Lady Tiger cagers put wraps on summer campaign

The Lady Tigers wrapped up a productive off-season basketball
program on July 30, with participation in the annual Summer Heat
hoops tournament in Healdsburg.
The 16-team Summer Heat tournament was split into four pools of
four teams each, and was arguably one of the strongest fields in
several years. Participating teams included Elsie Allen,
Kelseyville, San Marin, Analy, McKinleyville, Terra Linda, Eureka,
Las Plumas, Novato, Windsor, Santa Rosa, Terra Nova, Sonoma,
Ursuline, Healdsburg-1 and Healdsburg-2.
Although the Lady Tigers posted just one win in six tournament
games, they were competitive every time they stepped on the floor.
Analy dropped its first five tournament games, including a 42-30
loss to eventual champion McKinleyville before defeating
Healdsburg-2 in its final outing on July 30.
As in any off-season program, there is far less of an emphasis
on winning games than developing budding talent for next year. That
was certainly the case for the Tigers this year.
³We played some AAU ball in the spring before taking part in a
league at Santa Rosa Junior College in June and July, and it¹s been
a good experience for a lot of our younger kids,² said veteran
Analy head coach and defensive guru Mike Carroll. ³They¹ve shown a
lot of improvement over the summer and the repetition has really
been good for them.²
Asked what the most important thing his team has learned this
summer, the crafty Carroll quipped, ³We¹ve come up with this theory
that if we can score more points than the other team, we should
win.²
The rebuilding Lady Tigers lost several seniors to graduation in
June, including all-leaguers Stephanie Barnes, Kelly Mills and
Janet Lanier, but hope to surround their returning players with a
talented group of underclassmen.
The summer roster included: seniors Ashley Pearson and Maddison
Foster, juniors Sophia Garcia, Ariel Natale, Ashley Erdmann, Emily
Schuster and Kelsey Ulrich, sophomores Mariel Carroll and Jessica
Doohan and incoming freshmen Jennifer Tsuramoto, Kate Haveness and
Shelby Paolino.