Camp Verde Middle School boys basketball coach Donnie Shanks wants to put out a challenge to all the other Verde Valley middle school basketball coaches, but his challenge doesn’t have anything to do with basketball.
The challenge? To adopt a family in their community and raise money to give that family a nice Christmas.
Shanks and his team held a shoot-a-thon last year to raise money for a Camp Verde family and plan on doing it again this year. So Shanks thought it would be fun to send out a challenge to his fellow coaches to do the same.
“We challenge each other on the court,” he said. “I want to challenge them off the court to support their community.”
On the court, the Cowboys are doing all they can to challenge their opponents as well.
With the bulk of his team playing the guard position and not a lot of height overall, Shanks said his team is going to depend on its superior ball-handling and quickness to rattle its opponents.
Guards Herbie Trujillo and brother Anthony Trujillo, along with Jordan Huey and Cayden Lauren are all excellent ball-handlers, Shanks said. And that’s a good thing, because it means the team will have no shortage of players who can move the ball.
“I’m doing a ‘whoever gets the ball can bring it down’ type of offense, so we’re not looking to get it to a certain person,” he said. “I basically have four guards and a center on the court.”
For the full story, please see the Wednesday, Nov. 27, issue of the Camp Verde Journal.
