Girls basketball starts season strong
January 4, 2019
The girls basketball team had their first match against St. Louis Park Nov. 23, 2018. They had a strong first game, winning 59-47. They are doing well with an overall winning streak of 6-3. This team is working extremely hard to do the best they can. They practice everyday after school to carry themselves into victory.
Basketball is a competitive game, and is time consuming. Practice is everyday after school from 2:45 p.m. until about 5:00 p.m. In addition, their games are almost every Tuesday and Thursday lasting a couple hours. It can be difficult to manage school and basketball during the season. The girls need to find time to do all of their schoolwork either before or after basketball. Although it is difficult, the girls make sure to do all of their work and balance out their sport and school.
Junior varsity player Delany Wagner said, “I have to figure out when to do homework, before or after games. Sometimes I have to stay up really late, but you know it’s worth it.”
There is also a lot of pressure for the girls, especially the captains. They need to make sure everyone is doing the best they can. The captains have to make special effort to cheer the girls on and keep everyone playing hard. Players walk in the captain’s footprints, and many look up to the captains of the team. If the captains give up during a game, the other players will too. During games they do their best to try to not put too much pressure on themselves and just have fun with the game.
Captain and future gopher senior Sara Scalia said, “Sometimes it is a lot of pressure. People are looking up to me and making sure I’m doing what I am supposed to be doing. I don’t put that much pressure on them on the court.”
One of the biggest keys to this team’s victory is being playing together as a team and communication. Although it is important to independently be good a team will not succeed unless they work together. That is a major goal for this team due to all of the new people joining this season. The girls need to talk on the court so they know where everyone is. They also need to talk off the court on what they need to improve on for next time and just to get more comfortable with each other.
“We are starting to come together as a team. I hope that we can communicate more and not be as quiet on the court. And to just keep winning and finishing out the tough games when it’s close,” Scalia added.
This year’s team is striving day after day to do whatever it takes to win. The coaches are very excited to see how well the team improves over the season. They are working very hard to win and their overall goal is to win the conference and go to state.
Coach Willie Taylor said, “We want to improve every time we go on the floor. The team goal would be to win the conference and then make it to state.”
The girls basketball team is shaping up to be very strong altogether. They are all excited about the season and all the improvements they already have. The players love basketball and growing together to shoot towards victory.
