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By James Kinneen
Hometown Weekly Reporter
With no chance of playing each other during the season, last week, the Walpole Rebels and Westwood Wolverines girls basketball teams decided to face each other in a scrimmage as a way to both gather information about their respective teams and get used to facing tough competition before the season begins.
For the Wolverines, coach Katherine Clifford noted that Walpole’s up and down style (they play four guards as starters) provided a solid litmus test for her team.
“I thought we played better than our scrimmage on Sunday. Walpole plays a really up-tempo game, which we’re trying to do too so that was a good challenge for us. I thought we kept up pretty well.”
When pressed on which players she sees as the newcomers that are going to step into a bigger role this year, Clifford noted that the team was still working on figuring that out, but that they have enough weapons that she feels good about the team.
“We’re still working that through. We’re a young team, just still trying to come together, take things one game at a time but I like what I see so far. We have a lot of weapons and we’ll see who comes through on any given night, but hopefully it will be a lot of people.”
While the team is young, it does have some senior leadership in the form of captain Sarah Roycroft. While noting that the team lost a lot due to graduation, she appreciates the effort the team is putting in and feels good about the group they have.
“I’m really excited for [the beginning of the season]. After today and our scrimmage on Sunday against Duxbury and Falmouth, I think we look pretty good. Every day we’re just trying to get better at practice, trying to give it a 110 percent so we can get better, so that in the season we’ll be the best we can be. I’m really happy with this team. I think we all really get along, even though we’ve only been together for like a week or so, but it’s a really good group. I’m excited for what the season has for us. I think we’ll be a strong defensive team that will be good on offense too.”
Roycroft noted Allison Noble and Katie Kissell as two players she’s looking forward to watching progress this year, and that the team is looking forward to playing the underdog as team’s underestimate them.
“Allison Noble, a junior, is the tallest player on our team. She’ll be a good post to have down low playing with me. Also, Katie Kissell a sophomore who is really quick with her handles on offense and is a really strong defender too. We lost a lot, so we’ll be kind of the underdogs compared to all the other teams in the league, but I’m excited about that.”
