A comment by one of my volleyball kids this weekend made me think a little about what my motivation is for coaching. Obviously most people wouldn't do it just out of the goodness of their heart, so you have to get something out of it to do it.
We've all seen coaches that are in it so they can feel like they're in control of something in their lives, or compensating for a poor athletic experience as a child, or whatever. I'm pretty sure it's not any of those things for me. But then when I saw one of my former volleyball mom's, it hit me. Four of the kids, half, of my 2004 J.O. team played in their first college matches this weekend.
All four of these kids are playing at D-3 schools, are insanely smart, and came from absolutely horrible high school programs. I certainly can't take credit for whatever God-given talent they had, but I had the opportunity to challenge them and make them better. Now they make me proud as college players. That makes me smile. Another isn't playing in college, but she went to Cornell. I had nothing to do with that, but it's pretty cool!
When you don't get the biggest kids in the area on your J.O. team, you have a real uphill battle in this region, but none of my teams, even the short ones, have ever embarrassed themselves. That 2004 team placed 19 out of 29 in the region, and we had a lot of ups and downs, but they were such a fun group, and worked really hard. It all paid off, and I'm so proud of them.
So why do I coach? Four reasons, off the top of my head, are named Caity, Katie, Megan and Rachel.