Girls basketball has started out with a strong start this year despite their losses of great players Andraya Flor ’15 and Olivia Morrow ’15. The varsity team, which now has upperclassmen who were new to the program altogether, includes four seniors, a lone junior, and three freshmen and sophomores. The relatively young team is led by Coach Michelle Hall, who has coached 16 previous Seattle Prep girls basketball teams.
With their recent games against Shorewood and Franklin, the team showed their relentless offense and strong defense anchored by Chinwe Ezeonu ’17 and Juliet Navone ’16. While Shorewood pulled away from Prep in the fourth quarter, ending the game 47-29, the team was given a chance to review what had gone wrong and make the appropriate changes. This reflected in their next game against Franklin, a team which has historically been a tough opponent for the team, where the girls secured a strong lead in the second quarter that they never lost throughout the entire game, ending with a lead of nearly 20 points in the 45-28 final score.
The Junior Varsity team has also gotten off to a solid start for their year, beating Shorewood by over 10 points and showing skillful team communication and coordination.
In the upcoming weeks, the Girls teams will be playing rivals such as Ballard, Bishop Blanchet, and Garfield, each of which have powerful arsenals that, as Alicia Bianchetto ’16 noted, “…will pose a challenge that we can be overcome with enough hardwork and persistence.”
Keep an eye on the Panthers in the coming weeks as there are games no one would want to miss.