Clements head coach Shane Childress won’t take all the credit, even though he was named the head coach of the year for girls 3A basketball by the Alabama Sports Writers Association.

“It’s hard to be humble and answer that question, and the good Lord told us to be humble,” Childress said when asked how it felt to receive the title. “Honestly, I had a lot of help now. I had a vision of what I wanted, and I had a lot of people get on board.”

He said his wife and assistant coach, Kelley Childress, and other assistant coach, Mitzi Bugg Grizzard, jumped onto his plan for the team. He also said the Clements championship team from 2010 came and talked to the girls a few times.

Coach Bugg said that she didn’t know anyone that was as passionate about basketball as Shane Childress was when he came on as head coach.

“He deserves it because he came into a situation of girls where everyone told them they weren’t good enough, they never would win, and he turned it around. He told them from jump that that wasn’t true,” Bugg said.

She said after games he would be up late at night studying film to figure out what they could improve, and he stuck with his plan, getting the team to buy into it. Coach Childress said the assistant coaches buying into that plan was crucial, too.

“I demanded as much as I could outta Kelley and much as I could outta Bugg, and I said, ‘Hey, this is yours, and if they don’t do it good, I’m gonna get onto you.’” He explained how he relied on them to help the girls with certain parts of the game.

He said at the beginning of the year they didn’t have an identity and he had to get to know the team to create a vision of what they could do offensively, but defensively he had a pretty good idea.

“I just had to keep teaching different presses and different formations so we would have weapons to use when it came game time. It wasn’t just the same old thing, and I knew they couldn’t play man yet, so I had to teach man all year long before I could use it at the end of the year,” he said.

After he figured out they were averaging about 53-55 points a game, he said he had to start designing schemes around that to keep the game in the range they were capable of scoring.

“I knew I had the guards to be able to control the pace of the game. So that’s what my offense turned into,” he said. “I’m gonna control the pace of the game. It’s gonna be what I want it to be. If we’re gonna play fast, it’s cause I’m playing fast. If we’re gonna play slow, it’s cause we’re playing slow. So that’s what our offense finally turned into, so that it wouldn’t hurt my defense.”

But, really he said coaching isn’t just about what goes on the court.

“I know that I’m in this for these kids, to get them stronger in life and get ready for problems in life, to get ready for the things they’re gonna face, the tough times. And, then I’m also teach ‘em to enjoy the good times,” he said. “I also want to teach them to dream. The world’s in front of you. You can go do whatever you want to do. Nothing’s stopping you. Only thing stopping you is you.”

He said he knows the girls picked up on that, and he saw how the season helped some of them turn their life around. Bugg said he deserves the coach of the year award because of the person that he is.

“He believes in our team. He believes in us coaches. He pushes all of us every day that we’re there,” she said. “I learned more things this year than I ever have as a coach.”

She said she’s seen him put in hours and do things for the team that she said is rare for coaches to do.

“Nobody’s seen him working the concession stand or going out of his way to get everything and staying late nights to clean the gym and coming early mornings when we didn’t have to be there. It’s just the little stuff that nobody sees. Everybody sees him coach and eat suckers, but he deserves them,” she laughed.

Bugg was an assistant Coach last year, so she’s seen how the team has changed, and Coach Childress knows things are on the upswing, too.

“Our girls athletics now is really starting to take off here at Clements,” he said. “I brought mine here because I saw that I thought we could have a decent team if I could get them to go all in.”

And, he said, they did.

“Those girls were amazing. They had it. They just had to have somebody try to get them to believe they had it,” Childress said.

Eventually the crowds got bigger too as the community started to believe in them too.

“People pitched in, and they saw what we were trying to do. Especially as we started gaining momentum and then they wanted to jump in to help too,” Childress said.

He said this year is just the beginning.

“We’re going to fill the gyms up again next year and for the next few years,” he said. “’Cause we’re going to put a product on the court that’s fixing to play hard. They’re gonna pull for each other. They’re not gonna play selfish. They’re gonna pick each other up. and whoever they’re playing, they’re going to go compete.”