Running with a whistle...

As Pee Wee basketball is well underway I look back when I was that age and remember that we didn’t have organized basketball in the third and fourth grades. We chose teams, had to know the rules and somehow made it through recess without starting or ending a fight. We just had fun, showed off our limited skills and dreamt about the days when we could wear uniforms and play for the high school team.

By the time we got to the fifth grade things changed a bit. The fifth and sixth grades played intramural basketball during the noon hours. Mr. Armstrong organized the teams and scheduled the games and he even had a board that showed the teams and their won-lost record. For the good teams they were able to brag and they also had reason to complain or make excuses.

It was a lot of fun and every so often I think back to a game and laugh to myself. Like the time I got a rebound and started dribbling up court when out of nowhere, Larry Rehn threw a cross body block and knocked me out-of-bounds. It really wasn’t surprising that Larry became a very good wrestler, but I couldn’t figure out why he didn’t give football a try.

There were a couple of other things that were unique with the noon hour games. First off there were no uniforms for us, we all wore white t-shirts. The home team got to wear the t-shirts and the visitors didn’t. So we played shirts and skins and ran our butts off. I think we were always a bit embarrassed to have to play skins, but once the ball went in the air we forgot all about it.

We also had cheerleaders which made taking that shirt off tough if we were skinny or even a bit chubby.

But like I said, playing the game was everything to us. Since the games were played during the noon hour and we had about 30 minutes to play including halftime, I’m not sure how we ate a normal lunch. We were all excited to play and that’s all that mattered.

One of the really cool things that were a part of every game were the referees.

Two of the high school varsity players came over to the grade school gym to be our referees for that particular game. I think we all tried hard to impress these guys with our skills and hoped they would notice. I’m not sure if they cared one way or another, but standing next to one of the Broncos was awesome for us young ratballers.

As I got older, I actually looked forward to being a referee at these contests. I’m sure several members of our team would rather spend noon hour with their girlfriends or buddies, but I enjoyed running up and down the court with these hopeful, young athletes and future Broncos.

I do hope they looked up to us like we looked up to the basketball members of the 1963 and 1964 teams.

A couple of weeks ago I was reffing the fifth and sixth grade boys’ games. My partner for the sixth grade game was Dylan Hartz. It was a lot of fun running up and down the court, and I think we did a good job of keeping the game under control. But it did bring back some fond memories of my time as a senior in high school.

I hope that some of those kids understand the importance of having a Bronco athlete reffing their game.

Talking with Dylan, he was impressed with how some of the kids had a great understanding of the game and I’m sure he hopes these kids will follow in his footsteps and work hard to become the best athlete possible.

There’s about 44 years difference in age between Dylan and I, but I really enjoyed working with this fine young man.

Running with a whistle in your mouth isn’t as easy as it looks, but there are a lot of moments that make it a fun!