Kids to Earn Thrills by Showing Off Skills at Basketball Camp

Last summer, 20 young athletes left the DeLazier Memorial Field in Bloomingdale quite sweaty from the summer heat, but also proudly sporting some new NBA gear and a newfound basketball IQ. 

Those children, who are athletes from grades four through eight, all attended the Drills, Skills and Thrills Basketball Camp sponsored by Bloomingdale Recreation.

This year, the same camp will be back, prepared to assist young players in the sport and provide them with a time to remember.

“The kids had a great time last year,” said camp organizer Ken Ferrare. “It ran Monday through Thursday with rain dates on Friday, and this year a bunch of kids are coming back.”

Originally slated to begin next week and run from July 8 – 11, the first session has been postponed to late August, but will still be available.

“Apparently August is just a better time for these types of activities,” said Ferrare. “But our July 15 session will be staying put.”

Operating since 2003 as a limited liability company, Drills, Skills and Thrills (DST) operates in many surrounding towns and is run by Ferrare (the current boy’s head coach at Morris Knolls High School).

He is a basketball ‘lifer,’ with more than 20 years of coaching experience and two Coach of the Year awards under his belt.

His first came in 2000 from the Easton Express Times while he worked at Vorhees High School, and another in 2012 while at Morris Knolls.

Accompanying Ferrare on the reputable staff, are: AJ Oliver, the Bloomingdale sessions’ director and employee of NBA Films, and Tyler Daniel, of Rockaway, a basketball trainer just coming off a successful college career.

Last year, according to Ferrare, the children were lucky in that Oliver ended up distributing NBA gear that he had gotten from his job.

On putting together this year’s Bloomingdale sector of DST, Ferrare said that the town’s Recreation Director, Gail Galbraith, has been “a tremendous asset who is helpful in supporting the program and getting the word out.”

Though Ferrare himself will not be in attendance at Bloomingdale’s Drills, Skills and Thrills because of other camps he’s simultaneously running, he said that he’s put “one of his top people in charge.”

“We have a model for how our camps work,” he said. “And my staff follows it.”

So specifically, Session “One” will be from August 26 through 29, with a rain date on the 30th, and Session “Two” will be July 15 through 18 with a rain date on the 19th.

The camp runs from 9 am until noon at DeLazier Field in Bloomingdale, and it costs $90 for one session, or $160 for both.

Campers should bring water and a snack, as it will be a week of demanding play, but they will each receive a free t-shirt for each session.

For more information, interested persons should contact Coach Ken Ferrare at kjferrare@optonline.net or (908) 720-6747. To sign up, go to http://dstcamp.com/Summer_Camps.html directly.