Kendall Jackson's Senior Season - First month of the season and the end of 2012

December 31, 2012 Terrence Payne

What’s up world? It’s Suffield Academy’s Kendall Jackson here again, here to tell you how the month of December went for the Suffield Tigers.  We started off the season with seven games in 13 days. With only four days to practice prior to our first game, we played well as a team as we beat Westminster in our home opener. Next, we travel to Avon Old Farms, and were able to beat them in convincing fashion.

Canterbury was our next game. We knew that would be a tough game, as they are very talented. Our experience paid off against Canterbury, as we opened the game on a 17-4 run, and were able to ride that opening momentum to a big home win.

Just a day after we beat Canterbury, we traveled to Babson College, near Boston, to take on Blair Academy (N.J.) in the Hoop Mountain Academic Roundball Classic. This was a tough six-point loss for the team, but again, we played well as a team. Considering Blair had been practicing and playing for over a month, compared to our week and a half, we did a pretty good job. 

We had to bounce back quickly from the Blair loss and prepare for the Loomis Holiday Tournament, as we would face Kimble Union Academy, The Gunnery, and Berkshire School on three consecutive days. We won two out of the three games, losing to a good Kimble Union in our first game of the tournament. We responded well against both Gunnery and Berkshire. We moved the ball well, and had a balanced attack in both games. It was a nice way to end our first hectic stretch of games.

Coach D [Jeff Depelteau] gave us the weekend off after the Berkshire win, because we were all pretty tired after that opening stretch of games and practices. After our off days we had three days to prepare for a very good Northfield Mount Hermon team in the Basketball Holiday Hoopfest. This was a disappointing loss for us, because we knew we didn’t play to our potential, and we knew we had to against one of the best teams we will see all year.

Even though we lost, the game against NMH showed us a lot of things we have to work on as a team moving forward. If we are going to be a championship level team in March, we need to focus on playing hard all the time, being more efficient on offense and talking more on defense. We definitely have the potential to get there, and I know we will put the work in as a team.

As 2012 comes to a close, we are 5-3. We are currently undefeated against Class B teams, and our only losses came to a strong team from out of region, a strong Class AA team, and the defending Class AAA champions, so as a team we feel like we are in good shape for 2013. We just need to continue to work hard and improve, and we will get there.

For the next two weeks I’ll be home in California, celebrating the holidays, hanging out with family and friends, and working on my game. I hope everyone has a great holiday season, and I’ll talk with y’all in 2013. 

Follow Kendall on Twitter: @Kenni_Bo

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