Glenwood...Spring/ Summer Sport Power?

[ghost80]

Congratulations to Glenwood on their 2011 3A track championship. Might be a good opportunity to pat them on their back for how their whole Spring Summer sports program is performing.

Last spring Glenwood's soccer program made state as a #4 seed. This spring they enter the soccer post season rated number #4.

Last year Glenwood's baseball team won the 3A Baseball championship.

The thing which amazes me is even as a 3A school (2A for soccer) it is very difficult to be at this level for all three of these sports. There normally just aren't that many kids and at best a school might excel at 2.

Don't know how they are doing it, but congrats and keep up the good work.
This post was edited on 5/22 9:36 AM by ghost80

 

[mtdew_fever]

Glenwood is tough. Their track team was absolutely stacked in the 400's and 800's this year.

On a side note, the reason why most schools can't/don't do well in all three sports (track, soccer, baseball) is because most schools could care less about soccer.

 

[pstripe38]

That is a good point; most schools do not place an emphasis on soccer. Glenwood always has had a good youth soccer program and it has showed in their high school teams. As far as being good in all three, Glenwood has had really good numbers of kids going out for each individual sport. I think it starts there. Track had around 60 kids, soccer around 35, and baseball around 50. As stated earlier, all three have good youth programs. Sometimes it takes a exceptional core of kids to get the "ball" rolling and from there it rubs off year to year. This years seniors are very talented in many areas and I think their work and dedication will rub off to the underclassman. I don't know how we will do in baseball this year but we have a strong group of seniors with good talent in the freshman and sophmore classes. Soccer is losing their coach after this year as Mike Artist is retiring and the Iowa Western asst coach will probably take over. It is nice to talk about something positive involving Glenwood athletics as we have been a door mat for many years except for soccer, wrestling and track some years ago!!!

 

[ghost80]

Although not familiar with the Glenwood feeder programs I suspect they are running their youth programs the right way. To keep that many kids interested and active in high school they must be putting the early focus on developement and not just winning.

Nobody likes to lose but there seems to be too many parent lead sport activities that are motivated by winning (usually at all cost by stretching or breaking rules IE, minimum play time violations, lying about ages, stacking teams, pitch count violations-in baseball, ect) and unless the young athlete is in a position to help his team win IMMEDIATELY they fall by the wayside. They leave that sport with little self confidence and have had a negative experience.

When that happens you don't see good participation numbers from the kids later.

I know an AD who sounds like a broken record saying, "we need to get more kids participating in athletics", yet is afraid to tackle one of the biggest problems which is clear down at the parent lead level.

 

[pstripe38]

Ghost, outstanding post! Here in Glenwood this problem has occured a time or two and I think it happens everywhere at some point. I was a little league baseball coach for 7 years and sometimes you have to pinch yourself and not let "winning at all costs" be too prevalent. Don't get me wrong, I think you have to emphasize winning but in such a manner that fundamentals are #1. When a kid who isn't one of the main players contributes, the whole team enjoys the feat! I think your right in that participation is greatly affected by how these things are handled. I have seen the other side of the coin also; coaches do not put any emphasis on winning at all. The kids get dejected from constantly getting beat badly. Basicly the coaches are setting them up to fail. It is not easy coaching young kids (6-10yr olds) but I would not give up those years for anything. It teaches you how to communicate.

 

[oldmansleague]

Glenwood has traditionally struggled in the sports not because of lack of athletes, but because of lack of athletes of size. They are competitive in sports that don't suffer so much without size. Not sure why they lack size (other than the obvious answer of genetics), but it's been that way for some time.