Tropical Storm Barry forced Varnando to push its basketball camp back five days, but postponement did not stop the school from having a solid turnout, as the clinic had 30 participants.
“Things happen for a reason,” Varnado coach DW Trosclair said. “Postponing because of the storm situation, I thought when we were going to come back to have to do it, the kids weren’t going to come out, but we did have a great turnout. I’m very appreciative that the kids came out. Hopefully next year, it’ll be bigger. That’s what I’m looking for next year, but I am so happy for the turnout that came out today for these kids.”
The campers worked on fundamentals, defense, shooting and agility.
Trosclair said shooting is very important for the game.
“Kids today don’t appreciate the form of shooting. They want to be the Kyrie Irvings, they wanna be Kawhi Leonard one of these days. I’m old school, so I try to break things down like shooting form, defensive stance, offensive stance, so that’s one of the main things I’m focusing on and agilities. Trying to move left-to-right, backwards-and-forwards, so that’s what I’m definitely working on.”
Trosclair said he loves doing camps.
“The No. 1 thing is it’s about the kids,” Trosclair said. “It’s about the children. This is our future. They’re coming up. I want them to continue working hard, especially if they want to play basketball in the future. This is where it starts. Kids, they’re seeing what’s happening now, ‘hey, I wanna continue doing this.’ I’ve got some kids that have never done this before and now you’ve got kids and I’m overhearing conversations, ‘man, hopefully I can do this next year.’ Keeping kids coming back, keeping kids in tune and keeping kids interested in basketball, that’s the big thing.”
Helping out with the camp were players from Varnado’s boys and girls basketball teams, Varnado girls basketball coach Cheyenne Wilson, President of the Angie Youth Sports Association Howard Kelly and Varnado assistant basketball coach and football defensive coordinator Chris Davenport, who played football at LSU and Varnado trainer Cheyenne Naquin.. Davenport is former LSU football player.
Also for the camp, former Covenant Christian Academy basketball coach and current youth speaker with the group Brothers at Peace Ronald Scott spoke to the participants.