SAN ANTONIO - I need you to indulge me for just a minute for a personal thought. As was the case for many outstanding high school basketball teams who did not quite make it to the state final four, the abrupt end came this week for our family and our team.
My son Landry finished his senior year at San Antonio Christian, bowing out to Houston Westbury in the state quarterfinals. Westbury went on to win the state championship Saturday night.
For years I have loved to cover lots of high school sports, never realizing until now the finality that players and parents feel when it's all over. For those who don't go on to play college ball, it is the end of a long journey that started at the pee wee level and continued through summers of AAU ball, freshman, JV and finally varsity. When it ends you realize that 12 years has gone by in what seems like 12 seconds.
For those of you who have been there, you know the nostalgic feeling that hits you when you realize that little Pop Warner or tee ball kid is long gone -- and a grown man is about to move on to the next phase in life.
For those of you with pee wee players now, take all the pictures you can, write it all down and savor the wins, the losses, and the trips to the burger joints after both. Nothing cures losing like an ice cream cone when they are 9 because when they are 18 it takes a little more.
The end came this week for lots of kids that we have coached or been on teams with and against. Kids like Matt and Chase and David Castaneda at SACS... Wes Miller at Alamo Heights, Sterling Holmes at Antonian, Matt Forey at O'Connor, Grif McHone at Boerne, Taylor Sutlive at Churchill, Luke Wilshire at Johnson and the list goes on and on.
My son has had fantastic coaches along the way from Paul Joseph and Ron Vanlandingham to Mitch and Buck and John Valenzuela.
My boy will never play in the NBA, and he won't get a full ride to play in college, but that wasn't the point. The lessons of discipline, teamwork, commitment, and hard work are what I value most about sport, and I hope it's what he will take with him as he moves on to college.
That and remembering that, boy did we have some fun!
That's my point let's hear yours at
donharris@woaitv.com.
