Hi,

This will be my first experience coaching a competitive 5th and 6th grade boys travel team. Currently I have 13 kids signed up. I would appreciate any advice that can be offered related to the number of players recommended to be kept on the final roster? Obviously, I would prefer not to cut any of the kids since i know many of them well, however, i recognize the challenges that keeping that many kids would present. Especially in managing playing time while keeping games competetive. There seems to be a lot of ways to look at the situation.

Thanks for the help.

I would split them in two teams. You can practice together but play separate games. The ideal number of players at a game is 8. Otherwise you have too many players and several kids just get "token / junk minutes". Those players won't get better.

You have to consider that some kids will miss. But 13 is too many when only 5 players can play at a time. If you do the math there is not enough time in the game to get them enough minutes. A players needs a MINIMUM of 8-10 minutes in the game to get any benefit. And throwing them in at the end after the game is won does not count.

Those are my thoughts. Hope it helps.

Thanks Jeff,

Good Advice. Unforturnately we can only field one team for the league we're in. Given that situation, i'm thinking 10 would be ideal for practice purposes. Thoughts?

I really dislike cutting players at this age. This is what I would try to do.

Rotate the players every game. Take a different set of 8, 9, or 10 players to each game.

Call the coaches in your league or area and try to set up scrimmages outside of the league.

In a league that I organized, we also set up an extra 10 to 20 minutes of play time for the players who didn't get as much playing time.

It's not perfect, but you don't want to cut those 11th, 12th, or 13th players. They may not look like much now, but all so often, there is a diamond in the rough.

Coach Sar will even tell you that he's had kids that get cut from the freshmen team that turn into all conference players by the time they are seniors.

Jeff and Joe have some great advice for you and yes, I have had several kids that didn't make the jr high teams, didn't play as freshman that became all conference..... the diamond in the rough.

My last year coaching 7th and 8th grade kids I did something like this....... ( we had a very good team for the first time in ages.... probably went 7 - 8 deep that could give us quality minutes.... weaker with the 7-8th player ) We played a lot of games since they cut one day a week off my practices... kids loved that... we practiced 3 days a week and played 2 games - a lot of them were out of our league.... so when I scheduled those games I made sure that we played a 10 minute quarter for the last 7-8 players on the team. That made them happy, they got some quality time and they played BEFORE the regular game.

This worked very well for us. At the high school level we started playing some Sophomore B games for the same reason..... makes the kids happy, no one wants to be practice fodder.

Hope this helps.

Thanks guys. One thing i forgot to mention in my original post was that there is an in-house program. Anyone cut would have the opportunity to play at that level.

Does that change anyones view?

Since there are only 13 - I would go with Joe's suggestion....

Rotate the players every game. Take a different set of 8, 9, or 10 players to each game.

This keeps them all happy and gives everyone a chance to be there on game day. Don't forget, during the season there are injuries, illinesses and things that come up in the kids lives that prevent them from being there.

Without knowing all the dynamics of the situation (coaches available, number of games, purpose of the team, etc, etc), it's hard to say what I'd do for sure. But here are the key points / guidelines that I would use to make my decision...

- make a positive impact on as many kids as you can!
- 8 players at each game is about the "perfect" number for a standard game. I would not go over 10. With 10 you can platoon and they will all get at least 16 minutes of playing time, which is not bad. If you play tournaments with lots of games in one day (which I don't recommend), you might want to have more players.
- make it fun for the players!
- teach fundamentals skills - focus on development and celebrating their improvement! Don't worry about winning at this age level.
- if you scrimmage during practice, play small side games (3 on 3, etc) so players get more touches on the ball
- if you have more than 10 players in practice, get an assistant or two. consider using stations. most coaches start feeling spread too thin when they have 10 or more players in practice. i personally feel comfortable with a large group but I study basketball for a living and i'm familiar with a huge arsenal of drills. so my situation is pretty unique.
- no waiting in lines during practice. keep them moving and working on skill every second you can. choose drills that keep players busy.
- every player should have a ball and get as many touches as possible (lots of shots, dribbling, etc)
- set a good example and teach life lessons. treat every kid as they were your own, help them as much as you can.

All the coaches have made really good suggestions and there are lots of ways to go about this. Hopefully these ideas and opinions help with your decision.

Joe, obvioulsy you have no idea about today's "Professional Youth Sports." I think you should not only cut the kids at that age level but tell them that their basketball careers are over, they won't play in HS, and they'll never amount to anything. Then recruit the best 7 or 8 kids you can and go "win the league championsip." You'll become a legend in due time and every kid in town will want to play for you. :)

Unfortunately, that is what youth sports has become these days.

If there is any way you can create 2 teams of 7/8 kids, that is certainly the way to go. It is worth persuing vigorously. Your giving as many kids as possilbe the opportunity -- isn't that part of our responsibility? 10 kids on a team sucks -- been there.

Rotating players could be an alternative, but what do you do with your best player? Do you rotate him out as well? If you do go that route, make sure parents know what is going to happen -- you're bound to get the "agent parent" you thinks their kid should play the whole game.

Good luck.

Unfortunately, there's no chance to split teams with the situation we are in. We only have 13, it wouldn't fly with the league, we wouldn't have coaches for the second team, etc. etc. Even if we could split up we would end up creating two teams that would not be competitive. Kids are not going to enjoy getting pummelled every game.

Thank you all for your suggestions. I'm learning that their is no good answer.