With a fresh offensive strategy and a new lineup, the girls varsity basketball team hopes to finish the season as one of the top four in the conference and head to the regional tournament.
To achieve this goal, the girls have instilled new tactics to specialize the way they play against each team.
“If a team has a really tall post player, we will front the post with our middle defender down low and the back side player on the bottom of the zone will cover the backside for the lob pass,” head coach Chad Scott said. “Our offense also has to adjust to whether a team plays man or zone defense and defends half court or full court.”
To gain knowledge of how the other teams play, the players sometimes go to their opponents’ other games before playing them to learn about the teams and specialize in the way that they approach the game.
“Sometimes we talk to other coaches that have played that specific team [and] sometimes the teams post summaries about their games or have newspaper articles we can read,” senior Julia Gurdak said. “[We scout them] to see what it is we have to really focus on to be successful.”
In addition to enhancing and specializing the offensive strategy during games, the players have also found that staying motivated and pushing through their game losses has contributed to the team’s success this season.
According to Scott, one of the team’s biggest accomplishments this season was “a convincing win at Stone Bridge following a disappointing loss at Langley.”
To move past the losses, the players focus on their dedication to the team and staying positive.
“We have a lot of spirit and we work really hard. We try and maintain high spirits,” junior Danica Mooney-Jones said. “Our defense is really good and we’ve pulled out some good wins.”
Although the players this season have had a hard time keeping up their free throw percentage, they still have assets that enhance their playing and focus on improving to reach one of their goals of hosting a first round tournament game.
“Making free throws to close out games has been a big problem for us this season,” Scott said. However, “the team’s biggest strength is our defense. In our wins, the opposing team is averaging less than 40 points per game.”
The team’s high energy and frequent bonding activities, such as team dinners, have also contributed to the way that the girls play on the court.
“On the court, if you don’t know someone very well, you’re going to not be on the same wavelength, like you’ll try to pass to them and they won’t be where they need to be,” Mooney-Jones said. “But if you know them pretty well, you’ll know where they’ll need to be and they’ll know where they need to be, so I think it really helps both on and off the court.”
Even with the more intense skill application and mindset shift, the team still has less popularity than the boys basketball team, according to Gurdak. The girls’ team, however, hopes to gain more support as the season continues.
“I think that once we get into conference playing, when we’re playing teams that are more competitive in our area and we start playing out more wins, people will hopefully get more excited about girls’ basketball,” Gurdak said.
With an increased number of fans, some team members believe that their playing on the court would improve.
“If they do start coming out then that’ll drive us to play better as well, so I think that’s just a positive force,” Gurdak said. “I don’t think it’s hurting us in any way.”