Highlands Basketball

[Way2serious]

I have to wonder how much more patience the Ft. Thomas faithful are going to have with Coach Flynn. Coach Schlarman left 4 years ago with a 21 win season since then the Bluebirds have won 14, 14, and last year 10. Now they have started out slow losing big a couple of times and now only scoring 35 pts in a game against Betsy Layne??? How tight is the leash getting???

[Jack of all Trades]

What?

 

Go dig back into old threads and you will see the one started by IMSAYS asking what is wrong with Highlands basketball.

[PurplePride92]

:popcorn:

 

 

 

Maybe Betsy Layne is better than you think.

[Way2serious]

Ouch. Just read the old thread from 2010. I guess an outsider like me should just mind his own business.

[Jack of all Trades]

Ouch. Just read the old thread from 2010. I guess an outsider like me should just mind his own business.

 

Or just continue to stir the pot and maybe things will change for the better.

[Qryche11]

They have almost half the wins they had the entire season last yr. I wouldn't panic just yet. However, the Birds ate going to require atleast 40 pts a game from Witte, Turner and Houliston in order to have a chance to win.

 

December is always a frustrating month for Highlands hoops.

 

Shlarman's final season included a lot of Basketball only kids if I recall.

 

As long as every Johnny and Joey suit up for football like the 168 or whatever did this past season, the hoops program will suffer.

[ColdHard]

I know Highlands is a difficult coaching gig due to the success of the football program. Kids in Ft. Thomas do grow up dreaming of playing football, but this is nothing new, and past coaches have made it work. Success breeds success and it works the same way for basketball as it does for football.

 

Right now H has no star basketball only players like they have had in the past when they have been successful. You can go all the way back to the early eighties when Schlarman was a player and find star players complemented by late arriving football guys. Schlarman had Kremer, Malie, Dougherty, and others. Later you had Draud, Glaser, Neltner all supported by football players who came on late. Currently Highlands has maybe 25 points a night on the team from non football players and their next best hope is steady production from Turner, Houlliston, and True, all of whom were playing football until three weeks ago. Now you could argue that if those guys were as committed to basketball as they are to football things would be different, but every one of those guys is a better football player than he is a basketball player and each has the ability to play at the next level on the gridiron. True may play ball in college if he committed to it, but at nowhere near the level that he will for football.

 

My point being that to be successful at H a coach is going to have to have one or two star calibre pure basketball players to build the program around each year. I am not talking all state guys, just top 10 in their district with one of them maybe being top 10 in the region. They don't have that right now. You can shorten the leash on the coach, draw it all the way in, or put it on a different dog, problem is still the same.

 

The real culprit is middle school basketball where the approach to development is a complete opposite of what takes place in football in Ft. Thomas. Beginning in sixth grade kids try out for the one middle school team. As many as 70 kids have shown up for these try outs and in the end 15 kids max are left playing round ball. Seventh grade is lucky to get thirty kids try out, and by eighth grade it's down to twenty. Nearly every year two of those spots are taken by the big tall thick kid who everyone knows has no future in basketball beyond freshman year, but he makes the team better now. (His real future Is as an offensive lineman but the basketball helps him keep his weight down and work on his footwork.) In effect a dozen 12 year olds are chosen and the basketball fortunes of the school are on them, knowing that more than half of them will choose to play football as well.

 

What happens to the kids who get cut? The answer is that you will find them in the FTJFL where they are welcome with open arms until they are handed off to the freshman coaches. Is there such an option for basketball? A school league, a city league an Armory league? No. Unless you hold this coach responsible for those conditions you need to give him his leash and hope he can do something with the hand he was dealt.

[Qryche11]

I know Highlands is a difficult coaching gig due to the success of the football program. Kids in Ft. Thomas do grow up dreaming of playing football, but this is nothing new, and past coaches have made it work. Success breeds success and it works the same way for basketball as it does for football.

 

Right now H has no star basketball only players like they have had in the past when they have been successful. You can go all the way back to the early eighties when Schlarman was a player and find star players complemented by late arriving football guys. Schlarman had Kremer, Malie, Dougherty, and others. Later you had Draud, Glaser, Neltner all supported by football players who came on late. Currently Highlands has maybe 25 points a night on the team from non football players and their next best hope is steady production from Turner, Houlliston, and True, all of whom were playing football until three weeks ago. Now you could argue that if those guys were as committed to basketball as they are to football things would be different, but every one of those guys is a better football player than he is a basketball player and each has the ability to play at the next level on the gridiron. True may play ball in college if he committed to it, but at nowhere near the level that he will for football.

 

My point being that to be successful at H a coach is going to have to have one or two star calibre pure basketball players to build the program around each year. I am not talking all state guys, just top 10 in their district with one of them maybe being top 10 in the region. They don't have that right now. You can shorten the leash on the coach, draw it all the way in, or put it on a different dog, problem is still the same.

 

The real culprit is middle school basketball where the approach to development is a complete opposite of what takes place in football in Ft. Thomas. Beginning in sixth grade kids try out for the one middle school team. As many as 70 kids have shown up for these try outs and in the end 15 kids max are left playing round ball. Seventh grade is lucky to get thirty kids try out, and by eighth grade it's down to twenty. Nearly every year two of those spots are taken by the big tall thick kid who everyone knows has no future in basketball beyond freshman year, but he makes the team better now. (His real future Is as an offensive lineman but the basketball helps him keep his weight down and work on his footwork.) In effect a dozen 12 year olds are chosen and the basketball fortunes of the school are on them, knowing that more than half of them will choose to play football as well.

 

What happens to the kids who get cut? The answer is that you will find them in the FTJFL where they are welcome with open arms until they are handed off to the freshman coaches. Is there such an option for basketball? A school league, a city league an Armory league? No. Unless you hold this coach responsible for those conditions you need to give him his leash and hope he can do something with the hand he was dealt.

 

 

Good points in some areas but a feeder system for hoops will never happen IMO. If you want to get better in hoops you have to do these things.

 

1. Practice individually on your skills such as shooting, ballhandling, etc.

2. Seek out an AAU team either from other area or with local group to get the proper competition needed to get better.

3. Commit yourself to getting better and wanting to get better.

 

Playing in a local feeder system keeps kids interested but doesn't always make them better.

 

You have to truly love the game to want to commit yourself to the things I mentioned above.

 

The football program and recent success with repetitious state championships has created almost a cult-like atmosphere in this city. Kids are putting down the basketball and not refining there game because football is the year round sport now that is nice enough to rent the football/basketball guys out 3 weekends in June until the dead period. It is what it is and you can blame football, coaches, whatever but in the end the kids have to want to get better and put in the time.

 

Not every kid wants to do this in today's society. You have a lot of technology to compete against, social schedules, etc. It's not like it wad back in my day when I would be so bored I would take my ball to the park and play for hours both individually and against older kids. You just don't see it.

[Clyde]

One thing that would certainly help the cause is a more exciting style of ball. The last time I was excited about watching HHS ball was when JLo/Smith played.

 

You know going into a HHS game you're probably seeing a game in the 40s and maybe 50s. Kids do not get excited to play such a style. It's one thing if it leads to consistent winning but when it doesn't you don't get kids who want to play.

[mcpapa]

^ So is that on the coach?

[spindoc]

Coach Flynn's teams were very similar in Ashland.

[mcpapa]

To clarify - is that the coach's philosophy, or is that style of play dictated by the players' talent/skill sets?

[spindoc]

To clarify - is that the coach's philosophy, or is that style of play dictated by the players' talent/skill sets?

I can't speak for the Highlands tenure, but when at Ashland, he was fairly deliberate. Many times it served them well.

[FTBIGBIRD]

I haven't seen many games but watching him scream the way he does can't help these kids or his blood pressure! If you constantly scream at kids through my experience coaching eventually they tune it out like white noise. I think it's time to get someone involved with the program that has a Dale Mueller type personality. A positive spin to draw more kids.

[ColonelCrazy]

You know going into a HHS game you're probably seeing a game in the 40s and maybe 50s.

 

Or if it's girls basketball, perhaps in the single-digits.