Let the Games Begin!

And so we’re off, starting another season tomorrow, traveling to Parkway Central to take on the Colts. Game time is 4:15 and will represent a homecoming of sorts for Coach Cerutti, returning to the school where he coached for so many years. I know the feelings he will have, because I had similar ones when Hancock played Webster the first two years after Hancock moved to the fall season. For a year and a half I had been the varsity coach at both schools. It was a little weird coaching against girls whom I had previously coached.

The girls have worked hard and we coaches are very pleased with the progress we’ve seen over the past couple weeks. It’s time now to see how well those practices can translate to game speed and game situations. Given what we’ve seen, we’re confident that we’ll field a high-energy team that demonstrates good sportsmanship, one that the opposition will respect. We’re a little hamstrung our first couple games with eligibility issues; we’ll only have 10 eligible players for our first game, 11 for our second game, the evening (6 p.m.) contest against Nerinx on Monday at KAA. But we’ll be at full strength when we take on the Cougars of Affton next Thursday at home. The always tough Seckman will come to visit on Friday. Here’s our starting lineup for tomorrow afternoon:

Please sign up to receive notifications of blog updates. I will post box scores (and pictures, when available – we need road game photographers, if you’re interested) the evening of a game, or perhaps the next morning. If you enter your e-mail address above, you will receive an e-mail when I update the site. If anyone has an iPad with a data plan, and you like to keep a scorebook, GameChanger allows parents who can’t be at games to follow along. We promise not to tell your bosses that you may not be entirely focused on your job. Otherwise, you’ll just have to wait for a report from your daughter and the box score.

One of the joys of coaching at Webster has been the opportunity to get to know not just the outstanding young women who make up our teams but the parents who support them, as well. Having spent 37 years at Hancock, where I began coaching in 1986, I don’t take this for granted. I am confident I will meet every every parent of every girl (if I haven’t already) at some point or another this season. At Hancock, I had girls I coached for four years whose parent(s) I never even saw once.

We hope that you are looking forward to enjoying this season as much as Coach Cerutti, Coach Knapp, Coach Fechtel (and Coach Poe, in absentia) and I are. We have a great group of girls.

Play Ball!

P.S. I am still working on how to change the cover photo to represent 2015. I have created a new photo but have yet to be able to import it to replace the old one. #firstworldproblems