Practice Match vs Nambara

The team's practice it went by pretty well, Coach Yoshida was happy with the gains of the practices and was considering these player combinations on matches, especially Hideki and Benjie's two-man synergy. But what's more intriguing was Hideki was now the de-facto starting forward for the team even Daiki Yamamoto gave way to Hideki as he saw he was outmatched by Hideki in any way both offensively and defensively. 

It won't be for long before this will be Hideki's team in the very near future. At this time, Hideki is just the starting Power Forward but he is showing signs of levels of play that's out of this league. His Defense is many levels higher than his teammates, Hideki sometimes carries Hanabira's defense whenever he is on the floor. While on offense, he has strong fundamentals, he does not turn the ball over, and he does not make bad mistakes, Assistant Coach Suzuki also saw Hideki's talent in being a Point Guard, he could be the team's second control tower if needed. 

Now Friday came pretty quickly, so Hideki and the team met up in the entrance of the gym and they saw Megumi and Ayumi, who told them, "Hideki-kun, Benjie-kun, please wait here for a moment for coach's instructions, we are still waiting for the team bus too." Hideki nodded and said, "Okay, sure." Megumi also poked onto Hideki and said "Uhm, Hideki-kun?" Hideki turned to her and asked, "Yes Megumi?" Megumi shyly asked "Can you help me lift the water bottles? I can't carry all of them. Sorry if I bothered you" Hideki scratched the back of his neck and said, "No, it's fine really, I'll help you later okay Megumi-chan?" Megumi looked to the side and said "Thank you, Hideki-kun"

After that Coach Yoshida came and told his players "Okay, we have practiced the different combinations of players but we have practiced mostly the starting 5 and bench 5, so I know we only have practiced for less than a week but you all have the talent and skill to navigate this game, but if you are lost me and Assistant Coach Suzuki will guide you in the game, just be attentive. Anything you want to add Assistant Coach Suzuki?" 

Assistant Coach Suzuki told his piece "Just three offensive pointers Coach Yoshida, 1st is fast break, I want everybody to be attentive to the ball handler and the field to do what's right. 2nd pointer, if everything fails we create space for Tanaka-kun for him to shoot. 3rd and last, Hideki-Kun you should be attentive when in the low-post, I know you can try to create offense in little ways but be sure to communicate with the team what you're trying to do, they're really effective if you're on the same page. " 

Everybody nodded before Yamamoto told the team, "Everybody, the bus is waiting outside the school gate, so let us go" Everybody followed Yamamoto to the bus. Hideki held the water bottle holder and Megumi wanted to help but 'accidentally' held Hideki's hand and quickly retracted her hand as Hideki told her "It's fine Megumi-chan let me handle this" Megumi held her hand and said "Thank you Hideki-kun" Megumi scored a point there, she won the battle.

The bus ride was pretty chill and after 30 minutes, they arrived at Nambara Junior High's gym. The school representative guided them to the changing room, while he guided the coach and staff to the team's bench, where they met with Nambara's coach and shook hands with him. 

After 5 minutes the Hanabira team finished changing into their gear, Hideki's match additional gear only consisted of a black sleeve on his right arm and a headband. After entering the gym, Hanabira then proceeded to warm up with pass and layup drills in pairs. After the drills, Coach Yoshida blew his whistle and told his players to sit on the bench for a short reminder.

"Okay, now is the time to try and exert 100% of your effort so we can dominate on the defensive end and convert the steals or blocks into points on our end. And remember Assistant Coach Suzuki's pointers on offense. But lastly, don't be pressured just play your all and remember Hanabira Junior High School's motto, have fun, so have fun playing basketball lads."

After that speech by Coach Yoshida, everybody stood up and Team Captain Tanaka began to speak, "Hideki and Benjie, I know this is your first game but don't be nervous, this is just a practice game, this will build up your confidence and make you acquainted with crowds. For the rest of the team, let's guide one another and the freshmen in their first game. Some of us had 1 or 2 years with each other, so you can impart your wisdom in any way in this match. Is that clear?" Everybody nodded, so Tanaka finally said "Okay let's shout WIN after I count to 3" Tanaka cleared his throat and said "HANABIRA!!! 1,2,3, WIN!!!"

Hideki's nervousness got out with that shout, it was as if his nervousness was gone with the shout, so he went to the center court for the game to start and shook hands with the other players in the court. In this match, the opposing Power Forward is a sophomore but Hideki is taller by 5 centimeters but he is more bulkier than Hideki by like 20 pounds.

At the jump ball, Kobayashi and the opponent's center are almost of the same height, Kobayahasi only surpasses his opponent in all categories by a small margin, height, weight, and even year level. So as the referee tossed the ball, Kobayashi beat his opponent at the jump ball by a wide margin also. So Kobayashi flicked the ball to Hideki who proceeded to throw it towards Tanaka who was positioned at the three-point line with no one on him, everyone was scrambling with no direction as Kobayashi won the jump ball, Tanaka was able to capitalize the moment that there was no one near him for 4 seconds so he said thank you to Hideki and shot the ball which got in. In the future Hideki calls this strategy Rush B. Of course there's Rush A, and in the distant future, Rush C.

Now Hanabira has the lead 3-0 due to Hideki's quick thinking and Tanaka's reliable shooting, they can be comfortable in defense and not squander the lead. The game got harder from there on as Nambara struggled from Hanabira's choking defense and to be honest Hanabira's offense was not that on par even with Hanabira's offensive output, so the 1st quarter ended with a score of 16 to 7.

As the second quarter started, Nambara changed their strategy to try and gain momentum, unlike the first quarter, this was because in all aspects or positions of one versus one, Hanabira outclasses Nambara by a mile, also they could not capitalize on defense, except rebounds, as Hanabira carefully treads their offense and always make sure to create a better shot so they are a slow half-court team. 

Hanabira is only fast on fastbreaks.

What Nambara did was to incorporate screens on their halfcourt setting. First possession was they tried to screen Suzuki's (PG) man with Hideki's man, they set the screen behind the three point line, Hideki had the presence of mind that his Point Guard was being guarded and told Suzuki, "Suzuki-senpai, screen from behind" Suzuki heard this and got around the screen but this gave little space to the opponent point guard and tried to shoot a mid-range shot. The basketball gods heard his prayer and the ball luckily bounced in.

Hideki felt bad that the shot got in but Suzuki patted him on the back and said "It's fine, don't mind it. Next time, if they do the same play, let's quickly double team and trap the point guard, you cover his right side, it's his dominant side." Hideki nodded and said "Okay senpai, thank you very much for the tip"

But still, Hideki was a little petty and wanted to get back at Nambara so he told Suzuki, "Suzuki-senpai can I have the ball at the top of the key?" Suzuki said "Sure" As Suzuki gave the ball to Hideki, Hideki didn't dribble the ball and waited for the play to develop, Suzuki screened for Tanaka who rushed to go to Hideki to get the ball from a handoff* after Hideki gave the ball to Tanaka, Hideki ran to the basket while looking at Tanaka as if asking for the ball, so Tanaka's man and Hideki's man chase him and Tanaka had free reigns to shoot a three. To which he swished* again to the net.

Next possession, Nambara tried screening Suzuki with Hideki's man but as Suzuki told Hideki they double-teamed and trapped the point guard not allowing him to shoot, dribble through, or pass the ball to a teammate, after 3 seconds he made a mistake by trying to pass through Hideki who swatted the ball to the other end of the court. Hideki got the ball and laid the ball in.

The 2nd quarter was a whole mirror copy of what happened in its first minutes, Nambara tried to do something new and sometimes they succeed, sometimes not. Then Hanabira is able to adjust against it. And like the 1st quarter, Hanabira still does its damage on the fastbreaks, by the end of the 2nd quarter Hanabira only scored 13 points not in a fastbreak. The 2nd quarter ended with 35 to 18.

By the mid-break the coach of Nambara suggested to Coach Yoshida to make use of the 2nd half with their bench players. Coach Yoshida agreed, he got what he wanted with the 1st half. By the 2nd half Daiki Yamamoto and Tatsuya Morioka led Hanabira in the second half, with this unit their defensive intensity was the same but was not as potent in offense as the starting 5. 

So the 3rd quarter ended with 45 to 26 and the 4th quarter ended with 58 to 32. You the reader may ask why are their scoring output so low, it is because Hanabira's top defense and subpar offense yield them low-scoring games. However, this would change in the future. 

After the basketball game, the players shook the hands of the opposing players and exchanged pleasantries such as "Good Game" and "Nice Game" and the coaches also shook the hands of the opposing coach. After the handshaking event, Coach Yoshida told his players they would meet at the changing room for the meeting.

In the changing room while the players were resting and changing clothes, Coach Yoshida gave his little speech "Good job out there team, we limited them to less than 35 points which was my hidden goal for all of you. Individually, I liked Hideki's communication skills on the court seeing screens before they happen and alerting your teammates, you may not notice but that helped quite a lot on defense as your teammates were able to assess whether to switch or not, also I liked your effort on defense when the opponent thought they had that possession but you still helped in any way you can. That's it for me, do you have any questions?" 

Hideki raised his hand and asked, "Coach is it possible to have any data from our opponents? So I can help more on defense, some of their plays were unfamiliar to me, and if the game is decided on a point or two, the advanced scouting can help me determine their course of action" Coach Yoshida smiled and said "Sure, let's see what we can do for that" 

Then Coach Yoshida asked for Coach Suzuki's opinion on offense "For me, I would like to improve more on our half-court offense, if better defensive teams hunt us on offense or are quicker than Hideki and Benjie we are screwed offensively, I'll double down our offensive practices and see what works and what doesn't."

After the short meeting, everybody got up and got to the bus while Hideki told his coaches and the adviser Tanaka-sensei "Coach Yoshida, Tanaka-sensei, I won't be with the team on the bus since, I'll go to the cafe where she works, the bus won't go in that direction" Tanaka told Hideki "Sure Hideki, we don't have any matters anymore after we go to school." 

Hideki bowed in thanks and left the group to go to the cafe where Kanai works. Excited to tell his mom he won his first game.

Hideki's stats: 8 points 10 rebounds 6 assists 4 steals 4 blocks

Terms said in this chapter:

*Handoff, stay in place, and give the ball to a teammate (Draymond Green is the one I can think of at the top of my head that does this)

*Swish - the ball passes through the net and does not touch the ring

*Trap - prevent the ballhandler from advancing with the ball and make it difficult to pass 

*If there are terms you can't understand you can post them in the comments