West Valley DRIVE organizes its teams in 3 tiers: Gold, Blue and Grey, following the colors in our uniform. These tiers correspond to different levels of competitiveness and also slightly different models of operation. This is a description of what to expect in each case.

Our philosophy for all teams

First and foremost, ALL teams at ALL levels of play receive the same amount of instruction (3 practices a week) and follow the same schedule (10 weeks of basketball instruction). They are ALL coached by the same head coaching staff, composed of current and past college and high school coaches, professional players, basketball veterans, etc. Our coaching staff has an extensive and succesful background at all levels of competition and instruction. You can learn more about our coaches here: https://www.westvalleydrive.com/coaches.

Our commitment and dedication to ALL teams is not only the same; it’s our gold standard. We strive to foster a love of the game and a healthy lifestyle as well as teach the ethical values of sportsmanship, dedication, perseverance, grind, teamwork, elegance in victory and resilience in adversity. We provide a caring and nurturing environment, where mistakes are learning opportunities and growth starts with self-confidence. To us, this is every bit as important (and probably more) than learning basketball moves.

In terms of basketball, we follow a common thread of playing uptempo, aggressive basketball, both on offense and defense. We work hard to help players go as far as their ability and work ethic will take them, with an emphasis on improving their basketball IQ as much as their technical skills. We are here to develop players and to develop teams by teaching them a broad set of skills, strategies and situations. Winning is a consequence of a job well done in practice. We don’t cut corners and never will. 

Gold teams

West Valley DRIVE has been blessed with a number of highly competitive teams throughout the years. The Gold teams are our travel teams and represent the highest level of competition that this club has to offer. They differ from all other tiers in a number of ways:

• They attend the most competitive tournaments and are bracketed at or near the top of their class. They participate in exposure events and are ranked by the AAU tournament circuit.

• They typically attend 1 or 2 tournaments more per season than other teams.

• Tournaments require overnight travel with regularity (at least once or twice a season) and consequently additional expenses

• For all practical purposes, these teams are handled as Varsity High School teams. Players have very distinct roles and responsibilities and also varying playing time. Players are expected to know and embrace their role in the team. They are coached to win.

• Commitment to excellence is expected. While we pride ourselves in a caring, nurturing environment, we also expect a high degree of dedication and the desire and work ethic to excel. 

• Given the additional tournaments, games and travel, these teams have a higher fee than the rest.

Blue teams

Our Blue teams are the most advanced of the developmental teams. They tend to be quite competitive and it’s not unusual that they do well in tournaments, but certainly not at the level of a travel team. Whenever we only have one team per grade, it will also be coined as Blue, so the level of competitiveness can vary between grades and between seasons.

Given the emphasis on player development, we emphasize giving all players sufficient opportunity to put to the test what they learn in practice. Hence, all our players play a substantial amount of minutes during games. Having said that, obviously not all players play the same amount, as playing time is earned through work ethic, attitude and skill level and ultimately it’s always at the coach’s discretion, but our philosophy is clear. 

All players are expected to show commitment to the team and a sincere desire and effort to improve. Attendance to practices and games is a must, but it’s certainly not sufficient. AAU basketball is not recreational and this obviously applies to all our teams, Gold, Blue and Grey.  

Blue teams are expected to prepare the players to maximize their chances of making the Middle School and High School teams by providing a broad and solid foundation on the skills of basketball, both individual as well as on a team.

Grey teams

Grey teams (before called SILVER) are the second of our developmental teams. The level of competitiveness is one step below Blue, although it depends greatly on the desire of that group of young players. We’ve had very successful Grey teams that managed to compete above expectations due to their intensity and grind, while developing their skills in the process. We love these Gray teams!

Same as with Blue teams, given the emphasis on player development, we emphasize giving all players sufficient opportunity to put to the test what they learn in practice. Hence, all our players play a substantial amount of minutes during games. Having said that, obviously not all players play the same amount, as playing time is earned through work ethic, attitude and skill level and ultimately it’s always at the coach’s discretion, but our philosophy is clear. 

All players are expected to show commitment to the team and a sincere desire and effort to improve. Attendance to practices and games is a must, but it’s certainly not sufficient. AAU basketball is not recreational and this obviously applies to all our teams, Gold, Blue and Grey.  

Gray teams are expected to prepare the players to maximize their chances of making the Middle School teams by providing a broad and solid foundation on the skills of basketball, both individual as well as on a team. We always rejoice when we see Gray team players evolve and graduate to Blue as the seasons go by!

 

It is often not obvious to a person approaching youth basketball what the differences between different organizations and leagues are. I’d like to clarify it here. 

In short, this is it:
 

Recreational leagues (e.g. YMCA, church leagues, LGSR, etc.) are, as the name implies, recreational in nature. The social aspect trumps the basketball one. Great way to get initiated into basketball, but it won’t bring your game very far. 

 

Typically only one practice per week and one game, but it’s a good complement for serious players trying to stay active outside of the AAU and school seasons. There are two tiers:
All-Net NJB: The top 10 players per age group in a given geographical area. This is the most competitive version of NJB and making it into this team is very challenging.
Divisional NJB: Open to any player at or above the recreational level, but not for full beginners.

 

Here is where the emphasis is on competitive basketball and developing players to their full potential. We practice more often, longer, and harder than the previous leagues and we have professional coaches. We play at least 2 games practically every weekend against challenging opponents from all over the Bay Area and beyond. It’s as simple as that, really.

It boils down to this: How much do you really want to improve your game? What are you willing to do to get there? Because the difference between these leagues is the degree of commitment that goes into it. Mutual commitment, mind: From the player (and his/her family!) to the program as well as from the program to the players. AAU and school ball expect and demand that players attend all practices and games (bar serious issues, naturally). It expects and demands that the players try their best and hardest and have a sincere desire to improve; day in and day out. If that’s not the goal, there are better alternatives (see above). 

Sometimes the transition from recreational to AAU basketball comes as somewhat of a shock. If you need us, we’re always available to clarify the implications and expectations.

 

Any coach in the world will tell you that the perfect number of players at practice is 12. High School and College rosters have anywhere up to 15 players, so that coaches are ensured 10 players at practice and games even in the event of injuries, accidents or any other unexpected occurrence. 

From a financial perspective, having large rosters is also quite advantageous: Less teams means less gyms to rent, less tournament fees and less coaches to hire! So it clearly makes sense to have as many players as possible per team, right?

Well… not quite. What every coach in the world will also tell you is that individualized attention trumps “mass” coaching every day of the week (and, yes, twice on game Sundays!)  They will also tell you that AAU games are famously short and there is no substitute for playing time in terms of accelerating the learning of the players (yet another reason why we organize our own tournaments, where games are 40% longer than at regular AAU events!)

Hence, we try to have 12 players per team, knowing full well that we may end up with less in practice and at games. We just think that it’s the right compromise to maximize the quality of the practice while offering enough playing time at games. It’s not a perfect formula, but one that we prefer to 15 players per roster, even if it costs us money!

 

Most AAU programs, including WVD, have teams separated by age. Whenever there is more than one team per birth year, those are typically separated by skill level. Once again, WVD is no different, as you can read in our note “What do colors mean?” (https://www.westvalleydrive.com/aau-team), where we describe the differences between our Gold, Blue and Grey teams.
And yet, that’s not the whole of it.

The ultimate goal of any of our teams is to provide the right environment for the players to develop individually and as a group and find the right opponents to compete against in tournaments, as games are the true test of our development. And that’s what makes our response to the title question a bit more nuanced.

First is the matter of experience vs skill level. In particular at younger ages, we encounter children that start their path into basketball at different ages. Some start in 3rd grade, but others hear their calling in 5th or even 6th grade. That is even more so for girls, with many starting sports later in their years. Hence, there are many newbies in teams at these ages, mixed with kids that maybe have been playing for a couple of years. Naturally, the more experienced players will have a clear advantage over the newer ones in the beginning, irrespective of their ultimate talent and development potential.

Second is the matter of physical development. Again, at younger ages physical development (height, strength, speed and overall athleticism) can make huge differences in their performance, even against more talented opponents. As we all know, children develop at different rhythms and while by the end of Middle School most of them tend to level up, the earlier years present great differences.

With these two factors in mind (experience and physical development), it is our opinion that making teams solely based on age may not always be the right decision to maximize players’ development and hence we try to be mindful of them when making our own teams, with the occasional player moving up or down in age group depending on our assessment.

There is a third factor, though, that is also important: The social aspect. Kids want to play with their friends, who tend to be of the same age and school grade. We believe that this is a big part of having fun and we certainly support it wholeheartedly. It just makes the equation sometimes a bit more difficult for us

And so we come to the topic of tournaments: How do we choose which “bracket” to play in? Well, the same way that we choose how to make our teams: By combining age, expertise and skill level. The purpose, as stated above, is to find the right opponents to have balanced, competitive games that will allow us to get better. Depending on the specific group of players in each of our teams, the right choice may be to play up, down or exactly in their age group and any of those options is fine if it partners us up against the right opposition. Additionally, tournaments sometimes mix age groups in their brackets, based on their own assessment of the different participating programs. So don’t be surprised if your 12u girl plays in the 13u bracket or your 13u boy plays in a 12u/13u one. It’s all part of the process.

One last thought: It doesn’t always work as expected. Neither us, the WVD organization, nor the tournaments themselves have perfect information or infinite wisdom. Ultimately, tournament organizers are the only ones that know who is participating in their events and they build the brackets as they see fit, based on the input/requests from programs, including ours. Making all those requests fit into a coherent schedule is a difficult task and sometimes we end up playing the wrong teams. That’s why we keep track of who we’ve played and we try to adjust our input to tournament organizers accordingly, but it remains a fallible proposition.