Head coach: Jansen Locher (4th season)
2019-20 record: 5-25
It’s not often a team’s leading scorer from the previous season wasn’t in high school a year ago but that’s the case for the Owensboro Lady Devils as Jansen Locher enters his fourth season at the helm of his alma mater.
The Lady Devils lost a few seniors from last year’s squad but Locher said he’s excited for what he has returning in his fourth season.
“We believe that this is a great opportunity for us to continue to build off of the positives that we saw last year,” he said. “We return most of our production from last year, with some talented young players coming up to now play varsity. A lot of talent graduated last year from the 3rd Region, so we see this as an opportunity for us to show that we can compete in a region that we feel is pretty open this year.”
With their season possibly being stopped at any moment due to Covid, Locher said he’s getting as much in during practices as he can.
“COVID has forced us to move quickly as far as implementing offenses and defenses,” he said. “We don’t know when we may have to quarantine or not, so we are trying to get a lot of things implemented in such a short time, while still focusing on fundamentals. It is important to have as many girls ready to play at the varsity level because we are expecting some to have to miss games because of contact tracing and other Covid issues that could prevent from us having our full team night in and night out.”
Freshman guard Alyrica Hughes led the Lady Devils in several categories as an eighth-grader last year but she’ll have an even bigger role this season.
“She led the team as an eighth-grader in ppg, steals, assists and minutes played,” Locher said. “The game has seemed to have slowed down for her and we look for her to continue to build off what she was able to do last year.”
Lyric Lawrence is one of four returning seniors for the Lady Devils and Locher said he’ll look to her for a leadership role this season.
“She is athletic and plays with a lot of energy,” he said. “Consistent play out of her is going to be crucial for our success this year. She is a great offensive rebounder, and has good instincts on the defensive end of the floor. Her leadership will be a determining factor to our success this season.”
Lizzy Phillips and junior Naraya Combest will also help the Lady Devils this season.
“Phillips is a freshman that has shown great potential so far,” Locher said. “Combest is a transfer from Apollo that has come in and really picked things up well. She is very athletic and has proven that she is capable of playing some significant minutes for us this year.”
Locher said consistency is going to be key for them this year.
“Last year we had games where we played great defensively, to only turn around the next game and give up a ton of points,” he said. “Same thing on offense. We have to be disciplined and trust each other to have team success. These girls have really tuned in and listened to us in practice, so hopefully that is something that we improve on this season in order to be successful.”
Owensboro starts the season Tuesday at home as they take on South Warren.
