One more day of coaching in Creston

I was not a star athlete in school, but I had a passion for sports that obviously spilled over to my journalism career, particularly the many years of daily newspaper sportswriting.

Along the way I also diverted some of that passion into coaching as my sons reached the age of competing in sports. I started working with Dick Bergstrom and Doug Wilson in little league baseball in 1995, and a couple of years later said “Sure!” to a request by a St. Malachy parent to revive the school’s basketball program as coach.

I stayed in that role for several years before a decision was made to merge the local schools into one Creston team. That’s when I became a boys middle school assistant coach with Mike McCabe and Dick Clark, until then-varsity girls coach Todd Jacobson asked if I would take the seventh grade girls job. This boy dad decided to give it a shot.

Between Creston and a couple of years in Orient when Creston’s split season format interrupted with my full-time role at the paper at tournament time, I’ve worked in girls basketball since that 2010-11 season. In recent years I stepped back into an assistant’s role, finishing this year with two quality young coaches in Cole Crawford and Brielle Baker. Brielle and her sister Brenna, my former coaching colleague, both played for me. Cole has been a varsity head coach at Wayne, and does a great job with this age group as well.

This week the journey ends with Thursday’s home game vs. Shenandoah. I’m turning 68 this year and I have grandkids growing up quickly. Two are playing basketball. It’s time to gain a little freedom.

The kids in Creston have given me so much. I often said the only redeeming value of living in Iowa in the winter is getting those two hours in the gym every afternoon. I couldn’t work at the high school level because of my other job covering high school games in the evenings, but the middle school level is a great place to make a difference in a lot of lives.

Fort Dodge role model

Baseball was the sport I stayed with the longest in high school and I was fortunate to have a Hall of Fame coach, Ed McNeil, who set the tone of being a leader. I was 12 when his Fort Dodge team won the state championship in 1969. When I got to play for him, I realized no detail is too small if you want to advance from mediocrity to excellence.

He even taught us how to exactly fold our uniform pants into our high stirrup socks, and you better show up with everything looking right before the pregame infield! That’s why I still cringe when a basketball team has guys with jerseys hanging out of their shorts. McNeil did not tolerate anything being sloppy. When we came on the field, the other team knew we were there to do business.

I was tough on kids at times, trying to gain the level of concentration I thought was necessary. But, I could also have a light mood at times in the gym, trying to convey that this could be a fun experience. One team had two nicknames for me — Scary Larry and Lar-Bear — depending on the mood at any given moment. Somewhere there’s a cell phone video of me doing a poor rendition of “the griddy” dance with this year’s juniors, in a deal I made with them if we reached the goal we set for our season. It was a fun moment.

I tried to convey how each team member brought value to our season, because we can only get better if we’re pushed in practice by our peers. Every role is important.

Lack of effort could trigger “Scary Larry.” The cardinal sin to your teammates is mentally quitting. No matter the score, gain respect from your teammates and opponents by competing until the buzzer. I actually got the most enjoyment from those moments of pulling a kid aside for a moment of praise. It’s like fuel for a kid and you see the light in their eyes when they realize you believe in them.

I enjoyed both the kids who went on to star in high school and even play in college, as well as those who decided not to participate in high school. We got to share an experience, and they can always say to their children someday, “I played basketball.” When they went to the high school games, they’d know more about what was happening than those who never played.

Learned from the best

I learned from many outstanding coaches I worked with for the newspaper. Too many to list here individually. It was a great advantage to be able to pick the brains of some of the most successful coaches in southwest Iowa about their craft, and translate that into the junior high practice gym. It was also fun to attend those IBCA coaches clinics in Des Moines every fall, as a gymnasium of coaches eager for the upcoming season gathered to learn from the best and share their thoughts.

Our role is different than a teacher’s. Not more important, just different. We see you after school, we go on the road together, we get to know your parents after games. We see you when you win and when you lose. There is a club feeling to it, a sense of friendship and camaraderie.

I think of people like Dannie Stephens, Teri Keeler and Bryant McCabe, Drew Dornack and Chris Tibbals in the boys program, and the many longtime assistants of coach Bergstrom and coach Morrison, in serving so many years behind the scenes in roles other than varsity head coach. I now understand how much they got from those experiences, after 28 years of doing it.

The late Al McGuire, flamboyant coach of the Marquette Warriors, once said, “Sports is a coffee break in life.”

I had a heck of a coffee break. Thanks, Creston.

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Contact the writer:

Email: malachy.lp@gmail.com

X: @larrypeterson