What I learned watching girls play basketball

JACKSON HOLE, Wyo. — My name is Jake Nichols. I cover the Jackson Lady Broncs basketball team. I’m paid to show up when they play. They aren’t. I’m doing a job. They’re just being superheroes in shorts and sneakers.

The Jackson Lady Broncs are not a good basketball team. Not by the numbers. Not in the way sports teams are traditionally measured. They’ve lost 8 straight games. They are 2-9 on the season. Winless in conference. Scoring, shooting, turnovers—by nearly every metric, every statistic, this team is near the bottom of the pack of the 16 teams in the 4A. It was worse last year and worser still the year before.

And this season has gone from promising to bad to cringe.

Their leading scorer transfers to another school. Another star player is lost to injury. Then another.

There is no conceivable reason I can think of that would cause a player on the Jackson girls basketball team to continue to come to practice every day, ride a bus for hours, and get drubbed game after game. At least, that was my impression before I started getting invested in watching them. Now I’ve bought in. I’m team Lady Broncs. And here’s why…

These girls don’t quit. Ever.

I respect their game. A full 32 minutes, score be damned, leave it all out there kind of round ball. Down 20 points late in the game, these athletes are still diving on the hardwood for loose balls. Beaten last week by a team that dominated them in every facet of the game, the Lady Broncs learn from it, put it behind them and move on. Resilient and ready to tap a new contest.

They just keep showing up. In a shallow ‘me’ culture of TikTok, rap stars, and Insta influencers, the Jackson Lady Broncs show up and play for each other if for no one else. In a COVID-panicked society that is all too willing to cancel everything not because of the fear of a pandemic anymore but because it’s just easier to go virtual, Zoom it, mail it in—the girls on the Jackson Hole High School basketball team make the effort to make the scene.

As the meme (and supposedly Woody Allen) says: 90% of life is showing up.

And it’s life lessons at work here, make no mistake. A high school sophomore is not going to remember how many rebounds she had against Evanston that one January night in ’22. Fans certainly won’t. And hopefully she’ll also forget the season they won just twice in 22 games in 2019-20, for instance. But what will stick and stay is the strong woman she will become. The warrior she is already.

While a state title gathers dust in the high school trophy case, graduates are sent out into a world they are increasingly, woefully underprepared for. SAT scores are nice but you wanna build character? Try surviving an 8-game losing streak. Hold your head up when your team hasn’t won a game in a month. Or two.

I watch these kids play their hearts out. Heart and hustle. For pride, for school, for their ride-or-die crew. Over and over, they take one for the team. They realize there is something bigger than themselves. When they’re down, they get back up. When they’re throwed, they get back on. They always take the re-ride; pick the path of most resistance.

This team is perspiration and inspiration.

Probably these players aren’t conscious of any of this. They’re likely just going through the ups and downs of being a teenager, doing school and playing sports. But the person they are becoming every game, and, yes, with every whipping they take on the court lately, is harder-faster-stronger. Polishing a pearl.

This team is fearless. And I love ’em for that.