JCM girls’ basketball looks to improve ahead of postseason

Jackson Central-Merry’s girls’ basketball team is continuing to improve in its second season back as a program.

Just the fact they competed in the Hub City Classic tournament at Liberty Tech is proof of that to first-year head coach Brian Lake.

“This time last year, we weren’t even able to play in this tournament because a bunch of our girls had COVID,” Lake said. “So being able to just play was already a big thing.

“But to come in and win two games and then play for the championship, that’s something we’ll take and try to build on with district play around the corner.”

The Lady Cougars, who came out of the tournament with an overall record of 6-7, competed for the District 14-A championship before finishing as runner-up.

The Lady Cougars are still a young team, so there is plenty of room for the team to grow.

“That’s something I remind myself of often – how many players on this team are freshmen or sophomores,” Lake said. “But they’re learning and getting better.

“There was a lot of improvement in the offseason, but I think that improvement has gotten faster like you might expect because we’re playing games. That kind of experience helps you get better if you can learn lessons from failures and build on successes.”

So what positives could the Lady Cougars bring from the two wins in the tournament – 55-29 over Liberty and 53-24 over Memphis Mitchell?

“I liked the way we were spacing on offense and moving the ball around,” Lake said. “If we can continue to do that and get better at that, that will open up more opportunities on that end of the court.”

The Lady Cougars ran into a Crockett County team that’s beaten JCM soundly twice in recent weeks. The second time was in the Hub City Classic, in which the Lady Cavaliers won 69-22.

“Crockett County is a very good team, and Kayla (Irvin) does a great job leading that program,” Lake said. “And we competed well early on, but we had a hard time making adjustments when they made adjustments, and they jumped out to a big lead on us.”

The Lady Cougars host Chester County on Friday for one more non-district game before getting into district play the following week.

Brandon Shields, brandon@jacksonpost.news