By Stephen Dawkins

The Jemison basketball team had just lost three games in one day, but coach Stacy McGehee was still in good spirits.
McGehee was less concerned with results than improvement during Monday’s exhibition games, and his Panthers played their best game of the day in their last game of the day, a 44-40 loss to Class 6A Clay-Chalkville.
“We finally got the tempo we wanted offensively and defensively during that game,” McGehee.
The tempo McGehee speaks of is a breakneck tempo, which the coach said his team will have to employ in the winter because JHS lacks height.
“We’re gonna have to cause chaos and play uptempo,” he said. “Our goal is zero transition time; we want offense and defense to be the same.”
An example of what happens when the Panthers don’t dictate the pace of play was the Keith game, which Jemison lost 60-40. McGehee estimated Keith scored at least 20 points on offensive rebounds.
Jemison fell to Holt, 48-44.
But, overall, JHS was much improved over this point last season, McGehee’s first.
McGehee on Saturday tried to substitute for each player after he had been on the court for three minutes—three minutes of maximum effort.
“We told them, ‘If you’re not tired after your three minutes, then you cheated the team,’” McGehee said.
An important part of how Jemison wants to play is conditioning. McGehee said his 11 players could have played a fourth game Monday if necessary.
The Panthers were co-hosting, with Verbena, a summer “play date” tournament, which included eight teams.
JHS will be the site of another such event on June 14. No admission is being charged, and concessions are available.
Jemison will also play in a team camp at Birmingham-Southern College this weekend.