Skills and smiles pass at camp

The Quakers Basketball Camp gives kids a chance to play basketball, learn fundamentals and have fun. For 120 Philadelphia area youngsters, the end of school hasn't put an end to their learning. They have been spending this week in the hot and humid gyms on Penn's campus improving their basketball skills. "We try to give a week of as much basketball as we can, teaching fundamentals, and at the same time, make it as fun as possible," Steve Donahue said. Donahue is the director of the Quakers Basketball Camp and an assistant to Fran Dunphy for the Penn men's basketball team.He has been the camp director for the last three years. This is the seventh year that the camp has been held, and though not directly involved, Dunphy attends camp every day, unlike other big-name coaches. The camp began on Monday and runs until tomorrow afternoon. Each day, the camp opens at 9 a.m. and closes at 3:30 p.m. Though girls have attended the camp in past years, there are only boys, ages 6-17, attending this year's camp. The boys are broken down by age -- as well as ability in some cases --into three divisions. The NBA division is for the oldest and most skilled boys, the NCAA for the group of boys from ages 11-13 and the NIT division for the youngest boys. For boys in all the divisions, the day begins with drills. "We work on ball-handling, conditioning, shooting, defense, offense -- mostly everything," 12-year-old Ryan Gallagher said. The majority of the instructors at the camp are former or active collegiate players. Current Quakers include Jeff Goldstein, Michael Jordan, Matt Langel, Geoff Owens and Paul Romanczuk."The kids like to see a big, tall guy that can play a little bit," Donahue commented. Donahue also has several coaches who help everything run smoothly. Gil Jackson, another Penn assistant coach, is the NBA division commissioner. Pete Bentivegna, a University graduate, is the commissioner of the NCAA division. Bud Tosti, the coach at Malvern High School, is the commissioner of the NIT division. Each day features a guest speaker. On Monday, Jerome Allen, the 1995 Penn graduate and current Denver Nuggets point guard, went through a presentation that included his ball-handling routine and a short speech on working hard -- on the court and in the classroom -- and on being a good person. Today, the boys will be treated to an appearance by Crazy George, a clown who puts on dribbling and ball-spinning show while also delivering a positive message to the campers. This year will be his third in a row speaking to these campers. After listening to a speaker, the boys usually eat lunch. The camp provides a free drink to each boy. At the end of the week, each boy also receives a camp t-shirt, basketball, certificate showing participation at the Quakers Basketball Camp, and an evaluation from the counselors. "There are a lot of young kids so we try to teach them the fundamentals of the game so they don't develop bad habits," Brad Hofmann, a camp counselor and assistant coach at Swarthmore College, said. "None of them are going to come here for a week and turn into Michael Jordan, but what the coaches are trying to do is emphasize things to do after they leave the camp to get better." In addition to drills, the boys are separated into five-on-five teams and three-on-three teams to hone their skills in a team atmosphere. It gives every player a chance to take home one of the prizes awarded at the end of the week. Awards are presented to teams, and to the individual winners of such contests as a foul-shooting contest, a three-point shooting contest and a hot shot contest that measures a camper's accuracy from several spots on the floor. "It's a positive experience for the kids to come down to the city, see the Palestra...Maybe they won't be basketball players, but they'll have a feel for Penn," Donahue said. Many of the campers return every year to the camp. "I'm coming back next year," 11-year-old Carl Rice said with a smile. Gallagher, a veteran of three years of these camps, has "loved it ever since" his first visit. The positive experience makes it easy to see why learning in the summer is fun for these campers. "We try to prepare them to take the basketball drills we give them home," former Quakers forward Bill Guthrie said. "If they work on them, over the summer, they're going to get better."