We love basketball. It consumes our winter - especially having a daughter on the high school varsity team. Hanna had a great year and a hard year.
Great:
She was the high scorer of her team during league play of the regular season. She had 159 points in 14 games. We had lots of people say to us that it is impressive that she had the most points and she wasn't even a starter. She only started about 3 games while Erika's ankle was hurt. Her coach, Shelly Quinton, did such an amazing job as a coach. The morale of the team was better than it has been for years. She did not demean any players. She knows the game. She is fun and just the right amount of intense. The girls on the team are so nice. They had such a fun year, not perfect, but really great.
Hard:
At the start of the season, Hanna was not feeling healthy. We were just figuring out that eating gluten was the main trigger that was making her so weak and losing weight. She started to feel better when she tried to stop eating gluten, but then she still ate it sometimes and she was not 100%. She also had a mild concussion from getting hit in the head at the Medicine Hat game which affected her for a couple weeks.
 |
| Three Amigos waiting for the Taber game to start - Madison Leishman, Hanna, Madison Barfuss |
 |
| Lucy and her superfan friends on senior night |
 |
| Austin dressed up one night as the Cougar mascot |
Morgan Gibb, Ava Hardy, Erika Smith, Madison Barfuss, Hanna, Breanna Fox
Hali Holland, Brooke Nish, Annie Soper, Madison Leishman, Melissa Carter
The end of the basketball season is brutal in the southern Alberta league. The girls play as many games in the last 4 weeks of the season as they do in the first 3 months. The first week of March they had 4 games to finish the regular season. The second week in March is zones and so they played 4 games that week.
In Zones, they won their first game against Medicine Hat. The second game was against Raymond, and they were really, really hoping to win but they lost. The third game they had to play against Catholic Central, a team we beat twice this year by 43 and 49. Our team was playing so bad. They knew it and couldn't break the barrier. The game was tied at the end of every quarter. Jewel Hardy was the first mom to go down to the front row to cheer. Then Maureen Barfuss went down, then me, Hali Leishman, Mary Ellen Smith, and Traci Holland came too. We cheered our hearts out. We jumped up and yelled every time they scored. They barely pulled off the win 51-50. If they would have lost, their season would have ended. They won so they had one more chance to make it to provincials.
The 4th game of the week was on Saturday against LCI. If they won, they got to go to provincials. If they lost, the season was over. It was a close game. At one point the referee blew the whistle to stop the game because blood was dripping down both of Hanna's knees. Luckily Coach/Nurse Sydney Carlson bandaged her up. Our team wasn't shooting very good. The last quarter or so Hanna kicked it into high gear and gave everything she had to help her team to win. I wish I could watch it again. She rebounded, stole the ball, shot, etc. She wanted to win so bad. We were down by 10 or so during the 4th quarter and Carly came to sit by me and put her head in my lap and cried and cried. Ericka Smith got her 5th foul early in the 3rd quarter so that was the end of her season. She sat on the end of the bench and cried the rest of the game. It was heart breaking really. We got so close at the end, but then we ended up losing by 4. Carly and I sat and cried for a long time. The team went in the locker room and cried for a long time. It's more than just losing one game. It was the end of a chapter in these girls' lives- a really great chapter. The seniors are done. They didn't make it to provincials. Hanna didn't want to talk to anyone for days - especially about basketball.
