By Will Collett and Nicky Kilmon
The Basketball teams here at the middle school each had a very successful season. Will Collett and Nicky Kilmon interviewed Mr. Glavin and Mr. Rivera, looking back on this season. Mr. Glavin and Mr. Rivera are the coaches of the teams. Mr. Rivera coaches the boys team, and Mr. Glavin coaches the girls team. Mr. Rivera teaches applied science here at WMS, and Mr. Glavin teaches history at the high school.
| It seems like defense is a very important part of your gameplay. Can you explain some of the strategies you use? How do you play offensively? | |
| Mr. Rivera | “Every season I have to look at the people we have.” He plays to his strengths. They play a two three zone. They try to push their opponent out of the three point line. (there was no audio for this) |
| Mr. Glavin | “On defense one of the things we emphasize is that the girls have a lot of energy, right? So they play hard. They move. They slide their feet and then otherwise we want them to rebound the ball, right? So we want them to put themselves in a good position to get the ball if it goes off the hoop. So slide use energy and rebound the ball.” |
| How would you describe this season of basketball and how has it compared to previous seasons? (What’s your record?) | |
| Mr. Rivera | “Our record this season is 5 and 6. We have one more game tomorrow (Feb 6, 2024) and compared to my other teams, you know, it’s different year to year depending on the personnel. But teams always work hard no matter what our record is. This year most of our losses have been by 2-3 points and one overtime loss and a couple games decided by 3 points or 2 points. And this team fights till the very end. One of the differences between this team and others is that we have all 8th graders which means these guys have played together on and off the court as a unit together. And they have good chemistry on the court and they get after it. They try to win every single game. Every single minute they’re looking to win.” |
| Mr. Glavin | “So this is my second season, and this season we’ve been really successful from a winning perspective. We’re 7-4 and we’ve won a lot of games where we really dominated the other teams, both effort wise and scoring. It was a big improvement on last year and I think a lot of that is that we have some talented eighth graders and then a few new seventh graders that came in and have been helpful.” |
| What is your toughest opponent equivalent to this season? Thinking about TriTown, MetroWest, and AAU, what league would it be similar to? | |
| Mr. Rivera | “So this season our toughest opponent has been A-B: Acton Boxborough. They have some really really talented shooters and they play to those strengths. They are pretty well coached and no matter what we do to defend them they are able to find the difference and a weakness in our defense and exploit that. We play them pretty closely for most of the game but they always find a way to manage to pull away. We lost to them by three points in one game and I think we lost to them by six points in another game. They just have some really talented shooters. I think they focus on a town level, skills wise and clinics. I don’t see a lot of A.A.U. players on their team so probably more of like a Metrowest type of league.” |
| Mr. Glavin | “So by far the toughest opponent we’ve played is Acton Boxborough Middle School and I think that team would be, at least their starting five would be considered like A.A.U. players because they have a lot of height, they have a lot of athleticism, they play tenacious defense, and when we switch to a zone they can shoot the ball as well, so I would say most of their players play A.A.U. basketball.” |
| What previous goals have you completed this season? What goals do you have for future seasons? | |
| Mr. Rivera | “As a team I think my goal was to make sure that the team plays as cohesive and as a strong unit. They’ve come together. They’re a team that likes to hang out with each other and it shows on the court. They stick together. They stick up for each other. Their cohesiveness on and off the court has been really big for me this year. I think that’s something we’ve accomplished pretty well and especially with the girls team being as competitive as they are it lends to a programmatic kind of team mindset versus just us and them. My goal going into every season is that the teams ultimately get better every single time they step on the court, so every time you step on the court my saying is that you should be better than the last time and use that opportunity to be better next time. I think these guys – boys and girls – take that to heart and that’s something I’m gonna continue to push in the future.” |
| Mr. Glavin | ‘So our main goal is to develop – to get better as the season goes on – and that is definitely something that’s happened, especially with a lot of our seventh graders. They’ve become comfortable dribbling the ball against a press. They’ve become better going to their left like working on lefty layups, left hand dribbling, and then we always want to compete as well. So we hope to play a lot of competitive games and that’s something we improved this year from last year where we’ve been in every single game. My main goals are to, as I said, compete every year so every game we come into we know we have a chance to win and then continue to have players that want to play for Wayland. Last year some of the girls on my team were seventh graders. They are now eighth graders and they’re the leaders on the team, so if you have a few seventh graders that play and they learn how to play at this level, they get to continue that process and be leaders as eighth graders and that’s really fun.” |
Will and Nicky conducted a fantastic interview with our coaches – well done!