Congratulations! I hope it was fun for everyone.
I certainly had fun this season. The kids, probably too. Coach Lance must have too, to fly back from business in Milwaukee in time for our last game -- or maybe he'd've done so anyway for family reasons.
Max sacrificed a good deal to play. His 17 YO sister was killed in a car accident this spring. He barely made weight early in our season to play interior line positions. For the final game he'd gotten under the weight limit to play unrestricted as to position.
This was the only season I'd ever coached that had two girls on the team (roster of 19). Most teams I've coached had none, but twice I'd coached teams with one. I've been with "this team" (in the sense of the core of players and coaches) since 2017, when they were at what the Morris County Youth Football League calls Clinic Level; both girls were picked up this year. Unfortunately in my experience 12 years old is about when girls tend to stop playing football, so I hope we keep them next year.
This season we also picked up Coach Dennis, who reminds me of a good and funny head coach I worked with for 3 seasons in NY. Dennis lives near me and coached another team in the club in previous years, although he did help us a little then too. Unfortunately the reason he could coach with us this year is that we couldn't field enough 12U players to form that team this year. This club's been very fortunate in fielding a team at each MCYFL level every year for some time until this year. Dennis replaced Coach Jeff, whom I liked very much -- he was a biophysicist, me a biochemist -- whose son Xander this year switched school districts and is concentrating on soccer, sportwise.
This season I frequently went to practice after dragging thru most of the day, and then felt energized by football practice. Something about the sport, being around children, and being out on the field and (somewhat) active. Been coaching in NY and NJ since 2007, and sometimes noticed that effect before, but never so frequently as this year.
Anybody else want to discuss football strategy and coaching as related to children, or to relative newcomers at any age?