Word By Jenny Yun-Chen Chang/ Taiwan
Photo By Danny Wang/ Taiwan
Kaohsiung- After trying to retrieve the Championship for two continuous years unsuccessfully and with the graduation of tall seniors, it’s super stressful to receive the title “Captain” of Private NanShan Senior High School (NSSH), but Pei-Cheng Li, the Captain of NSSH for 2018-19 season, has a secret to himself to calm down.
Li is a sharpshooter who has earned himself stage time since he was only a freshman. As Li’s experience and skill led him to the position of “Captain”, head coach Shih-Ching “Xavier” Hsu has a special goal for him.
“I need him to connect everyone’s thoughts.” Xavier said, “A captain is the person who has solid interaction with coach, and provides the detailed situations of their private life to the coach. That’s my mission for him.”
This specific plan requires Li to be talkative, but he seems pretty introvert. In order to do this job well, Li tries another way to connect everyone’s thoughts.
“Instead of giving orders and scolding them,” Li said, “I encourage them. Since coach is already strict, I think being nice would be better.”
Even though Li and Xavier haven’t seen the fruit yet, maybe this really works. Xavier said that being flexible is the key to next level for NSSH, so having players less stressful isn’t necessarily bad for the team.
“I calm their emotions.” Li said. “During this year of being the captain, I hope that I don’t have too much emotion on the court. I always tell myself that it doesn’t help even if I get emotional out there.”
Started when he was a junior in high school, Li reads self-help books. Reading and listening to music calms him down, and all the techniques in the books are useful for solving problems on and off court for Li.
“Yes,” Li said, “it really helps. It teaches me on how to get back to my normal condition when I’m low, and it helps me to switch off when I need to relax myself.”
Besides putting Li in charge of his teammates’ emotions, with all the tall seniors graduating, Xavier also needs Li to be one of those who leads everyone to play in a different way.
“Everyone can shoot,” Xavier said, “but we don’t have powerful centers now, so I want them to grab more rebounds, and current centers need to pay more attention to the ‘ground’ instead of the ‘sky’. We need to think differently now, so stop thinking about the ‘sky’”
Fully understands this instruction, Li as the captain knows that Xavier wants them, the shorter players, to help with the rebounds, and be as stable as possible.
While Taipei Municipal Song Shan Senior High School is trying to defend the crown, NSSH tries to win the honor and glory they once had, and for Li, it’s something he aspires so badly.
“Yes,” Li said, “I’ve never won a championship before. I really want to win this year. This is my priority now, so I haven’t thought about which university to go.”
Dreaming big, especially when it’s something they couldn’t achieve the past two years, Li is not afraid at all. To him, playing this year is no different than previous years, moreover, he feels even better.
“I’m less nervous this year.” Li said. “I don’t know why. Maybe it’s because I’ve been playing for three years, and we’ve played so many games that I can now treat any of them like regular games now.”
With such confidence and his secret reading self-help books to calm himself down, Pei-Cheng Li is ready to bring his fellow teammates to challenge the other teams as they aim for the ultimate goal – Championship.