Head basketball coach David Hernandez is going into his fourth year leading the Spartan basketball team. Coach Hernandez is widely respected by not only his team, but his peers among him. In past years, Hernandez had a large amount of success in out-of-town tournaments including a win in the Bryson-Johnson Tournament and winning a local tournament, Willie Cager-Chris Forbes. Hernandez is a coach who prides himself in his faith when doing all things especially coaching. He wishes to create respectful young men who are ready to conquer the world in front of them, leaving the program tougher and stronger than when they first came in.
Q. How long have you been coaching basketball?
A. High school basketball, this is my 11th year coaching. Coaching in general, 15 years.
Q. Did you always want to be a basketball coach?
A. No, I did not. I wanted to be a physical therapist out of college and then I started coaching a youth team that my cousin was on, and once I started, I started seeing improvements from not only him, but the team that we were coaching. I got hooked, so that’s kind of when I decided to change my career path.
Q. Going into your fourth year coaching here at Pebble Hills, what’s your biggest takeaway?
A. Biggest takeaway is it takes time to build something that’s going to last over a long period of time, it’s not you know, nothing is a quick fix even though we live in a world that wants things you know at a rapid pace, at a quick pace, and people get impatient, I get impatient as well but, if you want something that’s going to last and that’s going to be high quality it takes time.
Q. What do you look forward to this season?
A. This season I look forward to a lot of younger guys stepping into different roles. We had a lot of seniors last year that filled a lot of those roles in a lot of different areas and its going to be interesting to see which guys step up and fill those roles being you know being a little younger, but they’re still going to have to fill them.
Q. How much do you connect your faith to basketball?
A. Pretty much the entire thing, I mean you know I try to live my life the right way, I try to instill that into the players that come through our program and you know we take
time before every game to make sure that we’re grateful, that we’re appreciative of the opportunities that we got and you know that connects a lot back to who I am,
what I believe in, so it’s pretty much intertwined throughout the entire part of my coaching.
Q. What’s your biggest goal for this season?
A. To see growth, to see maturity, to see togetherness, all those things you know will equate to the bigger picture but for me I really want to see individuals grow and mature and get better as the season goes along and a collective the same exact thing.
Q. How important do you think it is to start the season strong?
A. I think it’s important you know it’s always nice to start off on the right foot but there’s always you know things that come up. It’s a long season so you know starting off right is important but maintaining that is more important.
Q. In your opinion is it more important to start the season strong or end it?
A. I think both are equally as important because if you dig yourself a hole to early its kind of hard to dig yourself out and at the end you know it always plays a factor, but also at the end of the season you want to finish off just as strong so that your heading into you know the peek part of your, the most important games at the best that you can so there both equally important but it’s just
about maintaining a high level throughout really.
Q. How do you balance coaching with your everyday life?
A. You try and make sure that you keep the main the main thing and for me the main thing is my faith, my family, and making sure that I’m present for them you know basketball can consume you in the sense of this is what were passionate about but, you have to make sure that you make time for the main thing which is family and faith.
Q. What do you wish to instill in the players by the time they leave the program?
A. What we try to instill in the previous classes that have left here and I think we’ve done a pretty good job for the majority is you know maturity, growth,
being a respectful young man, somebody that’s ready to lead not only themselves but when its their time, to lead their families, to lead, to take care of there families in a responsible way and to know that you know their tougher and you know stronger than what they think and sometimes their going to have to pick themselves up when times are tough but knowing that they can do it
because they’ve already been through it here.
