Did anyone here play varsity basketball in HS?

Yes.

Well I was on the team my sophomore year but rarely played.

I would disagree that it is great prep for track if you are talking distance events (and also would say running XC is not great prep for basketball either). If you like basketball, play it. But do not try to justify it as being great conditioning for track.

i played all through high school. Definitely doesn’t help distance stuff, but I was an 800 runner and I think the basketball conditioning helped a bit there. If you live in a cold climate and are still in high school, I don’t think it’s that much worse than running all winter.

Contrary to what the above poster wrote, basketball is great conditioning. Especially if your team gets punished a lot and they make you run gassers for 20-30 minutes at the end of practice!

To the OP - I played basketball all four years of high school (small forward and power forward). I went to a rural school (HS enrollment 600 kids) where our smaller gym was packed every night by all the locals and some of the student body and would get very loud as during close games and for rivalries. Really intense/fun atmosphere.

My junior year, we made a run all the way to regionals before getting beat by 20. I was a reserve and played a little bit, but not much. Our legendary coach left after the season.

My senior year, we were terrible. Absolutely awful. I started about 8-9 games and averaged about 5 points a game, so I wasn't an all-star. I think our record was 3-18. Our new coach was the former JV coach and he was a complete idiot and it sort of ruined the sport for me. It took me awhile to jump back in and start playing pickup ball again in a few men's leagues but by that point I was too focused on running to keep my skills up.

Yes, at a small school, and I sucked. My coached liked an uptempo game and I could keep up.

Sorry, I didn’t play.

I know everything there is to know about the greatest game ever invented.

Yes. Took me a month or a little more to regain my lateral quickness and jumping ability after XC but it was more fun than winter running in snow and bitter cold. Was an easy transition into outdoor track for 400/800 guys though. I never came out of a game because I was tired and we were a full court press, run and gun team. But I was a mediocre runner whose favorite sport was BB. If you're a talented runner with hopes of running collegiately you'll have to decide whether the risk of significant injury is worth playing BB. If you're an average runner like I was and you like BB, go for it. Playing multiple sports was one of the best parts about HS.

Went to a small, rural school of 300. Started JR year. We won our first game and lost the rest. Was not going to go out SR year and just train but track coach told me I had to go out. We won 2 games. Made some friends but it didnt help me get better for track even though I still did pretty well.

Fast forward 20 years. Coached at a school of 2500. Big bottle neck after soph year for kids wanting to play bb. We were consistent state champs and USA Today top 25. So, my runners started winter training mid November to mid Feb. School was big enough to have great programs in all sports but they definitely had to find their niche after 10th grade. Track/CC had room for everyone.

Went back to my hs for a mid winter game. It was fun because of the small community support and packed gym. At the big school, our crowds were small in a huge gym. Id come in from early season track practice to see a cram packed gym with 2 small communities 2 hours before gametime as we hosted small class sub state finals.

So, depending on where you are, you can get very different experiences. I will tell you that if you like bb and go out, you can still find time to run outside practice. I had a kid at a different school of 800 that loved bb but rode the bench. He ran every night in the dark after practice. Said he wanted to be a state track champ like his uncle. 2 years later, he graduated as a member of 2 bb state champ teams but never played and 2 track champion teams with 6 gold medals and 1 silver with 3 state meet records. He wasnt a good bb player but was around good athletes who happened to be his friends. Spring came and he flipped the tables but his friends were pretty good too. A lot of times at larger schools, the better bb players wont go out for track since they have league ball to get "seen/noticed".

Played for a big school in Texas. All white guys. We got up to number 2 in Texas. 30-2 but lost in playoffs to a team with a big guy who played for the Celtics. A lot of us were only 5'11 or 6' but we could all dunk pretty easily.

AJ Green (2019 800 meter champ) from Eastview did