As a start-up program, we knew there were going to be some hiccups along the way. Amidst all the excitement and positive energy, we have run into scheduling challenges for the girls teams, uneven game match-ups in all divisions, lack of adequate practice space (even though both facilities are first-class), and cheerleading uniform surprises. We have addressed most of these issues but feel one area still needs some fine-tuning.

 

Our goal as a recreational program is to provide a place in the community where families and players can enjoy learning about and participating in sports in an environment that focuses on encouraging, challenging, and developing people. We believe competition is a tremendous teaching tool when used appropriately.

 

That being said, the Legacy Sports leadership feels like the scoreboard is becoming the focal point of the game. Due to some uneven matchups on the court, several teams are having trouble “staying in the game”. This is bound to happen when you have over 250 players and 30 teams. We fully believe keeping score is appropriate and can create a great deal of learning opportunities. However, we also believe most college, professional, and even recreational sports have placed too much emphasis on the final score.

 

At Legacy Sports, rather than having the scoreboard become the only factor in determining success and whether or not a team had “fun”, we feel it should be kept in its proper place as one of many evaluating factors (others would include hard work, sportsmanship, attitude, effort, progress from last game, teamwork, and so forth).

 

With that in mind, we are planning to experiment with a new philosophy over the next few weeks. Rather than keeping a continuous tally of the score throughout the game, we will reset the score at the beginning of each period (in reality, teams will now be playing 6 short games rather than 1 long game). We believe this format will help “devalue” the importance of the final score but still allow for teaching and learning opportunities.

 

It is important for our young children to understand that there are winners and losers because society is built itself around this principle. They also need to learn how to handle the emotions that come along with winning and losing. But, we need to teach these young minds that winning is not the only thing that matters.

 

God has given all people the opportunity to become part of his team, not just those with special skills or talents. Anyone who accepts his initiation is welcome, even those who finish in the “middle of the pack” or “last” because God doesn’t care about the final score as much as he cares about my heart, attitude, and decision to accept his free initiation to join the team.