Allison Jacob, ’09, is from San Rafael, CA.  She enjoys soccer and manages the Girls Varsity Basketball team.  A native of San Francisco, she enjoys the beach and driving to Napa Valley.  Also, she loves perezhilton.com. 

                                                                                                                                                                            The Girls Varsity Basketball team has pushed limits that no one has expected. Are those times coming to a close? Is the team diminishing or can the new coach build this fresh group of girls into a flourishing team?

Last year was a strong season for the team, earning the title of class C New England champs. As the team stands this year, they lost four valuable starting players, leaving just three original varsity players. Angelica Pascual, who is a starting senior and captain on the team, voiced her concerns for freshmen players new to a higher-level high school team. Angelica always looks dressed to play as we sit on the bleachers in the gym after dinner hours watching the boys practice.

I ask her about her feelings on the new players. “Knowing that they have not experienced high school level basketball lets us be patient while they adapt to our team.” Angelica seems stressed though hopeful for success in her last year playing ball. “It’s just a new experience, and we are all learning.” So far the team has been doing a fine job with figuring out how to work together, especially having a new coach, Alyson Stolpman. The dynamics of how the team works together shifts with the energy of an unfamiliar teacher.

I ask her about her thoughts on the new coach, “It’s tough, you adapt to a way a coach does certain things like drills, expectations, and rules. But it’s just like the new girls, and I am new to the people around me. We all have to learn to work together to be successful. And I see no reason as to why this won’t be accomplished in the long season we have ahead.”  The girls are gearing up for a game versus the Tilton School this coming week and so far practice has been brutal. The girls seem like they have some hope, and with a lot of faith and hard work, this awkward band of girls should build into a strong-willed athletic group of women.