Wakefield girls' basketball team tries yoga as a method of maintaining focus in games

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After an hour and a half of practice, the Wakefield girls' basketball team heads down the stairs to the school's wrestling room. With bags piled along the far wall, the girls take off their shoes and head to the mat. Saturday morning practices often end like this. Trying to find new ways to strengthen her team - physically and mentally - Coach Marcia Richardson has added yoga to the Warriors' workouts. "Practice and games create a lot of wear and tear on the body," Richardson says. "We do this to take care of the whole mind and body. It's a wellness thing."

"We're shooting horrible from the free throw line," admits Richardson, who turned to yoga as a way to get her team to focus. "I'm trying to figure out ways, in the flow of the game, to get them to slow themselves down. Understand that, as a player, I have to gather myself and my thoughts in a hostile environment and I have to tune all of that out. Right now we're not doing that."

After the team works through a series of yoga poses, the players pause to focus on their breathing. "We know when we can control our exhalation, we are calming ourselves down," says instructor Monu Harnal of Illume Yoga. "I wanted them to see that. The way you feel, your tiredness and your mood all are affected by your breath. That's the key, controlling your exhalation. You can bring it all down within seconds, so we want to incorporate that" into the workout.

"Basketball is such a fast-paced sport," Richardson adds. "You rev up and then you slow down. Your breathing is important. If I'm playing a lot of minutes, I want to continue to play a lot of minutes. Your breathing technique and being able to slow your body down is important."

The room is silent when the sound of bouncing basketballs begins on the floor above. The boys' team will begin practice soon and players have begun to trickle in, shooting baskets while they wait for their teammates. The sound goes almost unnoticed in the wrestling room, where the girls' team may have achieved just what Richardson is looking for. One of her players has fallen asleep, so calmed from the mediation.

"I don't mind that," laughs Harnal, who says it often happens with her yoga students.

"It just means she was in her zone," Richardson says, "and that's one thing I wanted them to learn from yoga. I'm hoping that because of today, I have something where I can say, 'Remember yoga? Remember when we gathered ourselves and took those long breaths and exhaled?' "