2015 Preview: Will Whiteoak Lady Wildcats begin new era with more victories?

This is the third consecutive season the Whiteoak Lady Wildcats will have a different coach leading the way, as Randy Abbott has taken over the Lady ’Cats program, looking to put his twist on a basketball team that has struggled to reach the win column in recent years.

Abbott, who has been an assistant basketball coach for nearly two decades and was last an assistant coach for the Hillsboro boys basketball team for the 2014-15 season, now is a first-year head coach at the varsity level and is looking to make becoming the head coach for the Lady ’Cats a success.

The new WHS coach is replacing John Kirschner, who coached the Lady ’Cats for one season.

“All I wanted to do is coach, and it has been fun. If it wasn’t fun, I wouldn’t want to do this,” Abbott said of taking over as the WHS head coach. “People ask me why would I want to coach with everything that goes on, but it is the relationships with the kids.

“It may sound corny in today’s world, but it is really what I believe. We enjoy them, and we like everything basketball entails. We like practice, we like games, we like it all.”

Leading the Lady ’Cats on the court will be senior Emma Wardlow, who is on the verge of scoring 1,000 career points, entering this season with over 900 points. Last season, she totaled 313 points in the regular season and 20 more points in their lone tournament game. She was also an All-District selection.

As for the preseason of WHS, they’ve been learning another new system, and for that, Coach Abbott is pleased with the work ethic his team has shown as they want to improve on a 5-17 overall record last season, along with improving on their 1-12 mark in the Southern Hills Athletic Conference.

“We’ve had three scrimmages, but we are still working on getting everything in,” Abbott said. “We are working really hard on our fundamentals and defense. They are coming, and again, the girls are working hard. We don’t have a lot of numbers with 15 girls in the program, but they are getting there and improving every day.”

WHS will have three seniors this year in Wardlow, Ashleigh Harless and Michaela Luman. Juniors fill up the remainder of the roster with the following players: Lexi Jones, Kattie Taylor, Maggie Carr, Jaycie Parr, Morgan Thompson and Chelsea Chisman.

“Emma is a great player and leader for us,” Abbott said. “Maggie Carr will run the point for us, and I think mechanically she is just as good as anyone out there as far as the way she conducts herself. With our seniors, we’ll also have to depend on Luman as well.”

The non-league schedule for the Lady 'Cats includes Piketon, Paint Valley, Blanchester, Huntington, Northwest, Silver Grove (Ky.), Williamsburg and East Clinton.

“We have to think we are going to win. We are setting our goals, but that is coming,” Abbott said. “Our journey starts against Piketon, and we expect to compete and win. We are going to cut our teeth really early with a tough stretch of games to start the year, so not only do we have to be physically tough, but we have to be mentally tough.

“The thing that impressed me after I was hired was some of the kids stayed behind after the meeting, and they wanted to know who I was. They asked, ‘Are you going to be here a year and leave?’ I said ‘No, I am here.’ They shared their concerns about all of that, but they also shared they were wanting to pay the price to win. They are here to win. They also asked me if I was here to ‘rebuild a program.’ I don’t believe in that … the seniors are here to win now, they don’t have a do-over, and we’ll give it everything we have right now. I’m impressed with who they are.”

Some within the conference don’t believe in the Lady ’Cats reconfiguration headed into the season, as Coach Abbott said his team was chosen to finish in last place. He’s using it as motivation for the season.

“At the coaches banquet, we were picked last … that’s not what we expect,” he said. “We know we are going to have to play disciplined ball and execute. We are going to have to play smart and play doubly hard. We don’t have the luxury of having a deep bench with our numbers.

“Our conference is tough, but I can tell you this – we aren’t going to look past anybody, and everyone we play, we are going to try to find the recipe to beat them.”

There is also the goal of gaining a team identity, and for the Lady ’Cats this year, that involves one thing … stifling defense.

“We want to pressure our opponents. We want to be the team defensively you don’t want to play. You look back at the SCOL, as that’s where I’ve been most of my coaching career, and with McClain the first thing that comes to your mind is defense,” Abbott said. “That’s the team we want to be. We don’t want our opponents to look on the calendar and go ‘oh, there is Whiteoak, that’s a win.’ We want to put in their mind a picture that our opponents will struggle doing what they like to do.“