Coach Liz

Hey Team! Coach Liz here. This is my first time ever blogging, but after seeing "Julie & Julia" on Friday, I feel inspired! So here goes... a tiny bit about my summer. :)

It has been a whirlwind from the beginning! I finished up my duties as a School Counselor and Coach at Timpanogos High, and also coaching a local club team, the Utah Flight. Literally days later I was immersed in my new wonderfully adventurous job at UVU! I have traveled quite a bit this summer. In addition to recruiting in Portland and Las Vegas, I was also able to go the following places:

• Lake Powell-with 60 of my closest friends ;) It was rainy, but we still had a blast!
  
• Boise-for my little brother Preston's LDS Mission report. He served in New York City and will return to BYU in the fall. (And he is very excited to meet all of you! ;)
  
• Star Valley, Wyoming-for the 4th of July with a friend's family. We enjoyed the beautiful scenery, great food, and plenty of fireworks.
• New York City-to visit my older brother and his family. They live the coolest life in Brooklyn!
  
• Lake Winnipesaukee-yes, the very same lake from "What About Bob". No we didn't do any sailing... but we did spend our days skiing, swimming, canoeing, and finding new cool toys to try and balance on as we pulled them behind the boat (Preston mastered balancing on a windsurfing board! I stuck to kneeboarding, a lost art. ;)
  
• Bear Lake-I'm going in a few days with my family. Bear Lake is my favorite place on earth! Boating all day, raspberry shakes at night, it really doesn't get much better!
  

A few other things that you should know about me:

• I love basketball and all sports really. I love playing them and watching them. I am pretty decent at most, I love volleyball, golf, football, softball, bowling, etc. However, I can't throw a frisbee to save my life.
  
• I love musicals. I am a total showtunes nerd! (Don't make fun. I'll convert you all to Broadway!) My favorite musicals are "Les Mis" and "Wicked", which I have seen 4 times! At work I am usually listening to one of my Broadway Pandora stations.
• I love my family. Even though we are all spread across the country, we are very close. They are my favorite people to spend time with. I have 2 nieces and 3 nephews and they melt my heart!
  

Last thing. I am thrilled to be at UVU! I feel so privileged to be able to learn from Coach Nixon and Coach B. And I can't wait to get to know each of you better! It is going to be a great year!

:) Coach Liz

oh i forgot to put my name down below in case some new ppl dont know who this is oopps!!!
Julie

Hey Everyone!!
Well my summer has been going ok, mine has been alot like jenna's not a whole lot going on. Most of you know i got married in may so now i just hang out with my husband and golf a bunch. I have been to cali twice this summer to hangout with his parents and my sister came down from canada for a week and that was really fun since i cant go back to see her. Other than that i go to dave's in the morning and just hangout!! I bought all the seasons of one tree hill even though i have seen all of them i wanted to start again from the beginning so that keeps me busy and i love one tree hill!! Anyway hope all your summers are going great and i cant wait to see you all soon!! I would put pictures up on here but i am not quite smart enough yet to figure out how so for now just read this haha and ill try to get some up soon!!

hello! so i haven't been up to too much this summer but i decided i better post something! I've mostly just been hangin out this summer, haven't gone on many trips but i did go to seattle to visit my sister for a week and that was a blast! so ya, i've mostly just been hangin out and going to Dave's conditioning in the mornings and thats about it haha so there's my summer!
Jenna

Hey Everyone,

I hope you are all having a great summer. It was so fun to see so many of you during June at our camps. We missed those of you who couldn't come but had a great time and successful camps with those of you who were here.

Our new assistant is Liz Darger. She got thrown into being a UVU coach last week when we went on the road recruiting to Portland and Seattle. Coach Darger (which is a very hard name for Asumi to say : ) is awesome and I am so excited for all of you to meet her. She is already working hard for you and is a great addition to our 'team'.

I have had a busy, fun summer. We had lots to do with hiring a new assistant and planning for camps but it was fun and rewarding. Sprinkled in with the work has been some fun. My family has a cabin near Jackson Hole, Wyoming and I have been able to go there a couple of times. We have had a blast being together with family, hiking, fishing, watching amazing animals (like deer, elk, moose, eagles) up close. It is my favorite place in the world and I wanted to share some pictures with you.

(Some of my cousins and me hiking in some beautiful mountains right by our cabin.)

(We all hiked to this amazing lake near the Tetons. Saw a moose just right before we took this picture!)

(My nephews Casey, Caden and me by the elk horn arches in Jackson Hole.)

I am so proud of all the hard work you are putting in this summer. I know it will pay off for our team. Thanks for being such dedicated, motivated teammates. It is going to be an amazing year. The game schedule for this upcoming season is almost done. We are going to have some FUN!!!

We sure miss having all of you around here. Not that Coach B and Coach Darger are boring but we do miss you!


I am so grateful for all of you and hope you are having a great summer. Keep up the good work. Time goes quickly so we have to make sure to live each day to its fullest.


Have a great day.


Coach Nixon

Quote of the day: One should not think so much about what one should do, but rather what one should be. Our works do not ennoble us; but we must ennoble our works. - Meister Eckhart

Hey everyone! Well I want to apologize I completely slacked and did not write my blog last month! Don't worry I'll fill you all in now :D Well as I'm sure all of you know I broke my foot in May at Dave's, and I was told I needed to get surgery and get a screw put in because it's prone to breaking again without something to support it. So I got surgery the beginning of June, I can't believe it's already been over a month! I was in crutches for about four weeks...never break something where you will have to use crutches they are no fun! But I've been walking with a boot on for about four weeks now so I've been riding the bike to get my leg back to where it was as much as possible with it on, it's so wonderful to walk again! Even though it's been pretty tough, breaking my foot has made me really appreciate little things like jogging, being able to stand in the shower, and I could just go on forever! So don't take walking and stuff for granted! Nothing else besides that has been too exciting, I've just been catching up with old friends and seeing lots of them get engaged, pregnant, and married, weird! and hanging out with my wonderful family, you also take them for granted when you live with them for so long! Anyways I love summer but I miss you all and can't wait to get to know all you freshman, so anytime anyone wants to do anything let me know! I love you all and see you soon!

Ball handling drills :)

Ok team... Dave (our weights trainer for those new gals that don't yet know) has us doing some ball handling drills twice a week before weights. Although that's a great idea and we are all very thankful he is making that a new requirement, twice a week is not enough. So I challenge all of you to do 15 minutes of ball handling at least 4 to 5 times a week. It's just a challenge, no biggie ;) I have had a few of the incoming freshmen ask what drills I used the other day at weights so that they could practice them over the summer while they were at home. I decided to just post them on here so everyone could see instead of emailing each individual that asked. So here they are. Enjoy :)

Ok, here are some ball handling drills :) Basically, you can do whatever you want and make up your own drills. Try to get 15 minutes worth. 

Warm-Up (no-dribble)

-Circles around your legs moving one leg backwards each time around. 10 times fast one way then reverse it.  

-Rhythm drill (this is the one where you drop it and then bring it in front and drop it again) 10 times each way... FAST.  

When you get really good, you should be able to go around your waist 60 times in 30 seconds (according to Pistol Pete lol).  

Dribbling Drills 

1. one dribble figure eights (10 times each direction) 

2. 50 times behind your back 

3. 5 dribbles big, 5 dribbles small (10 times each hand) 

4. swing crossovers in front (5 big 5 small, 10 times) 

5. in and out in front of your body- 5 dribbles big and 5 dribbles small (10 times each hand) 

6. in and out to the side of your body-5 dribbles big then 5 small (10 times each hand) BY NOW YOUR ARMS SHOULD BE TIRED IF YOU'RE PUSHING YOURSELF 

7. small dribble figure eights without messing up! 5 times successfully one way before switching other direction. Once you get better you can push the number up! 

8. Small dribbles around one leg. 3 times successfully to begin with. each direction with both hands. 

9. small dribble crossovers. Get on your knees and dribbles as small as you can to the side of your body and then cross it over. this should be somewhat challenging. 

10. walk while dribbling behind your back. try to go to half court and back without messing up!  

OK, those are all the warm up drills we did the other day. They should take a while to finish. Roughly 10-15 minutes. They can be done in any order, beginning with the no-dribble warm up. When you finish those, work on your moving crossovers and incorporate your ballhandling into your moves and work on them. There are plenty of other drills, these are the basics. Focus on your footwork with your crossover... that's most important. Have fun :) When you get bored of these drills, youtube is great at giving more ideas.

Good work ladies, I can't wait to see you all again!

Kayla