No Such Thing As An Offseason

Life around school has definitely been different ever since the season came to such an abrupt ending on March 12th of this year.  Nobody really expected us to lose, not even the doubters but that is just how the month of March is during basketball season.  There is no doubt in my mind that the phrase "March Madness" is anything close to an overstatement.  While a lot of the seniors have come to cope with what has happened for myself and my other teammates the loss has done nothing more fuel us in getting ready for next years season.  We are not the only people on the team working hard to continue what we have going here at the University of Mary though.  The day after we lost we got on the bus to head back to Bismarck and not one of the coaches came back on the bus ride home with us.  Literally the morning after our season had officially ended all of the coaches were heading out on recruiting trips in order to get a head start on next year.  I know I can speak for my other teammates when saying this but no one returning from this past year wants to have a let down in any way shape or form for next years season.  We are looking to start down the same road that we traveled on this year to try and get back to the NCAA Tournament and we want to host the region here in Bismarck as we try and bring a National Title here to the University of Mary.  Next years team is going to be much different from the team we had this year but in that same way we feel like we can still get a lot of things accomplished.  As for working out we have been on a break from the season and official workouts for the past two and a half weeks, but those are just official workouts.  Yesterday was the first day that I personally have not worked out since we lost on March 12th, and I have not simply just been working out on my own.  I always have one or more of my teammates with me when I get a workout in so that we all stay in shape together and do not waste any time in getting prepared for next years season.  Today is the first day that I am going to see any of the coaches since we lost in the first round of the tournament and we have a team meeting later this afternoon to discuss getting ready for next week.  With the coaches being around more often now we are going to start back up individual workouts as well as lifting which I am very much looking forward to.  This is going to be a huge so called "offseason" for a lot of people on the team in aspects of improving our strength, speed, agility, and individual basketball skills to keep up the level of play from last year, but everybody is optimistic about the results it will bring.  At the end of the day we are a group of college athletes and this is a business to us and we want our business to thrive next year like the year before.  We are looking forward to representing the University of Mary, the city of Bismarck, and the State of North Dakota next year to the best of our ability.  After all in my eyes there is no such thing as an offseason.