MW GIRLS BASKETBALL: Lady Jays prepared for new season

WORTHINGTON — Although many things have change over his 32 year stint as head coach of the Lady Jays basketball team, there is one thing that has stayed the same for head coach Mike Fury.

“Our goal every year is to get into postseason play,” MW coach Mike Fury said. “We use the preseason practices and non-conference games to get ourselves ready for the conference season.

“That is what we do every year. Then we try to qualify for the post season. That is our goal and it is a good goal.”

One thing that will help the Lady Jays in their quest for the postseason is the chemistry that most of the players were able to build together while playing on the women’s volleyball team this season.

“Having the girls from the volleyball team is a good thing because the success that they had is going to carry over,” Fury said. “They gained a lot of confidence playing volleyball.”

Of the eight players on this year’s squad, four are sophomores and will offer both experience and leadership for the rest of the team.

“We have four sophomores back from last year’s team and they are going to be good leaders,” Fury said. “You always kind of depend on them to get you going.”

One of the keys to success for the Lady Jays this season will be the development of their young players.

“The key for us this year will be how the freshmen come around and how fast they come around,” Fury said. “Sometimes that is a little quicker than other times, but we just have to learn how to play together.

“Every year is a new team, so it takes a while to mesh and get things going.”

With just a few days left before MW opens its season with back-to-back games on Saturday and Sunday, Fury knows there is a lot of learning to do in a short amount of time.

“We want try to get everything in, from our full-court offense to our full-court defense,” Fury said. “We usually try to play as hard man-to-man coverage as we can, so we will try to get that going.”

The Lady Jays will face strong competition this weekend when Madison Area Technical College and Mount Marty College come to town.

“It is going to be a really tough weekend since we are playing such tough competition,” Fury said. “But that is okay because that is the way you learn. Hopefully we will play well and get better every game.”

MW takes on Madison Saturday at 6 p.m. and will then play Mount Marty at 4 p.m. Sunday at the Worthington High School gym.

“Hopefully we are learning in practice and the sophomores are setting a good example,” Fury said. “But the games will be the telling story. You usually do learn more in games.”

Daily Globe Reporter Jordan Willi

may be reached at 376-7335.

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