Before this winter, the Henninger girls’ basketball team had won three games since 2018 and hadn’t made it to sectionals in over two decades. This season, they’re starting to flip the script.
“We are live on the bounce,” Henninger girls’ basketball coach Ben Kochan says.
Kochan’s starters are young.
“We’ve got eighth-grader Kai Baker, eighth-grader Alayna Wood, ninth-grader Sanai Lee, ninth-grader Inese Odom and a senior, Tay Scott,” Kochan said.
But don’t let their average age fool you. They’ve been playing together for awhile.
“About like five years,” Ta’Kai Baker said. “We know each other’s games, we know how each other plays.”
“Since like sixth, seventh grade,” Inese Odom said. “The way our friendship and chemistry is and the way we have been working hard throughout the whole year has been really paying off.”
The tight-knit group went from going 1-8 in the spring, to starting this season with a 3-0 record.
“We’re just proud of them. We preach all the time about hard work, it’s just good to see that reward, everything that they’ve done is coming to fruition now,” Kochan said.
“We were the talk of the town last year about not winning. We could be the talk of the town this year about winning,” Baker said.
The girls are hoping that their sizzling start is only the beginning.
“I feel like we’re going to go a long way this season. I feel like we’ll make it to sectionals and have a chance to win it,” Odom said.
“Sectionals, number one. And then make some noise. I think we’re on the path to certainly doing number one, and number two, we’re getting better every day,” Kochan says.
They’re hoping to set a new standard for Black Knights basketball.
“It’s a change of fortune from where we’ve been the last couple of years, and again, it’s not by accident. It’s the hard work. We want our young kids to realize that. We want the even younger kids behind them to see what they’re doing and be a part of it,” Kochan says.
