Park girls basketball faced off against New Prague Feb. 13. The Trojans swiftly took over the court and continued to dominate throughout the game. New Prague won with a final score of 75-48.
According to head coach John Hayes, the beginning of the game was a little rough for the team. He said during the second half the girls went out and did their best, putting them in a better position for the remainder of the game.
“We responded much better in the second half. We got off to a slow start, (but) we talked about how we were going to respond to a significant deficit in the second half and the girls came out,” Hayes said. “Our goal was to come out (in the) second half and get three stops. The girls did that, and it got us off to a much better start in the second half.”
Sophomore Abby Carlson said the experience of winning and losing together as a team brings the team closer together. She said the team’s positive energy helps them work together through difficult parts of their season.
“The more that we’ve been together, and just winning and losing together, makes (us) closer as a team,” Carlson said. “We’ve been able to work through the ups and downs together just because of the positive environment and energy.”
According to senior Bella Miller, the team’s environment now has improved a lot since their last season. She said even with all the losses the team still maintains a close bond, and everyone cares for one another.
“Coming off of last year, the environment is just way better and way more positive. Our record might not show (it), but we still have fun, we have a good bond and we all love each other,” Miller said.
According to Hayes, the team has already made significant improvements during the season. Hayes said the team has improved overall on small details since the start of the season.
“We’ve improved a ton. It’s been fun to see little things that we noticed we struggled (with) at the start of the year improve. Things like handling pressure, and especially breaking full-court presses, have made a lot of improvement,” Hayes said. “The girls have done a great job handling full-court presses that we’ve seen from Benilde, Orono (and) Waconia. Tonight didn’t start the way we wanted to break, but they stuck with it and started to handle the pressure a lot better.”
Carlson said she wants to improve on personal skills before the end of the season. Carlson said to accomplish this goal she wants to start putting in more work outside of practice and increase her work ethic.
“I want to improve on ball handling and shooting before the end of the season. I plan on just getting in the gym, practicing and doing more drills outside of regular practices to improve,” Carlson said.
Miller said a highlight from the game was seeing one of her fellow teammates shoot for a three and make it. She said it’s always nice to see other girls on the team score.
“At the end of the game, Julianna (Oleisky), who plays mostly JV, got a three. It’s always fun when the girls who don’t play Varsity come in and score,” Miller said.
Park girls basketball’s next game is against Tartan at 12 p.m. Feb. 15 at home.
