Teammate Program

---

Each year around October Cager Basketball starts to ramp up. Leg work in the offseason to get a schedule together, secure game and practice facilities, and creating a character curriculum is well underway and almost finished. There is an excitement for the new in 2026-27. New challenges, new opponents, and new players. But with the new and exciting, we maintain an old standby, the foundation of the Cagers, prayer. 

We relaunched the Teammate Program a couple of years ago and it has grown in numbers. This is something that we have done before at other schools with a tremendous amount of success. This involves you, me, the players, and prayer—a simple formula that results in an eternal product. 

There probably were people who prayed for you and encouraged you on your journey as a young person. It might have been a parent, relative, or friend at church. Maybe those people were constantly edifying you with words, notes, and support, all of which pointed to Christ and eventually led you to accept the calling of the Lord to be a child of His. We don’t know, but we do know that there is power when we are on our knees.

.

Value: We see Teammates as a vital part of the Cager Basketball Program. A part so important, it might be the most valuable position (MVP) in the program. The reason we believe it is so important is because the spiritual well-being of our team will determine the success of our season. Wins and losses will make the papers, create a buzz, and give a worldly identity, but it lasts only an instant. However, even though the spiritual condition probably won’t make the papers and would be a long shot on creating a buzz, it lasts for an eternity. 

Vision: We envision each player in our program having a Teammate(s). This Teammate is committed to pray for and encourage a particular player and team on a regular basis throughout the entire season. They might send a card or personally encourage the player/team, never emphasizing points or statistics. We envision Teammates who celebrate and speak life into the character of the player/team.

Victory: Sure, our players will refine and learn new physical skills that will improve their play in order to hopefully win games, but ultimate victory lies in what these young men become because of what is taught through the game of basketball. We desire our team’s play on the court to be a direct result of the character that we are trying to teach. We also desire that the character that we implement will point to Christ and either prick the hearts of the unsaved to accept the calling to be a child of God, or to minister to those whose names are already written in the Book of Life. That is true victory.

The Bad Part: It has been our experience that when the implementation of character is attempted, the devil attacks. The devil doesn’t want us to succeed. He will try and infiltrate the program through players, coaches, parents, or administrators. He will even attack people physically and mentally. He will do whatever he can to destroy the Lord’s work. He will pull out all the stops. Right now, Cager Basketball is under attack from Satan. We are in the fight of our lives for the souls of our kids.

The Good Part:  By continually uplifting our players in prayer and putting on the full armor of God, our program will in effect fend off the devil’s flaming arrows aimed to discourage, dishearten, and derail our attempts to do the Lord’s work and allow the Gospel to work in the lives of our players and program. 

Your Part: We select a player for you to pray for. But it doesn’t have to stop there - you can select others to pray for as well, we just want to make sure that each kid has at least one Teammate.  Throughout the year, we ask that you take a couple minutes each day to pray for your Teammate. We will include some background information like grade and other sports played, as some simple connecting points for you to get to know your player a little bit better. We just ask that you stay focused on uplifting their character and not glorifying their stats. We also ask that no gifts be given unless it is intended for the entire team. You can also keep up with the team via our Facebook page and our website.

Our Part: Throughout this year we will be utilizing a character curriculum as our character vessel. We will focus on one trait per week. We will define the word, describe it, demonstrate it, and talk about where the trait is demanded on the court and in life as a man. We will reinforce the trait with illustrations, quotes, movie clips, and guest speakers. Our hope is that our players will learn just as much, if not more, about being a person of character in Christ than what they learn about the game of basketball. We will keep you up to date with a weekly email to let you know what is going on in this area. We will highlight the praises that have happened, as well as specific prayer requests for our team. 

If you are interested in joining our Teammate Program, please contact us to get signed up. Thank you for supporting the Cager Basketball Team by being a Teammate!