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November 14, 2022 a
Anderson (Continued from page 1)
to coach but going through that process made me a better coach,” said Anderson. “I got it taken away from me and I didn’t think I would ever get an opportunity to do it again. When I was finally able to come back and step back into the coach’s box and get to stand in front of kids and mentor them, for me it changed the whole perspective on what is important. Winning is great but playing athletics my whole life prepared me for the battle that was cancer. In my younger years of winning and losing and fighting and going through injuries and having those mentors around you and that family and team around you—that built me into who I needed to be to be able to fight that and to be able to win.” Anderson was a really good basketball player, and that experience gives her the advantage of being able to relate to the good player on the team and the pressure that comes with that from peers or from coaches. “At the same time, I can mentor them by saying, ‘Hey, we’re a team. There are other people out here. You don’t have to do it all yourself.’” Anderson says she struggled with that as a player due to her personality of wanting to get things done. She says the good players will have to carry the pressure of having been challenged to meeting certain goals during the game. She expects that the Lady Bulldogs will show a lot of heart and grit this season. Anderson says that in order to be successful, they will have to be a good defensive team. “We have to really get after people. Sometimes we will have really good matchups because we’ve got some size and we’ve got some speed, but at the end of the day, it’s going to be how well we play together and can we game plan to put ourselves in the best situation,” said Anderson who expects to play a lot more up-tempo this season.
She says sometimes they will be going up and down the floor quickly and sometimes slow it down based upon which players are on the court. “You’re going to see more bigs in there and more pick-and-roll and we have to get after it,” said Anderson. “Practices have been really tough and really gritty. We’re diving after balls and doing those kinds of things and if we can do that, we’re going to be in good position come January and that’s where we want to be.” The Lady Bulldogs will have a multitude of seniors, but Anderson says they will be leaning on Teagen Stubblefield for leadership. She says Presley Shockey and Brynn Riley will be young players that can contribute. Shockey will be moving from a guard to a post position this season. “For those sophomores, if we can have them for three years together with that size and length, that’s good for us and we’re hoping to see big strides from them this year,” said Anderson. Anderson says there’s no beating around the bush as far as stated goals for the season. She quickly said, “Make the playoffs” upon that question. “I met with the girls and said, ‘what do we want to do’ and they said, ‘we want to be back in the playoff hunt,’” said Anderson. “So, I told them that we’re going to have to do some things different.” She says they felt like they were behind due to the COVID year, but they played 30 games this summer in camps and improved greatly. “Every time we stepped on the floor we knew that we may go get beat by Holliday who may be in the state tournament. But they were going to take their lumps so that we can be preparing for the opportunity to go face teams in our district and be successful,” said Anderson.
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