“But I have promises to keep, and miles to go before I sleep”
-          R. Frost
 
Things continue to roll on over here. CNU just wrapped another very successful Family Weekend, both for the school as a whole and for several of our athletic teams who posted big wins.  Many of our guys had their parents and siblings on campus to join in the festivities.  Aside from the horror those parents must have experienced when they saw the condition of their sons' once neat and tidy dorm rooms, it was a fun and relaxing time all around.
 
Moving forward from that, the cool autumn weather sinking in across our great Commonwealth can only mean one thing: the start of basketball season is almost upon us. Our official start date is Monday, October 15^th, when we will take the court for the first time as the 2012-2013 Captains squad. All of us, players and coaches, will finally be able to channel all of our anticipation and excitement into getting better on the hardwood.
 
This week, the last of the preseason, will be spent resting our bodies and making final preparations for the start of practice. We all want to make sure that we're ready to hit the ground running once we start this next leg of the journey. The preseason can really drag on at times – especially at the Division III level, where coaches are prohibited from working with their players on the court. Being able to sense a new beginning is a real plus to team morale and the energy of the guys.
 
Many outside observers would think that October 15^th is the time when we really start to get to work on the upcoming season. However, it's truly been a long and arduous road just to get to this point. Each member of the program has put in a lot of time and effort over the previous months. The returners have shouldered new leadership responsibilities while also continuing to balance the demands of their schoolwork and basketball. The freshmen have gone through the long recruiting process and then adjusted to the new academic, social, and basketball life at Christopher Newport. In a lot of ways it's a relief to be able to start this season up and see what results we can achieve from these efforts.
 
From a coaching perspective, it is also very rewarding to get to the official start of practice. Since last season ended in March, all of our time and energy have been spent on literally everything under the sun, except coaching on the court. This has always seemed kind of wrong to me, since we are basketball coaches after all. What happens on that hardwood is the essence of what we do. I've always believed that no matter what, as a coach if you don't feel a jolt, a fire in your belly, when you step onto that court to coach your guys up, then you shouldn't be doing this for a living.
 
Now that isn't to say this all isn't a grind, and many times that fire in your belly can represent different things (one of my latest Google searches may or may not have been for “symptoms of peptic ulcers”). Regardless, through all the hours, the work, and the travel, everyday from October 15^th until sometime in March I get to spend at least a few hours a day on a basketball court, helping to make our players better as individuals while also teaching them as a team to better play the greatest game ever invented.
 
That's just it; we are indeed playing a game, but we've all made the choice to dedicate ourselves to being the best we possibly can at it. It's a long journey, but one that offers a lot of promise and potential to those who choose to take it. The coaches get to devote their lives to their craft. The players receive a world-class education and get to play the sport they love, and hopefully learn a ton about themselves and life in the process. All in all, not many people in this world are afforded this luxury and opportunity.
 
So I say bring on the start of practice, because we are the lucky ones, peptic ulcers and all.