The Top 10 Sports Feel Good Stories of the Decade

The news coverage for a sports feel good story follows a familiar path.  Typically, a local newspaper covers the story first followed by local TV.  If the story is interesting enough, its picked up by sports blogs big and small.  If the story still has legs, other national media outlets including well known sports columnists, Sports Illustrated, ESPN, sports radio stations pass the story on to their audiences.  Morning news shows and talk shows might interview the people involved in the story.  Sometimes, even books and movies  are created.

As a result, an inspirational sports story can touch many lives. The ten stories below have.

Here are our Editor’s selections for the “Top 10 Sports Feel Good Stories of the Decade”

10. 12 year-old girl pitches perfect game. In a Bayonne, NJ Little League game, Mackenzie Brown became the first player to throw a perfect game in its 58 year-old history. Mackenzie, one of only 2 girls in the Bayonne league, struck out 18 batters — all boys — in route to her perfect game.  Read more/See video

9. One-handed player wins Div. I basketball scholarship. Kevin Laue’s left arm ends at his elbow as the result of his mother’s umbilical cord cutting off the circulation and stunting the arm’s growth.  While he could never quite succeed on the monkey bars or with a guitar, he plays basketball at a very high level.  He earned a Division I scholarship to Manhattan College.  Read more/See video

8. Blake Hoffharber’s shot from the seat of his pants. A high school basketball player’s incredible shot.  See video

7. Maurice Cheeks assists 13 year-old National Anthem singer. Natalie Gilbert, a 13 year-old, began singing the National Anthem before a basketball game between the Trail Blazers and the Dallas Mavericks on April 25, 2003. When Gilbert struggled to find the correct words for the song and became flustered, Trail Blazers’ Coach Maurice Cheeks came to her rescue.  Read more/See video

6. College basketball coach Don Meyer overcomes car accident and cancer to set all-time NCAA wins mark. Another impressive Don Meyer record:  In his 37 years of coaching, one player — only one — hasn’t graduated.  Read more/See video

5. Father’s response to daughter tossing souvenir ball back onto field. The crowd cheered Steve Monforto’s catch of a foul ball at a Philadelphia Phillies baseball game on September 16.  But the loudest cheer came when Monforto hugged his daughter after she tossed the ball back onto the field after he gave it to her to look at.  Read more/See video

4. Michael Oher’s inspirational story:  from homeless to top NFL draft pick. If you’ve seen “The Blind Side,” you know the story.  Read more/See video

3. Sportsmanship shines at college softball game. Opposing team players Mallory Holtman and Liz Wallace carried Sara Tucholsky around the bases when her injury prevented her from taking a home run trot on her own.  Read more/See video

2. Team Hoyt. A father-son team whose picture should be next to “inspirational” in the dictionary.  An amazing story.  Read more/See video

1. Jason McElwain, diagnosed with autism, scores 20 points in 4 minutes in his first varsity basketball game. His point total included 6 three-pointers.  Read more/See video

SportsFeelGoodStories.com showcases inspirational sports stories that focus on good deeds, overcoming obstacles, achievement and sportsmanship.

Iowa State Cyclones celebrate football victory over Nebraska

Missing their starting quarterback and leading rusher, the Iowa State Cyclones upset the favored Nebraska Cornhuskers by a score of 9 – 7 in Lincoln. Compounding their key personnel absences for the game, many of the Cyclones were also battling the flu or colds. But, the Cyclones took advantage of 8 Cornhuskers turnovers, and used a fake punt to rally for the victory.

Iowa State’s last victory over Nebraska dates back to 1977.  That partially explains the wild locker room scene shown in the clip below. Paul Rhoads, first-year head coach of the Cyclones, and his team celebrated the big win.

More on the story:  www.gocyclones.com

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The Don Meyer Interview

Is Don Meyer the best-kept secret in basketball?  Despite passing Bobby Knight, Dean Smith and Adolph Rupp on the all-time NCAA men’s college basketball coaching victory list, would average basketball fans recognize the name Don Meyer?  Probably not, but they should.

Currently coaching at Northern State University in Aberdeen, South Dakota, Meyer also earned victories at Lipscomb University in Nashville, Tennessee and at Hamline University in Saint Paul.  The national basketball spotlight doesn’t always shine brightly on these basketball locales, so Meyer’s amazing 903 career victories were earned with little national fanfare.

Last year, some may remember the video clip shown and speech he gave at last year’s ESPY awards when he won the Jimmy V (Valvano) award for perseverance.  The video detailed his car accident on September 5, 2008, in which he lost the bottom of his left leg and suffered many other injuries.  During emergency surgery, cancer was discovered in his liver and intestines.  After recovering from surgery and rehabbing, he was released from the hospital on October 30, 2008.  The next morning at 4:45 he was back in his office working on the season ahead.  He didn’t miss a practice or a game the entire season.

Meyer has had 26 seasons where he won over 20 games in his 37 years of college coaching.  Highly regarded amongst his coaching peers, Meyer’s coaching clinics and resources have taught thousands of basketball coaches.  Perhaps his most impressive stat relates to the success of his players in the classroom.  In his 37 years of coaching, one player — only one — hasn’t graduated.

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Sports Feel Good Stories: In youth basketball programs across the country, parents volunteer as coaches frequently with only high school playing experience (or less).  What three tips might you suggest for youth coaches as they begin seasons with their teams?

Don Meyer: You will usually only have one hour to practice, so keep it simple and fundamental. Start with fundamentals, move the fundamentals to the next section with competition, and finish with scrimmage.  No more than four trips up and down before critiquing the play — praise, correct, and then play some more.

SFGS: From your experience, what are the important qualities that separate the good coaches from the bad?

Don Meyer: Character…Servant’s heart…Love for kids…Love of the game…Desire to improve and bring it every day.

SFGS: Some coaches seem to be able to quickly adapt key learnings from other coaches. What couple of coaching tips, strategy-wise or tactical, have you picked up from other coaches and found really valuable?

Don Meyer: You have to get all the good ideas but you cannot use all the good ideas.  Study other coaches, leaders in any profession and determine how they motivate, instruct, and drive athletes to high levels of performance.  How do they build teams?

SFGS: For young basketball players intent on improving their games, what advice might you give them on how to improve their driveway workouts?

Don Meyer: Start slow, get a rhythm and then go fast enough to make a mistake — mistakes are your friends if you are going at a game speed.  You learn what you can do at game speeds and you overload your mind and body.  That is how you improve.  After you have worked on something and know what to do compete with yourself by time or score or both.

SFGS: What suggestions could you provide coaches who are encouraging players to take some risks during game play, e.g. how to encourage players who will only dribble with their right hands to dribble with their left hands during games?

Don Meyer: You work on it in practice and look for time in blowouts to concentrate on some of those skills. Confidence comes from demonstrated ability and that comes first from practice.

SFGS: What do you find most rewarding about coaching basketball?

Don Meyer: Seeing individuals and teams improve and play to the highest level of their competence. Overcoming difficulties and combating adversity whether it’s on or off the floor for yourself, players, and teams.

SFGS: What’s your favorite basketball drill in practice and why?

Don Meyer: I have no one favorite drill.  We try to use drills that simulate game situations and require concentration by the players and coaches. We like to use stop and score a lot.  You must get a defensive stop and a score to win the game.  We like to play three possessions when we do this.  Short games accentuate the pressure and make each possession important.  We also like to play 4 on 5 to promote ball movement, defensive rotations, and develop athleticism in our players.

SFGS: Your comeback to coaching after the terrible car accident and cancer diagnosis is a great inspiration.  In addition to the great support you received from family, friends and supporters; what helped you through this incredibly difficult time?

Don Meyer: The desire to come back and coach a team.  The desire to be part of a team is very important to me.  Bible study and prayer were big keys for me.  You think about the things that are really important when you are flat on your back.

SFGS: How have these events changed your approach to coaching?

Don Meyer: I am more intense and try to squeeze more into each day.  I am hungrier and I believe more understanding and appreciative of great efforts.  You are always looking for ways to win on and off the floor. You can’t have one personality while teaching on the floor and another off the floor.

SFGS: Linking the learning of basketball skills with understanding some important life lessons is a specialty that you excel in.  How would you explain to a beginning coach how to go about doing that?

Don Meyer: You are constantly looking for teachable moments, times for informal learning, and ways to use  “soft rain” to get life lessons across.  Jesus is referred to as “teacher” in the Bible more than any other descriptor.

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Check out Coach Meyer’s site at http://www.coachmeyer.com/.  It’s a great resource for basketball coaches at all levels.  Books, tapes and DVDs are available.  Also, check out the Players’ Corner, Coaches’ Corner and Parents’ Corner sections.

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30 Youth Basketball Practice Plans — Be ready for every practice in 5 minutes! Go to www.coachingwhiz.com

The Hampton Inn Basketball Commercials: teenagers, a basketball, a video camera and YouTube

You may have seen the commercial where the kid chucks the ball off the roof and then it one-bounces on the driveway into the hoop for a basket. Other commercials in the campaign feature a basket bounced in off of a tree, a ball kicked in like an NFL punt and a shot that goes in from long distance after being struck by a baseball bat. The commercials promote a loyalty program for the Hampton Inn with the payoff, “Want an Easier Way to Score Points?”

It’s not an uncommon response to think that these shots were the result of some trick video editing, but that’s not the case.

A group of teenage boys from Hoover, Alabama planned, executed and filmed these shots. At the time, they never realized they’d be shown as commercials that played on national TV during the NCAA Final Four, at NBA arenas and on the Jumbotron at Times Square in NYC.

Carson Stalnaker, the ringleader and cameraman of the group, describes how the boys started out 2 years prior to the commercials airing, “One day, my friends and I were playing basketball and the ball rolled away. I went to get it. Just for fun, I kicked the ball back from behind the goal, and it went over the top of the goal and hit the rim. Everyone was thinking how cool it would have been if it went in. Every once in awhile, we would try it just to see if it would go in. We told the people there that if it did go in, we had to tell people about it cause no one would believe it.”

When Stalnaker acquired a Digital Blue video camera, the group decided it would be fun to tape the shots. Stalnaker said, “We were going to make DVD’s and sell them for money. That idea did not become a reality so we decided to put them on YouTube.”

The degree of difficulty of the shots requires the group to try shot after shot, sometimes pausing to delete the missed shots to create more space on the tape. One shot took almost 4 hours to make, but the average is about an hour.

After posting the “The Legendary Shots” on YouTube, the boys tracked how many visitors came to watch their videos. They spent some time defending the legitimacy of their videos as some of the shots appeared so unlikely that many assumed they had to be fake.

Draft FCB, a worldwide advertising agency with headquarters in NYC and Chicago was working on an assignment for Hampton Inn that focused on the Double Hilton HHonors base points offer. “Basketball immediately came to the team’s mind as a creative angle,” according to Draft FCB’s VP Jim Dzwierzynski, “ Not only did it lend itself well to the ‘double points’ offer we were communicating, but Hampton already had a college basketball sponsorship in place for 2009.” Dzwierzynski continued, “During the creative process, our art director remembered seeing YouTube footage of real kids scoring points with the most difficult and unbelievable basketball shots. The authenticity and realness of both the kids featured and their unbelievable shots captured on YouTube, perfectly personifies that earning points shouldn’t be so difficult and Hampton makes it easy.”

An agency representative contacted Carson through YouTube. Carson’s mom, Jill Stalnaker, followed up and a deal was quickly struck.

Carson said, “ The first time I saw the Hampton Inn commercial, we had been told by the ad agency that it would start airing the next weekend. It was a Tuesday and I was sitting at our computer doing homework and the TV was on. I look over at the television and saw our next door neighbors house on TV and I couldn’t understand what I was seeing. Then I realized it was our commercial and started screaming. We were able to get it on DVR, called the shooter, he and his mom came over in jammies at 10:00pm to see it. It was so exciting, we watched it over and over.

Soon, “The Hampton Inn Hotshots” were the toast of the town appearing on the front page of the Birmingham News, a segment on the local CBS News and appearing on Good Day Alabama.

Hoover High School, noted for its strong football program — yes, this is the same school featured in MTV’s “Two-a-Days: Hoover High” with Coach Propst — now had a contingent noted for its basketball shooting. The core group of kids are: Carson Stalnaker, William Snoddy, Jeff Keith, Chase Martin, Bryan Anderson, Barret Crawford, Jeffrey Higgenbotham, Alex Watkins, and Phil Latko. Although none of this group play on the school basketball team, their basketball skills have been seen by more viewers than probably any high school player in the country.

So, did the commercials work? According to Judy Christa-Cathey, Vice President Hampton Brand Marketing, “The combination of our 15 second television spots with our Hilton HHonors reward incentives is a winning combination driving incremental revenue to our hotels. We launched this in the fourth quarter of 2008 and are maximizing it for the entire 2009 calendar year to impact our performance.”

In the first commercial, Carson’s classmate William Snoddy is shown making the shot that bounces off the roof and into the basket. “When the shot went in, I felt relieved when I realized I accomplished something that took quite awhile to do,” said Snoddy.

How did the group get permission to shoot off of the roof of the house? Carson, revealing some tricks of the trade, said, “Our next-door neighbor didn’t find out we were using his roof until he saw the commercial on TV.”

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The First Commercial

The Second Commercial

The Third Commercial

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