Announcement
Commentary articles on games will be discontinued. Basic game results showing score by quarter will be provided. Provision of individual scoring in each game is still undecided.
Comments on the STATS, October 2011
Initially (ten years ago) my desire to honor the boys and to be fair to them compelled me to provide the stats but recording of the individual player stats during each game is a very labor intensive effort which greatly distracts from enjoying the game. An inordinate amount of time is invested for this effort to assure accuracy of the numbers. Consequently, the individual player stats will not longer be collected for this website.
There is a high degree of duplication of effort between my statistician's effort and my effort, and the stats collected by the team's student stat recorder (the coach reports the team's stats on maxpreps.com).
In my opinion my stats overall have been more accurate than the team's and my desire to honor the boys and be fair compels me to provide the stats. Reviewing the game videos many times to resolve significant differences has confirmed that for me. The reason is simple. My stats are the result of two veteran pairs of eyes: mine and a stat recorder with a decade of experience recording the stats. In addition, I video record every game for the purpose of resolving any questions which arise regarding the stats. Not all videos are reviewed to verify my stats but it does happen when significant differences occur. The team's stats are recorderd by a student usually with no prior experience newly trained to record the stats. The team's stats are reviewed and sometimes changed as a result of the game videos being reviewed by the coaches.
In addition, different coaches record some stats differently especially when it comes to assists and rebounds. I have tried to align my definitions of each stat with Coach Penders' definition.
Prior Comments on the stats. The stats will sometimes be slow in coming to the web site. This is due to the logistics of the process and time constraints, not any lack of importance that I place on the numbers. If the stats are wrong, it is nothing personal or intentional (For a description of the process used to gather the stats. See SITE USAGE HINTS, Varsity Player Stats from the menu). If a player does not get mentioned as much as he or his relatives feel he deserves in the game write-ups, it is probably because I am not aware of something that deserves mention or because I was tired and sleepy when I entered my recollections of the game. I will diligently try to be as fair and equitable as I possibly can in everything I post on this site. What is most worthy of mention is certainly subjective but there will most assuredly be times when I omit something that should have been acknowledged. I apologize for this. A timely email from someone may help correct my oversites. A verbal reprimand by an overzealous parent will have little effect but I appreciate the interest.
The general guidelines I regard as deserving comment include: obvious acts of integrity by a player or the team, outstanding plays, outstanding effort, scoring more than 9 points, more than 4 rebounds, 4 or more assists or steals, and more than 3 blocked shots. I make no guarantees that I will not overlook something that deserves mention however.
The fact of the matter is, in basketball, some things deserve mention more than others though. I am eager to mention anything positive about our players and our team with the understanding that I already spend too much time doing this.
To play 5A basketball in Texas today, these boys must be prudent enough, mature enough, and tough enough to endure any minor criticism of their performance as a team that they might get from this web site. I hope the parents and the fan base are too. After all, isn’t basketball truly one of the games that helps the player learn about life and how to deal with it?
