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Season one of Junior NBA comes to a close in Yellowknife

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Coach Cole Marshall asks how many fingers heSA国际影视传媒檚 holding up SA国际影视传媒 part of a drill designed to help people look up when they dribble SA国际影视传媒 during the opening day of the Junior NBA Program at Weledeh Gymnasium this past October. The inaugural season of the new program wrapped up on Sunday. NNSL file photo

Whenever a new program starts out, there's always anxiety about how it's going to go.

Basketball NWT had that feeling about the Junior NBA program in its inaugural season in Yellowknife but it ended up being unfounded.

Coach Cole Marshall asks how many fingers heSA国际影视传媒檚 holding up SA国际影视传媒 part of a drill designed to help people look up when they dribble SA国际影视传媒 during the opening day of the Junior NBA Program at Weledeh Gymnasium this past October. The inaugural season of the new program wrapped up on Sunday.
NNSL file photo

The first season came to an end on Sunday, closing out a program which was, according to Cole Marshall, Basketball NWT's technical director, a huge success.

He said a total of 28 youth between the ages of five through seven signed up to play and the season went even better than expected.

SA国际影视传媒淚 haven't really worked with young, young kids too much so there was always that feeling of not knowing what to expect,SA国际影视传媒 he said. SA国际影视传媒淐anada Basketball provided us with the outline and we just went with it. It was amazing.SA国际影视传媒

Junior NBA is essentially a miniature version of basketball with nets lowered to two metres, as opposed to the regulation height of three. The basketballs themselves are also smaller, making them easier to handle and work with on the court.
Marshall said most of the programs drills dealt with learning by playing, 'tricking' the youth into thinking they were simply playing a game and not knowing it would help them in their development.

SA国际影视传媒淚t's much different from a standard program,SA国际影视传媒 he said.

SA国际影视传媒淲ith the Steve Nash Youth Basketball program, you can get the kids to sit for a couple of minutes, show them a drill and off they go.

SA国际影视传媒淲ith Junior NBA, the kids are a lot younger so you don't have a lot of time to teach and everything has to be shown quicker. You just hope they can retain what you've showed them.SA国际影视传媒

An example of just how much the kids wanted to simply play basketball was the amount of times Marshall had to remind them not to dribble and run around while he was trying to explain a drill.

SA国际影视传媒淚 think I had to say 'hold the ball' about 10,000 times,SA国际影视传媒 he joked.

As is the case when new programs start out, the level of play isn't up to where it should or could be but Marshall said it was all about progression and that progression was obvious on the final day.

SA国际影视传媒淭he kids weren't hitting a lot of shots at the start of it all,SA国际影视传媒 he said. SA国际影视传媒淏ut we had a scrimmage against the parents on the last day and the kids were whipping them good and were hitting plenty of shots from all over.SA国际影视传媒

The hope is that Junior NBA will be able to run alongside the GO-Ball program, which is for girls only. Junior NBA was thought of by Basketball NWT as a way for boys aged 5-7 to get in the front door, so to speak; GO-Ball already had programming in town for girls aged 5-7.

Marshall said the program isn't exclusively for boys as there were some girls who played Junior NBA.

SA国际影视传媒淭here's no real conflict with GO-Ball,SA国际影视传媒 he said. SA国际影视传媒淚t was great to have girls take part because it's only going to improve on what's already happening. Girls youth basketball really wasn't on the radar a few years back and GO-Ball did a great job tapping into that age group.SA国际影视传媒

Season two for Junior NBA is already in the works with Marshall saying that the interest is there from parents.

SA国际影视传媒淪ome of them were asking me if there's a spring program being offered,SA国际影视传媒 he said. SA国际影视传媒淥bviously, it went over well because if they hated it, they wouldn't have come back. We want them to love the game of basketball.SA国际影视传媒



About the Author: James McCarthy

I'm the managing editor with SA国际影视传媒 and have been so since 2022.
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