second place, by a hair

Last weekend, Liam had his season-ending basketball tournament. It's been a good season, with him switching back and forth between the A and B teams (which is a pretty fluid distinction) and honing his skills the whole time. There are five elementary schools in our town, so the first round had two games, and rounds two and three had one game each. Liam's team won the first game handily, then had to play (arguably) the best team in town, our local Catholic school, in the bye round. Amazingly, our team won 16-10, and then it was on to the finals, which didn't disappoint. Our kids were pretty tired, given that this was their third basketball game of the day (and it was only early afternoon!), and the other team had a definite advantage because they played in the first round, then got to sit out the second round, so they were well rested. Still, it went right down to the wire. My sister Bethany was at work, so I was sending her text updates that went a little something like this:

Liam just scored again! Up 14-13. A nail biter!
Down 15-14, 1:20 left.
Up 16-15, 1:09 left.
Tied at 16, 0:22.4 left!!!!!!
Kid hurt, still tied, 0:09.6 left.
WE'RE IN A 2:00 OVERTIME.
0:08.9 left, down 18-16.
And that's the game.

Liam played so hard and so well. He got 10 points over the course of the day, plus a ton of rebounds and great defensive plays. We were so proud of him ... but his disappointment at coming in second just about broke our hearts. There was just nothing we could say to make him understand that getting as far as he did was a major accomplishment that he should be proud of.

Which brings us to yesterday. During school this week, the kids who signed up did the first round of a basketball shoot-out. Liam made the cut for the second round, which was yesterday. And of all the kids in fourth grade at all the schools in the whole town ... he came in second. By one shot. And he was heartbroken. He is the alternate for the district contest at the end of the month, and he did so well, but that doesn't matter to him because he didn't win the trophy. Poor kid. We wish we knew the right words to make it better, but for now, we just keep telling him how great it was for him to get that far, and how proud we are of him.