Black Forest Academy's Emily Campbell goes to the basket in last season's Division II final at the DODDS-Europe basketball championships. (Michael Abrams/Stars and Stripes)
Black Forest Academy's Emily Campbell goes to the basket in last season's Division II final at the DODDS-Europe basketball championships. (Michael Abrams/Stars and Stripes)
Patch Panthers and Wiesbaden Warriors fight for a rebound in last seasons Division I final at the DODDS-Europe basketball championships. Both teams are set to participate in a holiday tournament in Stuttgart during the Christmas break. (Michael Abrams/Stars and Stripes)
Games are the basic building block of any competitive sports season. But in DODDS-Europe basketball, they are a valuable commodity.
For a variety of financial and logistical reasons, the average DODDS-Europe basketball team’s regular-season schedule has fewer games than a typical stateside counterpart. Most DODDS-Europe teams are playing about 14 games this season, not including the European tournament. A review of United States high school schedules revealed regular season generally numbering between 20 and 25 games.
The reasons for the difference are obvious and unavoidable and beyond the monetary constraints that come with staging each game.
Many DODDS-Europe teams are far removed from their opponents, making midweek games prohibitively disruptive to the academic calendar. So games are relegated to the weekend. A standard agenda sees a visiting team play on Friday evening immediately after a long bus ride, spend that night in the host team’s gym and play the same team or a nearby opponent early Saturday before heading back home.
But that produces just two games a week.
Meanwhile, the relatively small size of DODDS-Europe schools reduces the pool of available players, compelling a sizeable percentage of student-athletes to participate in multiple sports. That requires that the fall, winter and spring seasons not overlap, shortening the window for each regular season.
An increasing number of DODDS-Europe teams are pushing against those limits.
Two major holiday basketball tournaments – one for boys teams and one for girls – are scheduled over the next few weeks, giving participating teams an opportunity to fill out schedules and log valuable live-action court time.
The first is the annual Stuttgart Winter Holiday Basketball Tournament, set for Dec. 20-22 at Patch High School and the Patch Fitness Center. The 12-team boys tournament features eight DODDS-Europe entries in Bitburg, Black Forest Academy, Kaiserslautern, Lakenheath, Patch, Ramstein, Rota and Wiesbaden, along with Paris International School and local German squads Vaihingen-Knox, Rot-Weiss Stuttgart and BSG Ludwigsburg. Play begins at 10 a.m. each day, with the Monday championship game set for 3 p.m. at Patch Fitness Center. Daily tickets cost $2 for students, $3 for adults and $5 for a family.
Two weeks later, on Jan. 2-3, Kaiserslautern High School will host a number of DODDS-Europe rivals the New Year’s Girls Basketball Tournament. Further information will be provided as it becomes available.
Coaches say the extra games can be hugely beneficial.
“The tournament is extremely important for us,” Patch coach and Stuttgart tournament organizer Brad Rehwaldt said. “It certainly helped us remain competitive.”
Rehwaldt’s Panthers learned that firsthand last season. Patch defeated Wiesbaden 66-48 in the tournament’s title game last winter; a few weeks later, the Panthers beat the Warriors again, 60-56, in the final of the DODDS-Europe Division I championship tournament.
“We were much better prepared since we had already seen them once,” Rehwaldt said.
Lakenheath also recorded a signature moment at a recent Stuttgart tournament, this one at the home team’s expense. In the 2012 tournament title game, Lancer guard Chris Cedarstaff made a game-winning, buzzer-beating three-pointer that gave his team a 41-40 victory over host Patch.
Longtime Lancers coach Alan Campbell said the tournament is “critical to our development,” especially for his current inexperienced group.
“We are in a constant search to build momentum and confidence, especially this year,” Campbell said. “The experience at this tournament will be key to our success later in the season.”
But that experience doesn’t come without some effort, not to mention expense. Rehwaldt said the annual cost of running the tournament is about $6,000. Local grants, team fundraising efforts, concession sales and gate receipts help offset that cost.
While participating teams don’t pay a tournament entry fee, they do cover their own expenses for transportation and lodging. The tournament is not considered a part of the DODDS-Europe regular season.
Campbell brings a “select team” to the tournament, asking the families of the participating players to help cover the costs. Black Forest Academy girls coach Cevin Sweeney described a similar path for his Falcons, the defending Division II champions, making the trip to Kaiserslautern.
“There are some challenges from the financial side,” Sweeney said. “We are fortunate to have some very supportive parents.”
In the end, the money and effort goes toward the same end as the considerable financial outlay DODDS-Europe makes during the regular season and European tournament: putting young student-athletes on the court.
“Most of these kids’ most memorable moments in high school come from these road trips, so any opportunity we have to play more games, I’m all for it,” Wiesbaden boys coach David Brown said. “The extra games are invaluable.”
Sweeney agreed, saying his Falcons are “super motivated” to participate.
“They want to improve and play more games,” Sweeney said. “And something about this kind of trip helps build team unity.”
Twitter: @broomestripes
