• Sales: The players’ coach Sales: The players’ coach By Duane Shimogawa Jr. – The Garden Island In all of his years of coaching, the best was always the current one because he loved the kids he coached. Longtime Puhi
• Sales: The players’ coach
Sales: The players’ coach
By Duane Shimogawa Jr. – The Garden Island
In all of his years of coaching, the best was always the current one because he loved the kids he coached. Longtime Puhi coach Clarence Sales was a coach who was liked by many and envied by few. He put an emphasis on winning the right way. A lot of coaches today want to win, but they do it the wrong way and Sales was one of the few on the island, who took players to another level. “I think that when I took my teams up to the mainland and around the state, that was the best thing for them because they got to see the talent from not just from Kaua‘i,” Sales said Friday night at the Kaua‘i/Waimea game at the Raiderdome.
When I played for Sales and his Puhi Wildcats squad, it was evident that we weren’t the most talented team, but we utilized every bit of talent we had.
We would often spend countless hours at practice working on fundamentals and getting it right, even if it took four or five times before we got it correct.
Sales coached for nearly 10 years, along with his brother and his wife, Joann by his side.
He and Joann moved to O‘ahu for about six years and he coached at the high school level and continued to teach the same things he taught us. You see, he was a players coach.
No matter where he went, it was all about making a player better and the individuals that have gone through his system know exactly what I’m talking about.
Now back on Kaua‘i, Sales says he wants to get back to coaching on the island that it all started for him.
His old players still come up to him and shake his hand, not just to acknowledge his presence, but instead, they do it because he made them better basketball players, and better people too.
There is a huge difference between being a players coach and being a players friend.
As a coach, you do want to build a good relationship with your players, but at the same time, you have to draw a fine line between being a friend and being a coach.
It’s extremely hard to do this and Sales mastered it.
At practice, you knew exactly who was in charge and you respected him because he respected you, and that’s what it all comes down to!
You knew that he would always have your back, but what made you play harder for him was the fact that you knew that he respected you both as a player and as a person.
What amazed me most about Sales, was his humble way of coaching.
He would defray the attention away from himself and instead point it in the players’ direction.
He was happy to see you do good, but more importantly, he gave you a sense of confidence, because he would conduct himself in the same manner.
Someday he’ll be back.
He has a little one, (not too little anymore, just about two years old) and I know he’d like to see her on the court one day and not with the pom poms.
It’ll be just a matter of time before you see Sales with the whistle around this neck once again at a basketball court near you, and if you’re lucky, it’ll be at a court where your child is shooting hoops!
Duane Shimogawa Jr., sports editor may be reached at 2453681 (ext. 257) or kauaisports@pulitzer.net
