2010 Steals

Hi Girls,

I think the best thing we did as a basketball team was being able to pressure the other team creating the opportunity to steal the basketball and create easy shots for ourselves. The 24 defense is a great team defense and it took advantage of our overall team speed and quickness, especially the speed and quickness of our 3 perimeter players.

When we executed it correctly to me it was a thing of beauty. As we talked about sometimes it took awhile for the other team to meltdown but more often than not as we kept the pressure up the other teams would eventually lose their wills to win and basically give up. All I can say is I give you the players a giant congratulations on your ability to execute this defense. It took a tremendous amount of heart and energy to make it work as well as it did. It was definitely fun to play and fun to watch. Great job!

Stats:

Jamie: 90

Jesse: 82

Lindsey: 66

Lindy: 43

Emily: 29

Caroline: 17

Mer: 12

Casey: 10

Alex: 10

Caitlin: 6

Megan: 4

Jordan: 3

Renee: 1

Team Total: 373

Average Steals Per Game: 16.2


Final Thoughts: Pressure defense, our calling card. I have not looked it up but I am certain 373 steals for the season and 16.2 steals per game is a team record during my tenure. It probably is a conference record. With 16 steals leading to probably at least 6 or 10 baskets per game on lay ups it created over half of our offense came from our defense. If we had scored everytime we stole the ball we would have averaged 32 points per game just on steals. That is why being good at 24 Lockdown was so important to us. It was also important for us to be equally as good making lay ups and making good passes in the open court leading to making even more lay ups.

On Individual notes. I think Jamie with 90 steals has the individual record for steals in a season. Right behind her was Jesse with 82 steals and Lindsey with 66 steals. They formed an unbelieveable pressure combination and that is what made us so good. There was essentially no place to hide for the opponent, there was no weak link to attack.

Also Lindy did a great job of covering back and still contributing 43 steals from the 5 position. Very few times did we get beat after gambling allowing the other team to break us down for an easy lay up. Also, Emily did a nice job using her long arms and quickness making steals and covering her man creating a total lockdown for the opposing team. Plus we got good contributions from the bench. Great defense is always a tremendous Team Effort. If there is any single player not doing their job the defense will not work. You are only as good as your weakest link on any given possession.


On a single game note, Lindsey has the team record with 13 steals in one game. Jamie is second with 10 steals in one game and Jesse is in 3rd with 8 steals in one game. Good work girls.

Be Proud of Yourselves. We might go a long time before we see a team that is as good as this one was at playing pressure lockdown defense. That will be the challenge for next years team to see if it can be as effective as this years team playing defense and to find other area's of the game it can improve on to make the team even better.

Thoughts to have a better team by:

There is no glory in defense, just Championships. Morgan Wooten, All Time winningest High School Coach.

Don't play defense the way you like to be guarded, play defense the way you hate to have someone guard you. Bobby Knight, All time winningest college coach

Teams with skill make good teams but teams that play with skill and heart make great teams.
Dean Smith, Hall of Fame UNC Coach

Next up Assists.

Coach May