High School Hoops Chronicles, S1V12: Finale

Wednesday’s sectional quarterfinal went pretty much as expected. Lawrence North jumped on Cathedral early and never let up. It took four possessions for CHS to even get the ball into the paint on offense, and that resulted in an immediate turnover. Our first shot was a hurried airball. LN hit their first four 3s and 6 of 8 for the half. Meanwhile our only 3-point attempt that even hit the rim came on the last play of the first half when we banked in a half-court shot to cut the LN lead to 34. The Wildcats cruised through a running clock second half to win by 32. They are a damn good team. They advance to play their arch rivals, #1 Lawrence Central, who won their quarterfinal by 55.

L never played, which she was fine with. She had no interest in measuring her progress this season against some grown-ass women.

I give L a solid B/B+ for her first season of high school ball. She started and was team captain for all 23 JV games. By the seventh game she was dressing for varsity. She got on the court nine times with the varsity girls and was officially double-rostered by Christmas.

She averaged 5.6 points per JV game, with a high of 15. If you factor in the quarters she missed because the coaches were saving her for varsity minutes, she jumps up to 6.8 ppg.[1] That’s decent. Her assist numbers weren’t great, but it’s hard to get assists in JV. If you have a reliable scorer you can pass to, she’s probably playing varsity. Turnovers are another area where she can make a big improvement. Her defense definitely got better from having to guard our best varsity perimeter player in practice.

Most of all, she was the rock for the team. I don’t know what our scoring totals were, but I’m guessing two of her teammates scored more total points that L did. But those girls constantly got subbed out because they ran plays wrong, got lost on defense, didn’t rebound, or got into foul trouble. L never left the court unless she was dying for a break, got injured, or was needed for the varsity game.[2] She stayed on the court because even when she wasn’t scoring, she made the team better. She was the one person who could settle the offense down, who could get her teammates into the right spots. That’s why she often sat for a minute or less of game time when she did get a break, since things went sideways quickly when she wasn’t on the court.

It’s been interesting to gauge her freshman year against those of her travel teammates. One of them goes to a 2A school and was the best player on their varsity team, which seems wild to us. She was not our best travel player but I guess against a weak high school schedule she tore it up. Props to her! Several go to big, suburban schools and spent all year on their freshman teams, playing in roughly 15 games. A couple other girls floated between their freshman and JV teams. Meanwhile L played in 32 combined games. I don’t know that there’s a right answer for what the best experience is. I’m hopeful L benefitted from playing so much with such a big role.

Looking ahead, CHS loses two seniors, the only two girls in the program that are six feet tall. They are going to be huge losses, literally and figuratively. One of our junior starters is a D1 soccer player and there’s always a chance she won’t play as a senior. At a private school, you never know what new players might show up or which expected returnees enroll somewhere else next fall.

All that means there is a big opportunity for L to be a varsity player next year. She needs to work hard over the next nine months to earn that spot. Her jump shot is the most obvious area that needs improvement. Without size, CHS is going to have to adjust their offensive philosophy and look to shoot from outside more. None of the returning girls are great shooters. If L can fix her mechanics, that can earn her playing time. She needs to continue to get stronger so she can compete with varsity level players. Her ball handling also needs to take a step up if she’s going to consistently play against 17–18–19 year olds.

The other big thing for next year is that Indiana is set to do a major reclassification of high school sports. We still aren’t sure of all the details, but based on what has been reported so far, there is a very good chance that CHS will move down to 3A. That will be huge for the girls basketball program. It will likely put us in the same sectional as Chatard and at least one other Catholic school rather than in one of the toughest 4A sectionals in the state. Chatard is going to be very good the next couple years, so winning a sectional will still be a tough task. It isn’t out of the question, though. I would hope that moving down means that the regular season schedule will change, too, and we will drop a lot of the high-level 4A schools we currently play every year. CHS loves to play insanely tough regular season schedules in every sport to prep for the playoffs. Given who is expected back in the program, though, it will be a good year to play an easier schedule.

On our way home Wednesday L asked me how long she should take off before she starts training. I like that she’s planning ahead, but told her to relax and not even think about basketball for a few days before we come up with an idea for what’s next.

I talked with her AAU coach this week about his plan for the spring. He’s still getting a feel for that, but it sounds like high school teams do most of their practicing on weekends when they are not in tournaments. Our program really pushes signing up for the group training they run on weeknights. It seems like several of L’s teammates are going to do that, so I expect that’s the path we’ll take. All that begins in March.

It would also be nice if she could squeeze another inch or two of growing out of her body along the way, but I’m afraid she might be stuck at 5’6”.

That wraps up her first year of high school ball. I hope you’ve enjoyed following her as much as I’ve enjoyed sharing.