Grace Upward Basketball

Mission Statement

Our goal is to share the good news of Jesus Christ through our basketball program. Grace Bible Church has partnered with Upward Sports to create a church ministry outreach using basketball as the backdrop.

League Information

Our basketball program is comprised of seven divisions.

Our season consists of

1)      Formal evaluation of players in November 

2)      Practices starting in December

3)      An 8 game schedule beginning the first week of January and ending the first weekend in March

Evaluations

Evaluations are done in November before teams are created in order to balance teams as evenly as possible. This process is not perfect so some teams will be better than others, but we do our best to give each team similarly talented players. 1^st and 2^nd grade players are not evaluated.

Practices

Our league has practices on three different nights; Mondays, Wednesdays and Thursdays. Practices last for 1 hour each starting at 5pm, 6pm, 7pm and 8pm. Each team practices once per week on the same night and time. 1^st – 4^th graders will typically practice at 5pm or 6pm, 5-8 graders will typically practice at 7pm or 8pm.

Games

Games are played on Friday nights starting at 6pm and Saturdays starting at 9am. The middle school ages play on Friday nights and the elementary school kids play on Saturdays. 5-6 grade boys may have a Friday night game occasionally.

Spiritual Development

As a ministry of Grace Bible Church, we use basketball as a way to share spiritual truth and teach life virtues. In the middle of each practice, we stop and take a moment for teaching the players. On game days, we have a teaching time for the players, coaches and family members in attendance. There are plenty of basketball programs for kids that just teach basketball. Our message of hope in Jesus Christ differentiates us from all other programs. If it isn’t something you care to hear, our Upward program is probably not for you. While we don’t expect all people to believe what we believe, we ask that as participants in the program, you respect the message time.