By Kyle LoJacono
The Wharton girls basketball team is at .500 this season, but its record is nothing that worries the squad.
In fact, the Wildcats (9-9) are in a better position than last season when they entered the Class 8A-District 7 tournament 10-14 only to win the district championship for the second time in three years.
“That game we just clicked,” said senior guard Courteney Cox (5.2 points). “We scored 66 points when we beat Newsome for the district championship, and that was the most points we scored all year. We knew we could do that, and it gives us confidence now.”
Senior center Kelly Brown (5.8 points) added, “We loved being able to change what people thought about us and their expectations of what we could do. We worked hard all season, and it paid off.”
Fifth-year Wharton coach Chad Reed said injuries prevented them from having the record they were capable of last year. This year has also had obstacles, namely the loss of four starters.
The Wildcats graduated their top two scorers in forward Abbigale Kaczmarek (11 points, 3.2 rebounds*) and guard Monica Cazes (10.3 points*). They also lost senior forward/guard Shannon Clark (8.7 points, 3.1 rebounds*) because of a head injury, and had to find a new point guard.
“Our point guard to start the season made some bad decisions, and we had to take her off the team,” Reed said. “Shannon gets hurt and had to quit the game, so we’ve got a lot of new starters and players playing out of position. They’ve just stepped up and have a great attitude and play hard.”
Wharton has used a balanced attack to replace those starters. None of its players are averaging double-digit points, but five are scoring at least 5.2.
“We don’t have anyone who’s going to put 14 or 15 points a night up,” Reed said. “They understand that. We’ve talked a lot about player’s roles and what we need out of them as an entire team. We’ve focused on working together to win. Telling them to get the ball, they have to give the ball. Trust your teammates, keep the ball moving and whoever scores, scores. Bottom line is we want to have the most points at the end of the game.”
The Wildcats have been led offensively by senior guard Allison Mitchell (8.5 points).
“We think of it like we’re just average girls playing basketball, but we play well together and make it work,” Mitchell said. She added, “After last year we saw how well it worked to spread things around. We don’t want to have that one player we have to rely on. … You can have a superhero all you want, but it doesn’t matter if you don’t have a team.”
Sliding into the point guard spot is Carlena Eugene (6.3 points), who moved from forward. She is getting used to the position, but said she is becoming more comfortable running the offense.
“It’s getting there,” Eugene said. “My dad has been working with me to get better court vision to see the spaces in defenses.”
Many of the departures were in the post, forcing both Brown and freshman forward Lauren Wall (5.4 points) to step up their games.
“We have a smaller team this year, so we can get back on defense a bit quicker,” Eugene said. “We can run the court better and play a faster game. Me and Lauren just have to do our thing getting rebounds and put backs.”
Reed said he likes his squad’s progression, but added there is still plenty of work to do.
“We have not reached our stride yet,” Reed said. “We’ve gone through so many changes early in the season that we are still developing as a team, which can be good, but also puts us in games that we have to work very hard to be successful. Through adversity comes strength, and these girls have responded to that.”
The 8A-7 tournament is at Alonso Jan. 29 to Feb. 1, with the final Feb. 1 at 7 p.m.
Wharton plays at Alonso Jan. 22 before closing the regular season at home against Freedom Jan. 23. Both games start at 6:30 p.m.
*Last year’s stats
—Follow Kyle LoJacono on Twitter: @Kyle_Laker
