-20, with R outscoring C by 23-4 in the second quarter.

It was evident in the second ten minutes that R had multiple advantages: the fastest player (#15), the tallest player (#33, 6’1"); it had more shooters, more athletic players, and was better coached by far.

The misery for C continued in the third quarter, which ended with R up 63-34. C’s #3 was removed with about seven minutes left in the period and never returned to the game. On the one hand, this seemed inexplicable, a starter lifted that early—but maybe, at least theoretically, without saying so, the coach knew the game was over and gave #3 a break by sitting her. The body language was not good for sure.

Throughout the contest, R drove to the hoop, created contact, got foul calls and made free throws.

In the fourth quarter, C’s coach put in some little-used players, who responded with energy, but there never was a chance to really close the huge gap on the scoreboard.

A whole bunch of fundamental thoughts occurred to the writer:

It is not only the direct pass which leads to a basket that is an assist, so is the pass which precedes the direct pass. This is referred to as a hockey assist.

A pass is faster than dribbling. Cross-court passes at the top of the key are high risk.

On defense, the rule is see your man, see the ball.

After a few minutes, a team should always be able to identify the shooters and pay extra attention.

When #3 is down low calling for the ball or the C center is doing so, the ball should go inside, with the recipient making a quick decision, turn and go to the hoop, thus drawing a second defender in all likelihood—which leaves somebody open-- or pass the ball back out. Often the very next pass in that event should go right back inside.

Passing is a function of the right person, the right place, and the right time. Simply passing the ball around the perimeter accomplishes very little.

On offense, if a player is making a move off the dribble, their teammate should not bring their defender into the relevant space on the court. Give the initiator of the move room.

C still does not have good out-of-bounds plays.

C’s #11 implicitly has little confidence in her teammates, continuously over-dribbling. The fact that she is gutsy and aggressive and a good long-range shooter when truly open are not offsetting positives. In contrast, C’s #3 seems to have too much confidence in her teammates, passing excessively as opposed to making a move of her own.

#4 for C demonstrated an above-average degree of athleticism; she deserved more playing time.

The quarterly recap is as follows:

17-16

23-4

23-14

23-19

86-53

This shows impressive consistency by R, reflecting the characteristic listed above, especially the number of shooters they had on the floor or coming off the bench.

If one wanted to be optimistic about C, deleting the second quarter means a loss, but not a bad one:

Ramapo: 63 to Centenary: 49.

Centenary 56—48 Cairn

November 16, 2021

Number three for CU was back on the floor and presumably not in purgatory. When she was removed in the first quarter with three minutes to go, she sat with the coaches, not at the end of the bench.

Throughout the game, she demonstrated her ability to collect far more rebounds than a 5’8" player should be able to get: positioning, intelligence, commitment, and desire make this happen. Moreover, she is the only player making productive passes off the dribble. Twice, particularly long such passes led to layups by teammates.

Perhaps because of the absence of CU’s big center due to injury, there was more of a flow to the team’s offense. #11 had somewhat reduced her dribbling, #4 was demonstrating her athleticism and energy, and #21 was being opened up for some good shots.

Cairn, a much smaller school, had a fair amount of discipline in its offense and was able to exploit some apparent uncertainty by CU as to what type of defense they were playing: zone, man-to-man, or a zone with man-to-man principles. The result was that Cairn ultimately was able to stay in the game when the score differential should have been significantly greater.

Quarter one ended 12-9, but by halftime, Cairn was up 27-25, having outscored CU 18-13 in quarter two.

Whatever transpired during the break, CU came out more energized. Both #3 and #4 went to the hoop, using nifty fakes or excellent cuts in doing so. One great sequence was #3 getting the rebound, speed dribbling and making a perfect pass to #4. Another assist by the former to the latter came on an end-line out of bounds play where both players caught Cairn sleeping.

Quarter three was a 19-5 run by CU, leaving them up 44-32, and perhaps thinking that the game was over. It was not. Little things went awry, like a turnover by #3 when she mishandled a pass, probably because mentally she was already making the next pass. On another occasion, she was stripped from the blindside as she went for a layup.

Cairn made open shots and closed to within five points, but ultimately lost by eight, having outscored CU 16-12 in the final ten minutes.

With the game basically decided, a Cairn player committed a hard and senseless foul that knocked #3 to the floor. She offered her hand to a glaring #3, who elected instead to take the hand of a teammate. If looks could kill, the Cairn player would have been pushing up daisies.

Some on-going thoughts:

When contact is coming, particularly on a drive to the hoop, the offensive player should be the aggressor, inflict the greater contact—because the foul is already about to be committed by the defender and the shooter wants to get the hoop for an And-1. Twice, on coast-to-coast driving layups, the minimal contact by the defender was not called and #3’s shot attempt was missed.

When getting an offensive rebound, the first look should be at the hoop, not passing it out —unless there is a teammate clearly open for a good shot. (#3 did the quick look at the basket in the second half, took the hit and got a nice bucket plus a free throw.)

CU still has not displayed good plays for sideline out-of-bounds passes. For example, many teams use the stacked player approach to such situations, but nobody puts the stack so close to the sideline that every defender has the opportunity to attack the ball recipient. The better idea is that the stack is well away from the line so that when the stack bursts apart, there are some relatively clear passing lanes.

CU needs to work on its entry passing to whoever is down low. The pass must be forceful; a slow pass enables other defenders to crowd the area. At times, it should be a bounce pass. When the down low person receives the pass and throws it back out, the recipient should think about sending it right back to the former; often the defender relaxes slightly when the pass goes out, so a pass coming right back in and the receiver making a quick first step can be a productive play.

Centenary 64—53 Valley Forge

November 23, 2021

A winding road through the hills north of Philadelphia took this writer to the campus of the University of Valley Forge. UVF is a Christian school, even if the descriptor Christian is no