Kellie Kennedy head coach of the lady wolfpack basketball team, will try to repeat last year’s success, where she led the team to a Gulf Coast Athletics Championship, in her first year as the team’s coach.

“We’re going to stick to what works and what worked for us last year was taking it one game at a time,” she said. “If we work hard and we’re disciplined, we’re going to be successful.”

Trenelle Smith, management senior, said they have the same goals as last season.
“As a team, the goals are the same as in previous years, win conference, the tournament and make it to nationals,” she said. “Hopefully this year go further than one game.”

This will be Kellie Kennedy’s second season as the coach for the Lady Wolfpack. In her first year, the team won the GCAC Championship. The twins believe this being her second year with them, will help them get better.

She believes this team has what it takes to repeat as GCAC Champions; however, there are things that need to be corrected for that to happen, as the exhibition game against Louisiana State University revealed.

“We need to work on our rebounding and execution,” she said. “When you only make four baskets in the second half, you’re going to struggle to beat people.

“I think we’ll be able to go further in Nationals because we are used to her system,” Trenell said.

Trenese agrees with her twin; however, she believes there is one more aspect that will help them improve.

“We have more people on the team this year, and last year we had like eight or nine, so we’ll be able to remain fresh throughout the games,” Trenese said.

Kennedy agrees with Trenese.

“We have enough depth to bring in fresh legs to keep going, keep coming at people from different angles and with different players,” Kennedy said.

She added they will work to maintain their fast tempo style of play, which, according to them, gives them an edge against other teams.

They, however, are quick to say that all this does not mean anything until they play their fist game, where they will be able to see the exact areas that need improvement.

“We haven’t been playing games yet and we have to learn how each other plays and what each player’s strengths and weaknesses are,” Trenese said.

The team will rely on Trenese, the Lady ‘Pack’s all-time leading scorer, and her twin sister Trenell to lead them to success this season, since they are seniors.

According to them the team’s strength is their work ethic. This should help their cause to improve on what they consider to be their weakness.

“We need other players to score more to become a more offensive threat,” Trenese said.

Kennedy believes that the post players will be a big part in making this happen.

“I think we’re really going to get some more point production from our post, and I think Rachel Blanchard and Lauren Pryor, and I think Madeline Gagneaux is going to be able to score for us,” she said.

Trenell added that the team’s speed is a big part of this team’s success.

This team will not count, however, with Christine Mainguy, who graduated.

“With her departure we lost a lot of rebounding, but we’ve addressed that through recruiting,” she said. “It’s just a matter of getting these younger players to recognize what it means.”

Despite having eight freshman joining the team this year, Kennedy likes how they are getting along.

“It’s never a perfect world,” she said. “You’re never going to have 15 young women getting along all the time. It’s not going to happen.”

She said the key lies in leadership from the twins and that they share the same goal, which is to win.

Eduardo Gonzalez can be reached at [email protected]