Summer Blog Post – August 7th

Today was the last regular full day of activities of the summer as this coming week beginning tomorrow will be filled with some special days such as Challenge Day and Choice Day and some out of Camp trips.

So for many campers, today was one last time to go to a clinic to work on their soccer and basketball skills. Some cabins may have logged their last BBK games of the summer as a group. Others may have had their last instructional swim until next year. We talk a lot about living in the moments when you’re at camp, savoring in the small stuff like sitting under your favorite tree or making time to do the things you truly love here with your camp friends.

The rest of the week will be spent tying up the loose ends of an incredible summer, sorting out Tournaments winners and deciding more of those Leagues championships I told you about yesterday.

One of those championships played out today on BB1, stretching from fifth period into Snack Squad. The Inter Boys Leagues title was on the line. On one side, the undefeated, first-place Shark Tooth Lion Head, coached by Jack Futerman and Scott Simons. On the other end, Luke Rosenthal and Liam Jones’s Snake Leg Dragon Lips were making a game of it, which nobody had been able to do against those guys all summer.

There were 12 seconds left on the clock.

Shark Tooth Lion Head led, 21-20.

Timeout.

I went into the huddles to hear what was going on.

“Make sure you play D on your man!”

“Do you know who you have?”

“When can we get Snack Squad?”

“What’s the score?”

“Guys, we can do this!”

“What do we get if we win?”

By now, the bleachers had filled with Cadet and Senior Boys, drawn to the drama of the game. People came down from the Canteen with their snacks and congregated at BB1 as the littlest boys in camp found their men, got organized and played out the last 12 seconds of their season.

It did not matter that Snake Leg Dragon Lips didn’t score with that last possession or that they lost the game. They had made a game of it. They took the best team in the league the distance, with a lot of older campers watching and cheering them on. That 12 seconds was their season.

All the boys shook hands after and were congratulated by their coaches and even some of those spectators for playing so well.

Yes, the team names are silly and some of the games we play at camp are less than serious. But these are the moments that make a CGL summer so special. Some of those boys may remember this day for a long time, when they played basketball in front of all those people, when they almost beat the first-place team in the championship game.

Shark Tooth Lion Head will get a pizza party this week.

But Snake Leg Dragon Lips and their coaches earned a lot of props today.