Cassidy Christmas Eve

Today was our big christmas eve bash with the Cassidy side of the family at my parents house. So that meant we had roughly 25 people over to the house. Each year it seems more and more little babies show up, most of whom i don’t really know there names. I guess i should pay attention more when my mom tells me who had babies. That’s a lie really, i know them all, but it’s usually only once a year i see them…so remembering names can be tricky, especially when they look a year older. 

Anyway, the Cassidy side of the family is very Irish Catholic and has deep roots in chicago. Stories are always told of distant relatives bootlegging or even being involved in the mob….which who knows if any of that’s actually true. But it’s fun to imagine being related to interesting characters, trying to learn what your family history really is and so forth. The same stories are told year after year, but each year becoming more exaggerated for effect.  

Generally our family gatherings consist of lots of drinking and lots of small talk, and then live music being played by my brother and a few cousins towards the end. Today was no different. There was a lot of alcohol consumed by both the men and women and then for those of us who were still left at the end, some good live music to enjoy. Overall it was a good time, and I ate way too much food. 

Tomorrow is Christmas day 2008. Amazingly enough, i am the only one of the 4 kids who will be waking up at my parents house on Christmas morning. Last year it was probably the complete opposite, considering I was in Arizona. But this year the siblings all have significant others who require them to be elsewhere, so that leaves me to open all the presents by myself. I’ll get to learn what it’s like to be an only child on Christmas day (that’s not true either, we all already opened presents today before they all left). 

So year after year, as the family dynamics change, Christmas changes. It’s no longer big sis waking us all up at 5am to see what Santa brought. Instead it’s whoever isn’t being pulled away with other obligations, that might role out of bed by 9am. Times have changed.  I’m just glad to be able to wake up on christmas morning at my parents house for the first time in a few years. But hopefully next year I will have other obligations with a female that might require me elsewhere! I’ll let you know.

-15 wind chill

Phoenix Nick is in town for the holidays and invited me to play basketball today. So i agreed and played. It was -15 degree wind chill today in Indiana, so getting lo0se to play basketball in a cold gym wasn’t exactly easy. Actually after playing about 5 games, i don’t think i ever did get loose!

I hadn’t played a real pick-up basketball game in at least a year, maybe longer. Fortunately I am in halfway decent shape from jogging, but my body isn’t used to jumping up and down a lot, as well as sliding side to side playing defense or running sprints up and down the court. Needless to say, by the time i arrived home from the short 5 minute car ride from the gym, I was already sore. But it feels good to be sore, because I know i got a good workout. I need to start playing more ball, because it’s too cold to run outside.

My basketball skills aren’t exactly close to being sharp at this point. Fortunately I realize this, so I try to do as little as possible on the court to hurt my team. This includes dribbling and shooting. And  I won’t even mention defense, because that left me about 5 years ago. Luckily I can still pass the ball halfway effectively, so that is what I try to do. It’s more of a mental thing than a physical thing which is why i can still do it. 

Unfortunately, i think i aggravated my neck issue again at some point while playing, and it is sore and stiff as can be now. So this probably means i get to lose some more sleep this week until it gets better. Oh the joys of getting old!

If Your Going…..

Just went to Lowe’s to buy some home improvement products and it was basically driving on ice. It’s been freezing rain all afternoon and evening, and it’s pretty nasty. I hate this weather. 

This is the first year ever where i kinda wish christmas wasn’t coming up so soon. I think it would be better if christmas didn’t happen for another 3 months or so. I’m sure i’m not the only one feeling this way right now. I haven’t even been thinking about christmas one bit. Kinda ignoring it up to this point. It’s just not a good time this year. Hopefully i’m not saying that next year at this time.

Spent some time in SF over the weekend. I’m a big fan of the city. Got to use a nice Canon EOS 40D camera for the first time. So i was excited to try it out and take some pictures. Here are some of my favorites that i ended up taking.

Response to JD’s question regarding Class Basketball in Indiana

From my previous post regarding Indiana High School Basketball atmosphere, particularly a Columbus North High School game I recently attended, former CN basketball star JD had a question:

JD Says:
December 10, 2008 at 12:09 pm e

“That is such a depressing atmosphere. Was the band just taking a game off, or do you think that is standard now? And I thought the regular season crowds were pretty bad when I played. At least you could identify the location of the student section back then.

I think I’m gonna need you to go to two or three class a/2a schools to check the atmospheres there before i blame class basketball for the lack of interest.”

From what i’ve seen in my own experiences, I think the small school atmosphere has gotten better since class basketball. You have some big name coaches with big school experience going to smaller schools winning championships. Tournament games are more important to them because now they have a chance to get out of there sectional. So in that respect class basketball has been good. However, nothing has really changed for the big schools because they still have to beat the other big schools to advance, other than it is now more difficult to get out of a sectional. Sometimes a state championship caliber team in Indianapolis might get beat in there Sectional, because they have to face another great team right away. And now what i find interesting is you now have smaller schools who are beating the bigger schools in the regular season because so many of the good coaches are staying or moving to the smaller schools and developing good programs. Why coach at a 4A school and struggle to get out of a sectional when you can coach a 1A or 2a school and build a dominate program because of your coaching ablility(example Basil Mawbey, Lewis Cass) . He knew what he was doing when he left Kokomo!

If it were up to me, I would go to 2 classes. It’s not football, you only need 5 guys on each team to play. Coaching is such a huge part of the success of a high school basketball team, that small schools with good coaches can still be very competitive with big schools. With 2 classes you allow the better teams more of a chance to advance through the tournament. Then, it comes down to a final game between a small school and a large school for the State championship. Would this not be better drama than 4 seperate state title games? Plus it still gives the smaller school a chance to slay Goliath at the end, but an easier path to get there than 1 single class. How would this be a bad idea? As far as atmosphere goes, I think you have to put that on the school.

Basketball is a form of entertainment. When your team isn’t very good, you need to still have created a good enough atmosphere to keep people coming to games. Just ask the Indiana Pacers marketing department because they have sucked for a while! Having gone to so many different high school basketball games, you see how different each experience really is. Imagine if a school created a Duke-like student section. Would that not improve the quality of an entire basketball program? Tri-Central did that and it was great going to games there. Hell, Norths gym is almost the exact same dimensions and size of Duke’s gym. Just needs a little student organizing and administration organization to do something like that. I would want to be at every game. So would opposing teams fans when they travel. 

Coach Speer did return and email and told me that the new athletic director understood that changes needed made and was even meeting with the Pacers to try and get some things done. Coach Speer also mentioned that the band is normally there, just not on that night due to another commitment. So those are positive things.

Remember when it was fun?

 I went to a local high school basketball game saturday night with one of my good buddies and former high school teammate at Kokomo. I wanted to show him the gym i lived in and played ball in high school my freshman and sophomore years before I moved to Kokomo for my junior and senior year in 1996. I was excited to show him Memorial Gym at Columbus North because I spent much of my childhood there, as well as it being one of the best high school gyms in the country. My dad worked for the high school, so I was fortunate enough to have access to the gym just about as much as I wanted. I’ve shot more baskets at Columbus North than any other gym, because I had been doing so since 5th grade. It’s where Dr. Copper showed me the proper way to shoot, ridding me of an ugly shooting form I developed when I was young. I even carved my initials on the top row of the gym with my 6th grade girlfriend when I was 12.

My buddy and I both played at Kokomo High School, myself just junior and senior year after my family moved there from Columbus. Our high school gym in Kokomo (also called Memorial Gymnasium) is a great old gym, and nearly as large as the Columbus North gym. I believe kokomo seats about 5500 people, and Columbus North seats around 7000 people. At Kokomo, we typically played in front of very good crowds which made the gym seem much larger. I would estimate that we averaged close to 3,000 people at each home game when I played, with some games (Batesville, Anderson, Marion, North Central) being close to 5000. The fans were very fanatical about Kokomo basketball and still are for the most part, both boys and girls, and for good reason. A lot of good players and teams have come from Kokomo and the county basketball scene is generally very good. The school provides a great atmosphere to watch a game.

I played varsity as a sophomore in Columbus, and my team was pretty bad. It was a lot of fun though as it was Coach Stearman’s last year of coaching.  I think our record was something like 4-18. Coach Stearman had already been inducted to the Indiana High School Basketball Hall of Fame, as he had gained over 700 victories. It was a privledge to play for Coach Stearman, something I will never forget. We even had news organizations such as CNN showing up to our practices to document his final season.  He even wrote me a letter after my family had moved. It reads:

“Dear Joe,

Just a note to wish you and your family a very happy holiday season. Give my regards to all of them. I see that your team and your sisters team are doing good. So i am sure that both of you are happy. Our boys team is not bad but we haven’t been able to beat the good teams, but we are getting better. Tell Basil I wish him a Merry Christmas and we will be ready for the Wildkats in a couple of weeks. Tell your mother I miss seeing her at the nursing home. Wishing you the best and I will keep track of your teams.”

-Bill Stearman

I have that letter framed as it’s something that I will always cherish. I just wish I was mature enough at that age to of kept better contact with all of my Columbus friends, including Coach Stearman.

My family moved to Kokomo and my junior year we  compiled a 23-5 record under another hall of fame coach Basil Mawbey. My junior year we made it all the way to the Final Final 4 at the RCA Dome in front of 27,000 people. Unfortunately we forgot to get out of bed against Bloomington North in the morning game, and lost by 7. But my experiences were very extreme between the two programs, and I was able to see what made a successful basketball program while playing at Kokomo. Playing at Kokomo was taken much more seriously, while playing at Columbus North was more relaxed. 

The reason I started writing this blog post is that it frustrated me to see very few people in the stands at the North game last weekend. It was kinda embarrassing to show my friend how empty of a gym  it was for the game. Maybe that particular game doesn’t represent the rest because it’s been almost 12 years since i’ve been there, but I’m guessing it does. My friend actually counted all the people in the crowd during halftime, and it amounted to just over 400! Living in Columbus once again, I know for a fact that there is very little to do on a friday or saturday night. So what has happened that so few people go to North Basketball games anymore? Of course the team is not always going to be good, but that’s not the point. It used to be friday night tradition to go to the game. Now, it seems that it’s just parents and some close friends of players who show up to support the team. I felt bad for the players because they actually have a pretty fun team to watch. 

I was surprised to see that there wasn’t a pep band at the game. It was like being at a middle school game. It was so boring. I’ve been a high school coach and have visited and played at a lot of gyms throughout the state. This game might of been the worst atmosphere for a high school basketball game i’ve ever seen, and no fault of the players. They were actually very fun to watch. My friend more than agreed. I don’t blame the community for not showing up. I was ready to leave before warm-ups had completed!  Playing in the North Central Conference, I was able to play in some of the top gyms in all the country. New Castle is like playing in a college gym. Playing in Anderson at the Wigwam is probably the best atmosphere to play in. It’s a huge old gym and they have an awesome pregame ceremony with the dancing Indian. Marion always has a great student section and a great crowd. Marion was the first time I had ever had an opposing student section chant my name to try and intimidate me.  Even scouting at a place like Tri-Central was fun. They blare loud music during warm-ups, and might have the best student section in the state. 

The common denominator of all of these places is the great atmosphere. It’s brought on by music and great student sections, along with traditions unique to that particular school. I think Columbus North could easily create a great atmosphere. Why let one of the best gyms in the country go to waste?

At Kokomo we had a student organization called the K-club. It was a program that got students together to create ideas for games, which intern kept students going to games. They all wore the same shirts and were always very creative for our games. We had a great student section, and right next to it was our great pep band. It always made playing at Kokomo a fun place to play. And when you have students creating a fun atmosphere, it provides the excitement for other fans to keep coming to games.  And when you create a good atmosphere with a lot of fans, you will find that the players take playing basketball for your school a little more seriously. They realize the responsibility of representing the school. Things like this help build a winning program.

Columbus North has always had a great band tradition. In my opinion they should get creative with the band. I’ve seen a few schools have a drum line of about 10 drummers on the court just before the players were announced after pre-game warmups. This always provides a lot of excitement to get the game going, and is fun for all. Halftime festivities and end of quarters are another time in which entertaining can be done to create atmosphere. Get fans involved with half-court shots or something, much like they do in the NBA.  When I played at North, they would turn all the lights out during pre-game introductions and shine a spotlight on each player when they were introduced. The student section would hold up newspapers while the other team was being introduced. 

What makes high school basketball in Indiana great is more than just basketball, it’s the atmosphere inside the gymnasiums. Columbus North needs to create a unique atmosphere that makes the games more exciting, even if the teams aren’t always great. They should develop a student organization to create tradition unique to North. Give the students a reason to go to games. Some school’s even give the students a credit for being a part of this organization and attending games. The way I see it, Memorial Gymnasium at Columbus North is being wasted. It has been for a long time. It’s time that something gets done to change this. North has a good young coach in coach Speer who you can build a good program around. It’s time for a change. Coach Stearman would be sad to see so many empty seats in his gym.

Secret Millionaire

Tonight was the first episode of this new reality show called “Secret Millionaire” on FOX. It’s a show that puts millionaires on the street with very little money in poor areas for a week. They are supposed to pretend to be poor for the week, blending in with all the other people. But their mission is to try to meet somebody who they think deserves a hand by giving them at least $100,000. 

I’m halfway into the first episode, and so far this is a great show. They have come across some very inspirational people already, which has been eye opening for them. Not sure how the rest of the show will go, or the future episodes for that matter, but I would suggest checking it out. It seems to be a reality show that has a good purpose.

I took this picture last night, just after the sunset. It was one of the few clear skies i’ve seen recently here.

i’m fat

I’m pretty sure i gained a few pounds over the weekend from the amount of food i consumed. I suppose it was worth it, i’ll just need to run a few extra miles this week. My mom happens to be an excellent cook, so that doesn’t help the cause. And i’m still eating leftovers…i suppose i should stop.

I love seeing my little twin nephews. However they are at a stage right now where they want nothing much to do with me. They would rather just run around the house, opening drawers and exploring. I’m not even sure they know who i am yet. Looking forward to the day when they do. Jameson did allow me to hold him for a bit while he drank some milk. He also paid attention to me when i was playing with a little toy car. I guess i need to learn how to cheat for their attention.

I’m pretty excited for the Purdue/Duke game tomorrow night. It’s probably the biggest non-conference game played at Mackey Arena for Purdue since the early 80’s. Even Dick Vitale will be there to broadcast the game.  You know it’s a big game for Purdue when Dickie V shows his face. 

After moving back from Arizona, i thought i wouldn’t mind the cold weather. I was wrong. I hate it. I think it makes me more lazy because i never want to leave the house. I guess i just need to toughen up and get re-acclamated.