The Academy at the Lakes Middle Division girls’ basketball team won its league last season and team coach, Marla Oliver, was hoping it would be good enough to repeat as champions this year.
But she got much more than she expected.
(Courtesy of Academy at the Lakes)
“I didn’t think that we were going to go undefeated at all,” Oliver said.
But that’s precisely what the Wildcats did. They ran the table, going 13-0 on their way to a second straight league title, making Oliver two-for-two as girls’ basketball coach. She also coached the boys’ basketball team for two years before taking over the girls’ squad.
They had a perfect season, but it wasn’t an easy climb.
As one of the smaller schools in the league, Academy at the Lakes has to deal with not only bigger schools, but older players as well. The Middle Division includes players from fifth-grade through eighth-grade, but since the academy also has a varsity team, their best players often get selected to that squad. That means they often have fifth- and sixth-graders facing eighth-graders from schools without a varsity program.
For Oliver, that meant using her team’s speed to overcome a size advantage from opponents.
“My girls can run,” she said. “Every time we got a rebound, we had our fast break in.”
Taking advantage of rebounds and fast breaks was key to their success, she said. Since that level of basketball often has low-scoring games (many teams don’t even score 20 points), every possession is important.
They were able to outrun many of their opponents, but they had some close calls.
Performing under pressure was good for the team, and it demonstrated players were able to follow the coach’s guidance and execute when necessary, Oliver said.
“I called the timeouts, I tell them what our play is and what our plan is, and they listened to me,” she said.
Listening to the coach was easy for Kendra Falby, a sixth-grader.
Falby described her coach this way: “She just says it like it is. She doesn’t sugarcoat it and water it down. She just gets to the point right away.”
That coaching style means the team has clear goals and knows what they have to do to succeed.
It also means tough practices, but that’s what was necessary to build on last year’s campaign.
Falby, who played for the team last season, is a softball player at heart, but really grew into her role with the basketball team. She scored nine points in the championship game against St. John’s.
Getting better meant taking the coach’s advice and trying some unusual methods, Falby said.
Falby practiced her shooting and lay-up mechanics at home. Falby also listened to her coach, who wanted her to try using her left hand for those plays.
The player said she would even eat with her left hand to get comfortable using it, which made shooting and going for lay-ups as a lefty more natural.
That kind of effort made a second-straight title all the more satisfying.
“It felt amazing because all the hard work we put into it,” Falby said. “It just showed how much I really did care.”
The girls cared so much that they made a special deal with their coach: If they won a second straight championship, Oliver would have special shirts made for them. They won, and now they have championship souvenirs as well.
The coach said she was happy to provide the shirts, and to commemorate back-to-back championships and a perfect season.
“They just worked really hard. They put in extra time and did anything I asked them to do,” Oliver said. “They’re awesome kids.”
Published April 1, 2015