Lake Travis head basketball coach Jan Jernberg is coming off one of the most successful years of his career. One in which his Cavaliers were ranked No. 1 in 4A and made it further in the playoffs – the regional final – than any other team in school history.

But on summer afternoons, instead of relaxing and relishing his most recent taste of success, he’s relishing the taste of cheap pizza and the sound of screaming kids.

Scattered about a gym in Lake Travis are a bunch of sweaty, mop-haired kids in oversized t-shirts and basketball shorts, and when they’re not playing with a sticker they found on the floor, they’re learning the basics of fundamentally sound basketball.

This slightly chaotic work in progress is what you might call Jernberg’s legacy, and considering his nature is one part disheveled and one part outspoken, this kind of seems appropriate.

“It’s something we started years ago, and we started it because we were so unhappy with the camps we’d go to,” Jernberg said. “Forgive the pun, but the attitude they had was so Cavalier and so lazy. Camps weren’t structured at all and they really revolved around elite kids with everyone else just standing around.”

A world of all half-day camps and overnight camps really didn’t work for Jernberg, who saw the first as too little time to get a point across, and the second as a babysitting job.

“We felt like if we could get 25-30 good hours in one week, we’d really be getting somewhere,” Jernberg said. “We felt like that was enough time to really teach a kid something, and we feel like we’re doing that now.”

The camps started back in 1988, and this week, Jernberg wrapped up his 220th camp since then. The camps started at just a few high schools, but now have spread all over Texas, and include staffs that get into the double digits at each location.

Jernberg – the 2009 Texas Association of Basketball Coaches’ 4A Coach of the Year – rolls in for the first few days, hands the keys to his counselors and then heads to the next gymnasium to set up camp for the next week.

The benefit for kids at Lake Travis is that they get access to one of the most demanded basketball camps in the state, and it’s run by a coach with over 30 years of experience, who one day may be calling the shots for those kids when they put on a Cavalier uniform.

“The camp is now popular enough that even if we wanted to pull back and do fewer, we really couldn’t,” Jernberg said.

Which is fine with him. There have been years over the last decade where the word ‘retirement’ has crept into his mind and the minds of those around him. And for a few brief moments, when riddled with angst over a loss that shouldn’t have been, he’s certainly wondered if it would be worth doing for another season. But he has come to a crossroads in his career, and understands his ultimate fate to some degree.

“I’m at a point in my life, where if I retire, I think it won’t be long before I die,” he said. “I really believe that. Just like Bear Bryant and all those coaches you hear about that go right after they retire. I just can’t imagine not coaching in some way.”

Now, one could take this to mean that he’ll be coaching the Cavaliers until he croaks.

Not so fast.

“I don’t think I could,” he laughed. “Would I love to go another 15 years? Of course, but I don’t think I have it in me. But I’ll definitely be doing these camps, and I’ll keep teaching kids the game as long as I can.”

He’s also been doing it long enough to see former campers become rival head coaches, which is enough to blow his mind on a near daily basis. But it also reinforces his belief that his camps are doing the right thing – developing sound basketball minds.

“I think we’re at a point where we really have this thing down,” he said. “I think the kids get a great education, and the parents get the bang for their buck.”