Lady Blues, Steers host annual basketball camp

Eighty young basketball players arrived at the Graham High School gym this week for the start of the Graham basketball camp. This year, both the girls and boys basketball camps combined, with the boys in one gym with Steers head coach Marcus Morris while the Lady Blues held their camp in the other gym with head coach Ky Graham and assistant Sarah Curd. With campers from the ages of fourth grade through ninth grade, Graham said no matter what age, players always need to improve on the basics of the game. “This community has great kids,” Graham said. “They are always fired up and ready to go. When you see the number that we have had so far these few days, it means we have a lot of support. If you have a basketball camp and nobody shows up, then you need to be a little worried about the interest level. Even with the strength and conditioning camp and soccer camp ongoing in the morning, some of the kids attend more than one during the day. That, to me right there, tells me they want to become good basketball players.” Graham’s son, Kaison, a coach at Class 6A Cinco Ranch, also helped with the event. Lady Blues and Steers varsity players, including Marc Tate, Cameron Mason and Evan Ranger, were on hand helping teach younger athletes, like Thomas Mercer and Lawson Wenninger, fundamentals and skills such as shooting, passing, ball handling, defense, rebounding, free throws and teamwork. “We start out with some mass dribbling drills, triple-threat shooting and split into stations where we teach the proper way to play a position,” Graham said. “I think camp should be like a step-by-step practice but needs to have some fun things so that they can think of the sport as a fun way to compete against each other.” For the rest of this story, subscribe to our print or online edition.