The Grand Forks Secondary School (GFSS) junior girls’ basketball team hosted a tournament last Friday and Saturday and despite finishing sixth there continue to be improvements.
The junior Wolves lost their first and final games by scores of 23-20 (vs. Osoyoos Secondary School) and 32-23 (vs. Stanley Humphries Secondary School) respectively but did beat Boundary Central Secondary School (BCSS) by a 36-14 score in their second game.
“I think we played hard; we tried our best and had fun,” said post Brook Thate after the team’s game against Stanley Humphries.
“I think we did everything we worked on in practice and it’s a good step towards getting better and they were really good games,” explained guard Shayna Plotnikoff.
Head coach Terry Clark echoed the sentiments of the two players.
“I’m really quite pleased with how they played,” explained Clark.
“We haven’t had a lot of experience. Half the kids are coming out of Grade 8, where you don’t get a lot of experience and I think their growth has been considerable from the beginning of the season to the end of this tournament.”
Clark was happy with the defence and attitude of his players and the focus going forward would be shooting and establishing an offence that will allow better shots – he also said that there were also improvements from the first game to the third.
“We started out pretty flat. We weren’t aggressive enough at all in the beginning of the first game and by the end of the tournament, everybody was out there busting themselves the whole time,” he said.
In terms of the girls’ rebounding – 37 boards vs. Osoyoos, 45 against BCSS and 32 vs. Stanley Humphries – Clark was also fairly happy, especially in the final game.
“Given the height of (Stanley Humphries) – those girls are 6’3” (1.9 metres), 6’4” (1.93 metres), I mean they’re just giants out there – I think we did a pretty commendable job,” said the head coach.
“If there’s one thing we have to do when we play them again, it’s we have to keep them out of the key defensively and boxing out and not letting them get any offensive rebounds.”
Clark also talked about improvements the team could make for the rest of the season.
“I think we need to have some pressure defence so we either have man-to-man full court pressure or we develop a trap where we don’t allow the team to get up into the offensive end and set up easily – that’ll be our goal the next few weeks,” he said.
The junior girl Wolves have a game against Midway Thursday, Jan. 26 at around 3:30 p.m. at the GFSS gym and the weekend of Feb 2 to 4, they’re in Kelowna for a tournament.
