In Spite of Others; Do Good!

Mostly it was intense, although at times cut-throat; always competitive! No, I'm not referring to the 'Black Friday' retail store scenes, I speak of the basketball play at the week long 43rd annual Decatur Team Soy Tournament. Springfield Southeast walked away with top honors as they defeated Pekin in an entertaining and hotly contested title match.

After the game, I was moving about the venue beginning my last duties as tournament director when a Pekin parent approached me with rather angry loaded comments regarding what he believed was bad officiating thus costing his Pekin team to lose. He said, "That's the worst refereeing I have ever seen!" I paused attempting to gain composure, which I seldom do in these latter years. As I spoke to this 'fanatic' however, I think I managed to make my point. I turned to face the irate gentleman and told him. "Perhaps that is the worst officiating you have ever seen but since you raise the question, I will tell you this: I have coached nearly 1,000 games and likely seen another 4,000 high school games. The worst officiated game in my opinion was on a Tuesday night in 1969 when I took my Washington high school team to Pekin to play."

For me, this tournament was far more than basketball. On Wednesday we honored Linda Shanklin, mother of Olympian Gold Medalist and current NBA player, Andre Iguodala as a former tournament participant. On that same evening, we also lifted up five local city 'heroes' for their volunteerism. On Friday night, we paused between games to honor the Decatur High 1964, 3rd Place State team, which posted an impressive 30-2 record that season. The point is profoundly this,we used the attraction of the tournament to seize moments to make others feel appreciate with praise while nudging others among us to reach for achievement.

On a personal note, I am running out of the necessary sustaining energy to continue this charge, thus I will muster up what I might and do one final tourney next season. I will step aside with hope someone will embrace the possibilities.