Greenfield-Central’s Chaney Brown (12) goes up for a shot in front of New Palestine Taylor Kelley (12) during their game at New Palestine High School on Friday December 10, 2021.
Rob Baker | For The Daily Reporter
By Brady Extin | Daily Reporter
GREENFIELD — The 2021-22 campaign was a tale of two halves for Greenfield-Central.
After beginning 1-9, the Cougars turned things around and closed out the remainder of their schedule with an 8-4 record to finish 9-13 on the season.
It’s that play down the stretch that has head coach Bradley Key optimistic heading into this season.
“You could see it last year as the season went on, just how much more comfortable they came. For me, I thought we had a really good spring, summer, and fall. It really gave us time to kind of come together and understand the offense a bit more,” Key said. “That was a big thing for us because last year when we started it was like I was speaking a foreign language to the younger kids. I feel like everybody is just a lot more comfortable with what we’re trying to get done now, so that’s exciting.”
Last year’s team had just two seniors — Annan Tiede (4.2 points, 3.2 rebounds) and Audrey Pechin (1.0 point, 2.2 rebounds).
This year, Aryanna Hibbard (1.8 points, 2.8 rebounds), Taylor Smith (2.2 points) and Kammi Anderson (2.0 points) will take up the mantle of senior leaders. And Key had nothing but high praise for all three.
“I really like our three seniors. They’ve been with us for four years. They know what to do, they know what to expect and where to be. I’m excited for those three this year,” Key said. “We’ve been trying to get the program back on track, and it feels like we’re getting closer and closer. A lot of that is because those three show up and do their part.”
While those three set an example and fill the leadership roles for the Cougars, joining them on the court and heading the Greenfield-Central offense will be a sophomore duo — Chaney Brown and Brooklyn McConnell.
“Those two had a really good summer and developed their game. They worked on a lot of their weaknesses, so I’m very excited to see that in live action,” Key said. “You see it in practice all the time, but that’s only one thing.”
What was a three-headed freshman attack for the Cougars last season — with Brown averaging 15.5 points, McConnell 8.6 points and Josie White 5.2 points — is now down to just two with White set to miss the season with a torn ACL.
Along with the three seniors, Brown, and McConnell, the Greenfield-Central team will see significant minutes from junior Katie Holmes, and newcomers Emma Nelson and Jalyn Smith.
“Emma and Jalyn had really good off seasons, and I expect for them to be in the mix and a big part of the rotation,” Key said.
According to Key, it wasn’t just those two, the entire team had a good off season. He sees that work as one of the biggest keys to where his team is at heading into the season.
“I think a big part of that was having a good summer together. The rules have changed significantly since I first started coaching. We had a lot of practices in the spring, summer and fall, so now the expectations are a little higher with what we can accomplish in practice,” Key said. “Getting comfortable with each other, believing in what we’re doing, and holding each other accountable are all things that we’ve learned along the way. Hopefully that stuff shows up on game days.”
Something that plagued the Cougars last season was their inability to take care of the basketball, averaging 18.6 turnovers per game. Those off season practices have been useful in Key trying to fix those issues and stress to his team just how important that will be to their success.
“Last year, we really struggled taking care of the ball. Part of that is having younger kids, but if we’re going to turn things around and get going the right way, we have to start taking care of the ball a little bit better than we did last year,” he said. “We worked a lot on ball handling and ball fakes, and just got back to the basics. A lot of them got thrown into the fire early, so mistakes were kind of expected. This year, we’d like to get off to a start where every possession matters, and we’re taking care of it and doing the little things.”
Greenfield-Central opens the season tonight on the road at Greenwood at 7:30 p.m.
