Every role is important

Gene Steinmeyer

I sat through many basketball games as a college coach, wishing there was a mercy rule where there was a running clock as the margin mounted for the winning team. Missouri has that mercy rule and, as a fan, it’s easier to watch a game that can be described as a “blowout.”

As a father of a son who plays limited minutes off the bench, I hate the rule. Let all those normal fans suffer while the players on the bench get valuable minutes of game action.

That was the situation Tuesday night as the Maryville junior varsity boys’ basketball team played its first game in Clarinda. My son, Sam, is a reserve on a very deep junior varsity team. I keep telling Sam that everyone on the team has a role. I have repeated myself many times telling him some of my most successful teams had a key component: A bench that had the same goals as the players who took most of the playing time.

I know Sam was a little worried Tuesday night. “I was afraid Coach forgot about me,” he told me after the game. Sam only played a couple of minutes against Clarinda, but still had a couple of important moments for him. More importantly, I noticed how he handled the bench when he wasn’t playing. That’s the part of the game that will benefit his team the most.

One of my first recruits at Northwest was Tanesha Fields. Tanesha was out of Overland Park, Kansas and was a quick guard. Tanesha logged a lot of minutes early in her college career. She had a career-high 30 points against Rolla her freshman year.

As I recruited more talent, Tanesha’s playing time slipped. She lost her starting job and then most of her playing time. It wasn’t anything that Tanesha did personally. I just had better talent recruited to the team.

I know Tanesha had to be disappointed, but it never affected her effort in practice or on gameday. Her senior year, the team broke out and won 23 games. We faced Emporia State for the conference championship in Kansas City. Very few thought we had a chance as Emporia had 17- and 24-point wins over the Bearcats during the regular season.

In the final huddle before the start of the game, Tanesha asked me if she could talk to the team. I had no idea what she would say, but I gave her the huddle for the final words. “Just win one media timeout at a time,” was her message. That meant don’t worry about the final score, just concentrate on each five-minute segment of the game.

Each media timeout, Tanesha was screaming at the players, telling them how they had won that segment and to do it one more time. With 39 seconds left in the game, we had a 17-point lead. I asked Tanesha if she wanted to finish the game, not because I wanted her to get into the game, but to reward her for her contribution to the win. I told her that and she was on the floor when the final buzzer sounded.

Monday night, I met Tracee Fairbanks in Fairfax. Tracee is a former player of mine at Doane College and is now the head coach. She was in Missouri recruiting some local talent. Tracee rode the pine for me a couple of years, but that’s only the beginning of Tracee’s story.

Tracee tore up her knees during a preseason practice before her sophomore year of competition. She had ACL surgery on both knees and sat out the season. At the start of the next season, Tracee was still slowed by the rehabilitation on the knees, but was still one of 15 varsity players.

Our second game of the season was a home game against Wayland Baptist. Wayland Baptist was a NAIA I team and ranked in the top five of its division. We were an unranked member of the division below Wayland Baptist.

The result wasn’t good. Doane College was beaten by 42 points, the worst home loss in my 15 years at that school. Fourteen players got into that game, but one did not. I must have just forgotten about Tracee like Sam was worried he would be forgotten.

That’s my only excuse. Her dad wasn’t mad at me for not getting her into the game, but realistically told his daughter, “If you can’t get into that game, you should read the writing on the wall.” Thank goodness Tracee didn’t follow her dad’s advice.

A year later we visited Wayland Baptist in Plainview, Texas. Despite being down 11 points at half, Doane College came back and took the game into overtime. Tracee hit the winning jump shot with 20 seconds left.

Her senior year, Tracee was elected captain of her team. She led her team to a Final Four appearance, the first in school history. It’s not easy being a bench player, but I don’t think most of those bench players realize the important roles they can play.