Belvidere addresses season start

By Chris Johnson

REPORTER

There haven’t been a lot of expectations placed on this year’s Belvidere Lady Bucs basketball team. There has been some work done though, as plans are made to survive the upcoming season with the hope of better things to come and possibly a late-season timely win streak.

The goal for most coaching staffs is to help each student achieve the highest levels possible in everything they do. Athletics always finishes in second place behind education, as many coaches have expressed. It’s the grades that matter. The sports are extra. It’s what the student-athletes do with the chance to play that leaves a lasting impression.

For the Belvidere Lady Bucs, a rough 0-3 start won’t take anything away from the hopes that were put in place before the 2016 winter sports season began. The goal of playing past the regular season in February is already going to be set.

According to the IHSA, each qualifying girls’ basketball team will get their chance to advance through the classic Regional-Sectional Championship Basketball Complex.

Depending on a team’s seed when the playoffs begin, the first steps taken on the post-season floor may occur in a Regional Semi-Final capacity. That means they would be two wins away from a Regional Title. They would be four wins away from a Sectional Crown.

A four-game win streak puts a team at the NIU Super Sectional, or something along those lines. The successful win streak brings a team all the way into “The Game” that will put them in the State’s Final Four.

Some coaches say all it takes is a well-timed win streak, determination and a little luck.

The Belvidere Lady Bucs will hit the mark two of three times, every time they head onto the floor this season.

If February comes to a close and all three of those variables come together, common “core” senses makes you think a team is about to head down to the finals. Belvidere will have to find ways to combine luck and skill and dress every day in anticipation of the importance of the game waiting for them.

The record won’t matter when the playoffs start, unless a team cares about who they might have to face in an opening round game. A really bad year is going to mean a really good bet the playoffs won’t last much past the Monday-qualifier play-in game for a select few.

Other teams will find the win streak they need. They will be able to rely on the team around them and understand how a squad given little chance, rises to the top when it matters the most.

Belvidere, though not heavily favored to be a major influencer on the final NIC-10 standings, will still have the chance to prove everyone wrong and start getting things together when the time requires it.

Losses to Genoa-Kingston, 63-40 on Monday, Nov. 14 were followed by shortfalls in matches against non-conference foes Wauconda and Richmond-Burton.

Tournament play allows the chance for a team to learn how far other teams have come along. The NIC-10 season provides an opportunity to begin putting that information to work in a pursuit of an attack on conference position.

Just like many other teams in similar situations to Belvidere, the Lady Bucs will need to discover the secrets that will lead to sustained success as the battles begin to collect. Good luck and the looming win streak won’t hurt either.