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From:
Subject: Expansion of Select Basketball Opportunities
Folks,
You may have heard rumor of a change to the Kettering Basketball Club (Cobras) policy regarding boys’ teams for the Fall/Winter 2006-7 season. I wanted to contact you all directly regarding this change. Please share this to anyone who may have a boy interested in 3rd – 6th grade select basketball for next season. It is also posted on our website at www.ketteringcobras.com
First, let me provide a little background. The Cobras were the first select basketball program in the area about a dozen years ago. At that time, the agreement was made by the founders that the club should be for Kettering and Oakwood. About 5 years ago, Oakwood started their own club. While this provided additional opportunities for the Oakwood kids, it left Kettering kids with one choice and Oakwood kids with two, so in a coordinated way, the Cobras phased out Oakwood participation to make more opportunities for Kettering kids to help the Oakwood program get maximum enrollment. In a similar way, a few years ago, Alter’s feeder program (South Dayton Knights), which had previously begun at 7th grade, decided they would serve the school best by expanding down to 6th grade. Again, this provided more opportunities for kids, but only Alter-bound kids. It also set up the situation that many Alter-bound kids would play with the Cobras from 3rd through 5th grade, but then naturally switch over to the South Dayton Knights so they could start aligning with the Alter program. This left big gaps in Cobra teams which then had to be filled with kids who hadn’t been able to make Cobra teams in past years because there were no more slots. Thus 6th grade Cobra teams with many first year select players were facing 6th grade teams from other programs with mostly 4th year select players.
While the creation of both of these new clubs were good things because they provided more overall opportunities for kids to play competitive basketball and an earlier chance to align with their intended high schools, both caused some inequities for Fairmont-bound Kettering kids, who were always limited to one option while others had at least two. It also caused some headaches in forming Cobra teams because some players were not returning at certain years. To solve this dilemma, I met with the leadership of the South Dayton Knights and offered to help them expand their program to the younger grades. They have graciously agreed to do this. What this opens up is great new possibilities for our kids because now there will be more teams and therefore more boys can play. Another key benefit is that the High School coaching staff is ready and willing to get more involved in the teams that are bound for their particular school. This means that, for instance, the Cobra kids can learn a simplified version of what the Fairmont coaches will be teaching in High School while they are still in 3rd grade. Each year they can add new skills and strategy so by the time they get to Fairmont, they will have 6 years of experience with what is expected, rather than just 7th and 8th grade. Hank Bias and the Fairmont coaching staff is ready to put this into action. The SDK kids will have a similar opportunity with Alter. This should lead to better teams in the future for both Fairmont and Alter, which is one of the goals of Kettering select basketball programs.
I hope the above information helps everyone understand why we are moving the Cobras boys program to be a Fairmont feeder program and how we are doing it without leaving any boys without an opportunity to play select basketball. If you have questions, please let me know and I will try my best to answer. I’m avoiding stating hard and fast participation rules because with anything there are always reasons for an occasional exception, but I would hope that everyone understands that the intent is to make the Cobras a Fairmont feeder program and have the South Dayton Knights continue to be an Alter feeder team. Also, bear in mind that this applies to the Fall/Winter core basketball season only. Because of OHSHA rules, Spring teams will not be exclusively focused on individual schools for teams 7th grade and older.
By the way, the girls program has not had the same growth issues and therefore the Cobras remains the place for all Kettering girls to play select basketball.