Last season, Mark Casper was the one in a new role, serving as a varsity head coach for the first time.
Now, it will be all the players on his Wyoming Area girls basketball team that are going through a new experience.
The Lady Warriors made it to Mohegan Sun Arena at Casey Plaza for the District 2 Class 4A championship game, qualifying for their first Pennsylvania Interscholastic Athletic Association state tournament in the process, in Casper’s first season. They accomplished that feat with four three-year starters, an all-senior starting lineup and another senior leading the group coming in off the bench.
“As I stated at Media Day last year, ‘the good news is we have eight seniors; the bad news is we have eight seniors’,” Casper said.
Morgan Janeski was a three-time, first-team, all-star and 1,000-point scorer while Anna Wisnewski, Jocelyn Williams and Halle Kranson all received some type of all-star recognition during their careers.
“In my time on this planet, whether it’s sports or otherwise, I’ve found out the phrase, ‘there’s no substitute for experience’, always rings true,” Casper said. “That’s kind of what we’re looking at.
“We have some athletic young ladies who have had success in other sports. Our very successful field hockey team, we have some participants on that and some other sports where they’ve made it to district finals or playoffs.
“We’re relying a little on that, but we’re only going to get better as time goes on.”
Junior guard Krea Bonita, who will probably take over at the point, is the most experienced returnee.
Talent within a large freshman group that will make up about half the varsity/junior varsity lineup is another of the reasons Casper anticipates in-season improvement.
“We have an influx of some very talented freshmen who are going to see a lot of time,” Casper said.
A group of players with limited varsity experience will be counted upon to help the youngsters transition to the high school level.
Seniors Morgan Slusser, Marissa Gacek and Maggie Hallman, junior Kendall Day and sophomore Alexa Gacek all saw some playing time when the Lady Warriors went 7-5 to tie for third place in Division 2 of the Wyoming Valley Conference and finished 14-11 overall.
“The bottom line is it’s an experience thing,” Casper said. “We had a record-setting year last year.
“ … The young girls coming into our program are similar to the others, they have had success in multiple sports. As they get more experience, we’re going to get better – a lot better.”
Wyoming Area opens at the Central Columbia Tip-Off Tournament Friday and Saturday.
