One school basketball schedule, three levels: how to get only your kid's games on Google Calendar

How to read a school basketball schedule

A JV and varsity basketball schedule puts every level's games on one page. Find your kid's level on each date, then read across to that level's time and whether the game is home or away.

Sheets differ, so here's what to look for on yours:

• Levels and times. Some sheets give each level its own row (Star Valley High School). Some give each level its own column, JV and Varsity side by side (a St. Johns County, Florida high school). Others put several times in one spot, like "3:30(JV)" and then "4:15 approx. (Varsity)" (Eastford, Connecticut).
• Home or away. Some sheets print the host school's street address (Eastford). Some name only the other school (Star Valley), and some just say "Away" (St. Johns County).
• TBD. A start time can read "TBD", tournaments included (Star Valley). It means the time isn't set yet.
• Tournament lines. A holiday tournament can show a city and no times at all (St. Johns County).
• The update stamp. Look for "Updated" and a date (St. Johns County). Jot it down. It's how you'll spot a revised sheet later.

JV and varsity on the same night: when does your kid's game start?

If your kid plays a later game of the night, treat its listed time as an estimate, because it can't start until the game before it ends. Some schools say so right on the sheet. Eastford marks the varsity time "approx.", and Heartland Community Schools in Nebraska runs a "rolling schedule" where "Games could start earlier than the time listed."

Heartland also lists some games with no clock time at all, just "Immediately following" the game before. Games can run late, too. On one Texas district's doubleheader night, a girls' tip-off went 25 minutes late and pushed the boys' varsity start back 20 minutes, and a coach complained that a referee dragged out a JV game (Killeen Daily Herald).

So plan for both directions. Get there by the listed time, since the game can start early, and keep pickup loose afterward.

If your kid plays the first game of the night, the listed time is the one to trust.

Away games: what to put in the calendar's location

Put the host school's name and street address in the event's location, so the map link works from the car. If the sheet prints only the school's name or just "Away", look up the host school's address once and paste it in.

If the sheet names a specific gym, like "North Gym" on our sample, add that to the location too.

How to add a basketball schedule to Google Calendar

If the school offers a calendar feed, subscribe once and it keeps itself current. If all you have is the sheet, add your kid's games yourself or turn the sheet into a file you can import.

The steps are the same for any sport, so you'll use them again to add a sports team schedule to Google Calendar for soccer or softball.

If the school has a calendar feed, subscribe

Look on the athletics page for a "subscribe" or calendar link. Scheduling platforms like Arbiter offer calendar feeds for iCal and Google Calendar (Arbiter). Kentucky Country Day, for one, tells families to follow a team on Arbiter to get an email when the schedule changes, and to sign up for its calendar feed (Kentucky Country Day).

In Google Calendar, you subscribe on a computer. Next to "Other calendars", choose Add other calendars, then "From URL". Paste the link and choose Add calendar, and it shows up under "Other calendars" (Google).

Two things to know. The calendar has to be public for the link to work, and you can't subscribe from the Android, iPhone or iPad app (Google). Before you subscribe, check which levels the feed covers.

A feed is the best option when your school turns one on. Not every school does, and the sheet in your hand is what the rest of this page is for.

If all you have is the sheet

You can type in only your kid's games, or let the free sports schedule to calendar tool make a file for you. It reads the sheet and returns the games for every level on it. Uncheck the levels that aren't your kid's, check each game's time against the paper, then download the file.

To import it, open Google Calendar on a computer and go to Settings, then Import & Export. Select the file, choose the calendar you want, and click Import (Google). Pick the calendar on purpose, since events go to your primary calendar unless you choose another.

Imported events don't stay in sync (Google). If a game moves, you'll fix it yourself.

Two kids, two levels, one sheet

If one kid plays JV and the other plays varsity, or your daughter and son are on the girls' and boys' teams, add each kid's games once and put their name on each one. That's the simplest way to keep track of multiple kids' activities on one calendar without doubling anything.

Put the name first in the event title and give each kid their own color if your calendar lets you. On a night they both play, that's two events, each with its own time. On our sample, the Ridgeway night becomes "Leo: JV vs. Ridgeway" at 5:30 and "Theo: Varsity vs. Ridgeway", whose time still reads TBD. If they play in the same game, make it one event with both names.

If your JV player might also suit up for varsity that night, put both games on their calendar. Whether that's allowed depends on your state (see the questions below).

When the revised schedule comes out

Compare the "Updated" date on the new sheet with the one on yours, then change only the games that moved. Where a school offers a feed, it updates on its own, and some schools email families when the schedule changes (Arbiter, Kentucky Country Day).

The day a revised sheet arrives

1. 1

   Check the update stamp.

   If the date is newer than yours, you have changes to find.

2. 2

   Read your kid's level only.

   Go line by line against your calendar.

3. 3

   Edit each game that moved.

   Fix the date, time and location.

4. 4

   Delete canceled games and add makeups.

   A makeup game is a new event, so give it a location too.

5. 5

   Keep the newest sheet and tell the other driver.

   Whoever does carpool needs the same change.

If you imported a file, Google's help pages don't say what re-importing an updated file does to games already on your calendar, so edit the changed games by hand.

The night the sheet comes home: five steps

It's short enough to drop in the team group chat.

1. 1

   Highlight your kid's level on every line.

   That's your whole season, at a glance.

2. 2

   Check the athletics page for a calendar feed.

   If there is one, subscribe and you're nearly done.

3. 3

   Add only your kid's games.

   Type them in, or use the tool and uncheck the other levels.

4. 4

   Put the host school's address in each away game's location.

   Then the map link works from the car on game night.

5. 5

   Mark later-game times as estimates, and note the sheet's update date.

   Then a late tip-off or a revised sheet won't catch you off guard.

Snap the sheet once, and each kid's games land on their own calendar

That's a lot of typing for one page, and double with two players. Say Leo plays JV and his brother Theo plays varsity, on our Alder Bend sample.

Snap the sheet in KidsFoldr (or forward the coach's email, or screenshot the athletics page), and Leo's JV games land on his calendar, Theo's varsity games on Theo's, and the freshman games are set aside, with no typing. Smart Extract does that sorting, and the games go to the calendars you already use: Google, iCloud or Outlook.

Set it up once: two settings and a profile line

1. Turn on Smart Extract. It's in Settings > Automagic Tools, and it stays off until you switch it on. It needs at least one family member in Family Profiles first.
2. Type each kid's level and sport. In each kid's Family Profile, put it in Sports, Activities & Interests: "JV Basketball" for Leo, "Varsity Basketball" for Theo, with their school in School. That's how Smart Extract knows which column is whose.
3. Pick each kid's Default calendars. In the same profile, choose the calendar their games should land on. A game for both kids goes to both calendars, and a kid with none set uses your default calendar.

If no one's profile lists basketball yet, it keeps every game, so nothing is lost. Add the level, and the next sheet narrows.

What happens to the Alder Bend sheet

Leo's five JV games go to his calendar, and Theo's five varsity games go to Theo's. The Dec 28-30 tournament comes in as three all-day events, and they're kept. The five freshman games go to Discarded, so the receipt reads "13 events kept, 5 discarded."

Home games read "Alder Bend High School", named from the sheet. Away games go to the opponent's school, like "Pine Hollow High School", and a gym the sheet names stays: "Kestrel Valley High School North Gym". Add Addresses then adds the street address, using your zip code to find the right place.

Titles read plainly, and an away game reads "Basketball @ Pine Hollow". If you want the name up front ("Leo: Basketball @ Pine Hollow"), pick that in Event Label Format. The color comes from the calendar a game lands on, so with Default calendars set, Leo's games show in his calendar's color and Theo's in Theo's.

Discarded means set aside: any game there comes back with one tap on Restore, if you want a freshman game after all. Games already played when you snap go to Discarded too, so a sheet snapped mid-season adds only what's ahead. On a tournament sheet that lists other schools playing each other, those games are set aside the same way, and your kid's team's games stay.

Look first, or let it import

By default, the kept games wait for you. Tap Review Events on the receipt, check them, then tap Import All or Import Selected. Turn on Automatic Import (also in Settings > Automagic Tools), and the kept games go straight onto the calendar; the discarded ones never do.

Looking first is a good habit for the first sheet of the season. After that, automatic is fine.

When the revised sheet comes home

Snap the new sheet the same way. If a game on it overlaps in time with one already on your calendar and has a similar title, Duplicate Protection asks first: Import Anyway, Import & Delete Existing Event to swap in the new one, or Don't Import. With Automatic Import on, it skips those duplicates.

A game moved to another day doesn't overlap its old date, so it comes in as a new event. Delete the old date yourself; the "Updated" date and the steps above help you spot which games moved.

The sheet itself

Every game links back to the sheet in the calendar entry's notes, one tap away. The sheet is filed under Leo and Theo as a Sports schedule, with no sorting and nothing left on the fridge. So scan it for peace of mind, then toss it.

The free tool gives you every level to uncheck yourself; the app narrows to each kid's games from their profiles.