Terrence Clarke
What's going on Basketball World?
Terrence Clarke is signing in to welcome you all to my fifth diary entry of my BballSpotlight Diary. This week went by pretty slow but sped up due to my preparation for Atlantic City tournament that kept me on track of my school work for the week. Also, my first Track Meet that was held on Wednesday and 3 test that I had for the week.
Monday was a pretty slow and chill day. Since I had study hall first on this day, I was able to get on track with any work that was due and YouTube videos of McDonald's All-Americans or any tournament mixtapes. There wasn't a lot of main things to worry about. At school, I got through my classes and finished most my work in class. After school, I had track practice. The practice wasn't lots of running but was learning how to do a long jump. After practice, I went to the gym. Every day I'd work on dribbling to keep my handle tight for 5-10 minutes, so that's what I started with. Then I got up about 100-150 catch and shoot shots with one dribble pull ups. All of my work was done so I got to chill and watch videos going into my nightly study hall.
Tuesday, I got informed I would get picked up pretty early from school on the following Friday, so I picked up my attitude and body language even though I was tired and ready to get out of school. The weather was charming and shiny, so we got the chance to wear shorts. In school, I felt much more relaxed throughout the day. But unexpectedly, I forgot that I had a quiz for English class! Due to that, I had to use my prior knowledge of words that were in one of my reading books. I thought I did a terrible job, so I was pretty frustrated on that. That same day, I got informed that I was going to have a history test and science quiz, so the day wasn't too good for me. After school, I had track practice that was an easy day due to our meet the next day. After practice, I got to the gym for a limited amount of time due to my school coach coming to the gym late. For the next 20-30 minutes, I put out four chairs and got busy with them. Used lots of combo dribble moves into dunks, layups, finishing moves and moving shots. Going into study hall, I had some work to do. I finish all the homework I had for my classes for the next day and got back to my dorm.
Wednesday seemed like a very long day. The weather wasn't very good, felt pretty tired and had lots of studying to do for the next day due to my test and quiz. I also had homework from my classes, so I had to use my study hall period to the fullest. My whole study hall period was full of work to catch up on so I could study for my test the next day at night. After school, I had my first track meet. I didn't participate in long jump due to me not trying to hurt my knees for the weekend. So I did the 100-meter dash. I didn't come top 3, but I finished with 12.13. I know that doing more meets and practicing will better my time. After the track meet, I had to go straight to dinner and study hall. At study hall, the new McDonald's All American All Access came out so I spent my time studying for science, finishing my study guide for history and watching that.
Thursday was a very long day. I took my history test, and I felt like I did excellently, but I could've done better. Then on my science quiz, I got an A- which was okay. But I know I can't settle for that, and I have to get a better grade. Next time, I'll study a little harder. After school, I ran a mile, and my knees started to stress a lot, so I got sent to the trainer to ice them for the day. After dinner and study hall knowing that I was leaving the next day, I packed my bags and went to sleep.
Friday was a great day because it was the day I was leaving. I went to three of my classes and left to go home. After school, I went home to get my clothes washed and went straight to the gym to play pickup ball with my boys. After, I went to watch some of my friends and teammates play in a league near us. We then left to go home, but I had to get ready to go to NJ that same night!
12 AM! That's how I started my Saturday. Driving to New Jersey at 12 in the morning. I took multiple naps because we had our first game at eight in the morning which is ridiculous. We arrived in Atlantic City at 7 in the morning, and we were tired than ever. Our first game was against Gauchos. It was a crazy battle that went to the end. Two of my teammates got ejected, and I had to close out the game for our victory. I hit two clutches three-pointers and some free throws to win us the game by three points. Luckily, our opponents missed a step-back three to give us the game. Next game was against the New Jersey Playaz. The game was smooth. We played well enough, and we won by a large margin. After our games, we went to go and support our young squad, seventh-grade Expressions. They won their game off a buzzer beater that looked like a bad moment terribly. As the shot went in, everyone went crazy! Now back to the hotel to get sleep now. We went to our young guys second game and they ended up losing but they came second in the pool which gave them a good look for the championship.
Sunday was our day. We knew we could finally win a BballSpotlight tournament for the first time as a team and we were ready. We started our day at 8 o’clock trying to get revenge on Dynamic Disciples. We began the game very well jumping out to a substantial lead. They made a good enough run to keep themselves in the game. To end the game, we made an even bigger run to put the game out of reach and give us the win. Our next game was at 1:50 and we knew winning this game gave us one more step to winning it all. We first went back to the hotel and went to H&M, Nike, and more stores in Atlantic City together as a team to bond since we had a few hours to rest. After, we headed to Atlantic City High School to watch our seventh-grade team. They weren’t doing too well, but we had to focus on our game. We left to begin our next fight against the New Jersey Bulldogs. We jumped out to a lasting lead but lost it in about 3-4 minutes. Going into the half, we were down a couple of points. We came out the half jumping with energy to keep us alive. I had two free throws, a dunk and my teammate made a layup to put us up one point. With the back and forth action, the game began to become very intense. I ended up giving us a bad technical foul on a play that pushed us backward. The game went on while we were battling a six point difference. Getting a few stops and buckets, we came down the court with 27 seconds left down by 3. Even with a missed shot, we got a stop the next play. We had tiny time to tie the game. With an out of bounds call and no shot taken, we had the ball with less than 12 seconds. Getting down to eight seconds left, I knew a move had to be made. I step to my right and make my move left to get my defender shaking and put up a three to tie and unfortunately I miss. We lost by three points. As mad as I was ever, I got a message from my guy, Anjie. I knew this was a learning moment for me. This is going to make our team even stronger in the long run which makes this lost more beneficial. As I ride back to school, I was thinking even more about how much I could’ve done more. But next week I will be preparing for EYBL session one for 15u in Virginia. I will be going on my daily schedule at school and preparing to work in the session to make my name. Tune back in next week as I’ll update you all on the days leading up.
Terrence Clarke signing out…
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