I currently have a 6th grade basketball team that has a 20-1 record this season. I have coached these boys since 1st grade. The size of our team has grown to 14 this year. The top 7 play very good together and I don't really wont to break them up. The remanding players are not real good. The players that are not that good don't get the playing time that the top 7 do, and they are starting to get upset on playing time. Do I split them evenly on talent or make an A team thats good and a B team with the bottom 7? I am afraid of losing our chemistry. Or should I leave things alone? We are a class A team from Iowa, Just want to know your thoughts. Thank You.

You are right at thee cross roads of winning and teaching fundamentals and having fun.

The Middle schools around here don't let their 6 th graders play on the school team..... at least a few that I know of. With those teams... 1st qtr ONE set of 5 play..... in the 2nd qtr.... another set of 5 play. Now you have played 10 people. In the second half you can play anybody.

It is hard to play 14 kids/players...... but with those rules, you are playing at least 10, and somewhere along the line a couple more would be subbed in. Are you saying that you would have TWO SEPARATE TEAMS?

When I coacheed 7th & 8th graders... in my lsat year I made some arrangements with a few coaches in the non coference games... played a 5th qtr before the real game.... the last 5 kids playd.. theywere very happy, especially since they started the game. Just a thought.

Congratulation on your season by the way.

I had a similar situation as yours back in 6th/7th. We had a few players that weren't going to be able to hang if we moved up to a more competitive division. They'd been with the team for a long time, but just hadn't developed enough to play up. I made the decision to move up which meant a few of the kids had to find other teams (which they did) and play at a level they could handle. It was a tough decision, but we'd just hit that point where it wasn't fair to the kids who were ready for better competition to hold them back.

In my area, the competitive leagues have different levels. If you split them into two teams, would the lower skilled team play in the same league as your "A" team or would they play teams at their own level?

They would have to play in the same tournaments against each other. Am I wrong thinking keep the top 7 together, I can see the chemistry getting better each game? We are starting to back door cut teams and reading each other. Its 2 or 3 kids that are getting upset. I think the parents are more of the problem, I think they are in there ears. Those 2 or 3 kids are really lacking talent.

Bottom line is that somehow you need to split things up somehow... 14 is too many to have on one team. Its' impossible to get all 14 kids meaningful minutes. Ideally you have 8 kids for a game. That way all 8 get good minutes allowing them to develop and learn.

It's hard to give advice without knowing the situation. If you're in a small town where you just play other small towns around you, then you'll need to think about what the "other 7" kids will do if you split up the teams. If you're in a bigger city then I'm sure the other 7 can find other teams.

In a perfect world your good players are playing against other good players and hopefully playing against competition that is better than them (at least for some of the games). That really helps with development.

And the rest of the kids are getting to play appropriate competition level. I almost guarantee some of those bottom kids that aren't' good right now will develop later on.

Last year I coached high school freshman that went undefeated. Very talented. Well one of the top players on the team played C squad as an 8th grader. He grew, lost a few pounds, got quicker, and really improved in the off season. By the end of the year he was a stud for us. This type of things happens all the time. Kids need opportunities to play because you just never know who will develop and when.

If that is the case, I would split them into two "equal" teams of 7 as best as possible. If you're 20-1 in 6th grade, you are not playing good competition. Your players aren't learning how to play against better players. You may not dominate, but playing against each other should help them all develop. Good luck.

I just came to this forum because I had a question and just happened to see this post. I currently assist coach my son's 12 year old (mostly 6th grade) AAU basketball team, and I've coached several of his previous teams since he was 5 years old. My son has been on 2 teams (one AAU and one middle school) like this just in the last year where he was part of the "other 7", and neither situation was good for him.

I agree with many of the suggestions already given. 14 players are too many players on one team. The kids won't get meaningful playing time as well as probably development in practice. I think 8-10 players is ideal. (I think up to 10 because, at least in AAU, a couple of kids often miss because of other commitments as well as injuries.)

With that in mind, I would take the best 7 and add the next best 1-3 players. Unfortunately, I would then cut the rest, but find them another team that would best suit their skill level and be better for their development and give them more playing time.

However, if you just don't want to cut anyone, I would make 2 teams (A team and B team). I would NOT have the B team play in the same tournaments as the A team. If you're the only coach, I would coach both teams together in practice, then schedule their tournaments on opposite weekends so you can coach both teams. Or, so that you're not coaching tournaments every weekend, I would schedule them in different tournaments on the same weekend, but have my assistant coach go with the B team. Otherwise, I would just find another coach for the B team.

Bottom line: I would not hold the more talented players back for the sake of the less talented ones. In reality, most of these kids won't even be playing any competitive sports in the next year or two -- either because they don't have the talent or they don't have the interest.

I would imagine that there are a lot of other programs out there that are in the same boat you are in.... why don't you start asking around and maybe you could start a B league?

The last couple of years that I coached an 8th grade team - when we played non conference games I would talk to the other coaches and suggest that we play an extra 10 minute quarter for the bottom half of the roster. That worked out very well, the kids were happy - by the way, we played those kids first. Just a thought.