Ni Hao

Ni hao

My daughter, Marisa, and I are taking a trip this summer to Shanghai to see my brother, Mark, and his family (wife Elizabeth and son Evan aka "Big Panda"). I am trying to learn simple phrases in Mandarin Chinese so that I can at least be considered kind and courteous to the Chinese people. The first phrase I learned was Ni Hao, which is simply "Hello".

As a coach, I consider myself a teacher. Teachers give assignments so that students learn new things. Then teachers give tests so they assess what has been learned.

I set up an appointment with one of my players for 12:15 pm today to come by my office. Spenser Cantrell is a charming young lady and a very good basketball player who had an outstanding high school career at Mt. Dora Bible in Florida. She is taking a summer class on the Pentateuch to get a head start for next school year. I asked her to stop by my office so we could look at her syllabus and she could update me on her progress. I am happy to report that she earned a 94 on her first test. What stood out to me was the volume of work that she was doing in this course. Her professor has obviously given her several assignments! Then he has scheduled tests to assess learning. I am sure they will assess their tests in preparation for their final exam.


I am about to email my first official assignment to my players. I am going to send them a roster with email addresses and cell phone numbers of all of their teammates and suggest that they connect with each one of them by email, text, phone call, or facebook by the end of June.

They need to get connected! They need to say "Ni Hao" to their teammates.

In the next year they will live with each other, travel with each other, sweat with each other, hug each other, fight each other, compete against each other, compete with each other, bleed for each other, and learn to love and respect each other. I don't want to waste time without using this summer to help them build positive relationships with each other. Even though they are scattered about the country, they can use technology for its designed purpose. If we are going to develop a championship atmosphere, we need to start by getting connected.

Baibai (good bye in Mandarin--i think),

Coach S

"..so in Christ we who are many form one body, and each member belongs to all the others"
Romans 12:5