The Team of This Century

Beginning in the mid 90s and lasting until 2007, the Falls Church basketball program enjoyed a dozen years of stability and a relative degree of success, helmed by only two coaches during those years and reaching as high as the runner-up to the Conference title during the middle of that span. But beginning in the fall of 2007, the program fell into a deep abyss for the next several years -- never winning more than four games in any single year including  an “0 for” season, giving up 80+ points in a game several times -- including a rout which made national news on one occasion -- rarely scoring even 40 points in a game and finishing one contest with just 8 points,  and (not surprisingly) watching a revolving door of coaches come and go while middle school promising prospects took their talents elsewhere for their high school years.

Then Janice Pritchett moved up from the assistant ranks to take over the team in 2013, the fourth coach hired in six years. She set an ambitious goal to pull this hopelessly lost, misfit adolescent out of the conference basement, instill it with pride and confidence, and push it out into a competitive world. After two years of some more growing pains but steady progress, Coach Pritchett and her heady assistant, Brandon Bailey, did just that. She built around her two multi-year varsity veterans, added raw and experienced younger talent to them, adjusted her offense and defense based on what she could confidently place on the court, and influenced the scheduling to remove the confidence-sapping  opponents and replace them with schools the team could be more competitive against.

The result was the 2015-2016 Lady Jaguars. They quite simply are the team of the century for girls basketball at Falls Church HS. No team in memory enjoyed as many wins (14), or even a winning record (14-11), or as high a position in the Conference hierarchy (3^rd), or a bigger differential between points scored and points allowed (+190). This team routinely overwhelmed opponents in the first half with an added dimension the fans had never seen before -- the long ball. These Lady Jags successfully launched 115 three-pointers, almost five of them per game! This threat (from four players) routinely knocked out opponents who could never game plan successfully to stop it. Better shooting and shot selection accumulated a school record number of points. This team failed to score at least 40 points in a game against only five different opponents while at the same time they routinely held rivals to fewer than 30 points and three times kept them in the teens for a complete game.

In the deepest point of their past abyss (at a time when this year's players were in middle school and elementary school), the average score of a Lady Jaguars game from 2008-2012 was a disheartening  25-58.  Coach Pritchett’s team this year enjoyed a complete reversal with an average score this season of 47-39. Both ends of that score either match or set new standards compared to any previous team in the last 15 years.

What were the ingredients to this success? Coach Pritchett deserves much of the credit, not just for game preparation and game-time adjustments, but also with her quiet interpersonal skills to pull out the best from each of her players. Coach Bailey also deserves a nod as the experienced assistant who knows his Xs and Os and is able to relay them to the team. Then comes the players.  Four of the team’s starters were All-Conference 1^st or 2^nd team selections this year—a record for a single year of this program.

 All age groups contributed. The key freshman on the squad, Sierra Kennard, was the obvious rookie of the year for Conference 13 as the first 300-point player in the last nine years at FCHS and a major contributor to offense and defense from the very first game. Sophomore Leah Shaw was easily the most improved Lady Jaguar on the court, who suddenly turned twelve “3s” last year into 42 of them this year, and blocked shots, assisted, and rebounded her way into the Conference 13 hierarchy. Fellow sophomore Mia Pendleton worked her way into the starting line-up and stayed there with outstanding defense and steadily improving scoring ability to make her the heir apparent at point guard for the next two years. Rasha Benhamida proved a valuable player as first or second off the bench with her scoring ability and improving defense. Nyeisha Gibson is a raw talent at forward and along with Rasha, these two sophomores are expected to make waves in the next two years. Junior Meg Verhagen brought experience, leadership and ability to the floor, both as a starter and a reserve, setting her up for a key contributor role for her senior-year campaign.

Then comes the seniors—starters since each was only 14 years old. Together Amber Ecelbarger and Leann Loch picked and rolled, rebounded, stole, blocked, passed and shot their way to four fabulous years of crowd pleasing entertainment for Falls Church fans, tallying more than 1,600 points together during those varsity years. The point guard and center rank perhaps as the best same-year pairing in team history. Both captains endured the growing pains of the team and leave as a major component of 31 wins in their four years together. No other Lady Jaguar in the past 20 years celebrated as many court victories.

So, how should the team fare after the graduation of all that talent, experience, production, and leadership the two senior captains provided this year? The surprising answer is: after they adjust and perhaps struggle early on from the void those two will most certainly create, the team should recover very well. Non-scoring contributions aside, it’s unlikely that next year’s team can come close to replacing the 475 points that Ecelbarger and Loch scored this year alone, but they may not need to.  The conference loses at least 15 other talented seniors, most of them starting on all but two teams, and Falls Church not only returns three starters, but they will be joined by two players who have occasionally started and have otherwise played in several games this year. Add to this other varsity players such as Nora Clock, Sophia McCall, Shannon Baily and add talent from at least one expected incoming freshman and perhaps a few players from the JV and/or freshman team ranks, and Falls Church’s mostly underclassman lineup next year will not only be a competitive group that should look to at least repeat the third place finish the team enjoyed this year, but one that is likely to be one of the favorites to win the conference title within the next two years.