“Lady Trojan habits” helped make Laura Lee Holman the softball and basketball player she was at New Hope High School.
Holman used hard work, a will to win, and relentless energy to earn an opportunity to play Division I basketball at Troy.
When her playing days ended, Holman channeled that passion for basketball and competition into a job as a physical education teacher and a basketball coach. In her first job at Cottondale (Fla.) High, she guided the girls basketball team to a 22-9 record and to the Class 2A Final Four.
A chance to return home to New Hope High proved to be the perfect fit and an ideal chance to re-establish those “Lady Trojan habits.”
But those traits didn’t take hold immediately. There were times early in her time as coach at New Hope that Holman wondered if the players ever would grasp the ideas she was trying to impress on them. In year two, the team won five games. Double-digit losses were common. There also were plenty of times the Lady Trojans wilted under waves of pressure defense and turnovers.
Through it all, the “Lady Trojan habits” remained.
Those habits started to pay dividends in 2011-12, when New Hope won 21 games. The following year, the Lady Trojans won 25 and came close to advancing to Jackson to play in the state tournament. Last season, new Hope realized that goal in a 26-3 season that ended in heartbreaking fashion in a 50-48 loss to South Jones in the state semifinals.
Eight seniors graduated from that squad, leaving Holman in a similar place this season compared to the one she was in in her first season with a group of inexperienced, but hungry basketball players who wanted to win.
Holman sees similarities between her first team in 2009-10 and her sixth team in 2014-15. She hopes the results will come in time, but for now, though, she is trying to strike the right tone and find the right message to get the Lady Trojans going in the right direction.
“There are days I see that,” Holman said. “I think this group has more depth. We have the tools. We are just not playing to our potential.”
New Hope slipped to 2-10 after a 63-41 loss to Shannon on Friday at the 18th-annual Joe Horne Columbus Christmas Invitational at Columbus High. The loss came on the heels of a 41-30 setback to Aliceville in the team’s first game at the two-day event.
Jada Jamison had 12 points and Kennedi Stephens added nine points for New Hope on Saturday in a game in which it didn’t quit after falling behind by as many as 28 points in the fourth quarter. New Hope struggled all game with Shannon’s pressure defense and committed numerous self-inflicted mistakes, including having possession in the front court and stepping into the backcourt and ballhandlers dribbling into congested areas with their heads down.
The mistakes were similar to the ones that plagued New Hope against Aliceville. Holman tried a variety of ways to get her message through to her players:
n “Run the offense, run the offense. Patience. Patience.”
n “Move the ball.”
n “Have some fight in you.”
n “Execution.”
All of the words sounded a lot like the ones she used the past few years with players like D.J. Sanders, Taylor Baudoin, and Tyler Blevins, who were at the game Friday to watch their old team. Those three were part of teams that played with a
“will to win” and found ways to win basketball games. Holman said those are intangibles she has stressed in the first two months of the season.
Holman said the 2013-14 team was a little bit more athletic at some positions, which allowed for those players to make up for a mistake. She said that group also had a competitive fire that enabled it to outwork or outhustle people. She said players like D.J. Sanders and Moesha Calmes, who played on the varsity team as eighth-graders, gave that group an edge in experience over her current group. She admitted Friday that the absence of three players out with the flu made things tough, especially when you have a roster of one senior, three sophomores, and nine freshmen left.
Still, Holman wants to see constant improvement. She said she has seen “light bulbs going off” over her players’ heads. She feels the team still has time and plenty of tough opponents to face to come together before it opens district play. Holman said a key will be getting the players to understand that they have to go as hard, or even harder, in practice so they are ready for the games.
“There is nobody at practice to make us play at that speed except me and my whistle,” Holman said. “I am trying to get them to understand they have to play at that pace at practice. Even though you may be able to dribble by your teammate at that pace, the kid who is going to be guarding you on Friday night is going to be able to stop that.
“We are trying to instill what I call those ‘Lady Trojan habits,’ and that when you come to practice you come to work and you work hard. They are very young and have to get rid of the pouty pants a little bit. I am trying to work on that one a little bit, but they are great kids. I have a good relationship with them.”
Holman said that is one big difference from when she arrived at New Hope. In coming back to her alma mater, Holman was a newcomer who didn’t know the players and had to build relationships. The players also had to adjust to her style. Now that Holman has been at New Hope for five seasons, she has had time to install her system and her players have gotten a chance to know what to expect from their coach. Holman feels the relationship she has with her players will be an important part of bringing the team together and helping it find its comfort zone.
“I am finding out they feed off that (positivity),” Holman said. “The other group, they fed off my energy. The more I was up and down with them, they kind of fed off my energy. I have found that with this group it creates a hectic panic, so it has been a challenge for me to stay calm and pick my battle. That third or fourth time I get on them, we kind of get the upside down frown and all of that kind of stuff. I hope they will mature and get to understand she is just trying to make me better, and if I can meet her expectations, I am going to be a great basketball player.”
Holman hopes this season helps make her a better coach. Her competitive spirit won’t allow the Lady Trojans to give up, even if they are trailing by 30 or 40 points. After all, Holman has been through that once before at New Hope and she knows how quickly a program’s fortunes can be reversed once players mature.
“It is going to make me a better coach,” Holman said. “It is a huge challenge to me. I am trying to approach it that way. If I can get these guys winning ballgames in February and get luck enough to grab a playoff game, I think it will be huge for what we are going to do.”
Follow Dispatch sports editor Adam Minichino on Twitter @ctsportseditor
Adam Minichino is the former Sports Editor for The Commercial Dispatch.
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