I hate basketball.
The thoughts she never could have imagined thinking flooded her brain. After hearing her coach’s comments and seeing how the coach was treating the team, she was done.
Freshman girls basketball coach Shalyn Waddell knew at that moment exactly who she did not want to be. Waddell loved basketball ever since she was a little kid. She played throughout middle school and high school, winning a state championship, breaking records and even going on to Western Illinois University to continue that dream. Waddell always knew she wanted to be a coach after seeing the impact her coaches had on her life. Toward the end of her college campaign, she had a coach who was the opposite.
“I didn’t pick up a basketball for five years,” Waddell said. “I hated basketball, and hate is a strong word for me, but I literally did. My goal was [that] I would never put another player in that position where they would hate playing basketball and they wouldn’t find satisfaction in it. That’s been my biggest motivation: keeping the love of the game with them.”
Waddell went directly into coaching after college. She started in Austin, but took a break when she moved to Baltimore to support her husband in his professional football career. She later returned to Texas where she got into teaching, while coaching for an Amateur Athletic Union team for 12 years before coming to Hebron.
“Coaching is something that I’ve always wanted to do, even as a kid,” Waddell said. “I had some influential coaches that made an impact on my life, so I was like, ‘Maybe that’s the realm that I wanted to go to.’ The girls and life lessons have always been my big thing — trying to teach them through that is something that I’m so passionate about.”
Waddell plans on creating a youth empowerment program after her coaching career comes to an end; however, she said she plans to continue coaching until she can’t anymore.
“The little things are what make big things,” Waddell said. “You can’t get to $1 without a penny. [This] program [is] very near and dear to my heart. [I want to] empower young kids at this age to want better, do better and be better.”
