Highland High School girls basketball team makes strides in transition season

On the court, the 2021-22 basketball season ended up being a transition year of learning, perseverance, and growth for the Highland Lady Bulldogs.

HHS entered the season with arguably the youngest roster in the Mississippi Valley Conference this winter and the Lady Bulldogs faced plenty of challenges but managed to be a competitive group by season’s end with an 8-24 record.

“Overall, obviously, we were not as successful as I wanted to be and I think the girls wanted to be. But, from especially the second half of the season on, I think we were competitive in almost every game we played which is big for us,” Highland coach Clint Hamilton said.

Highland began the season struggling to find traction and started 2-8. which included blowout losses to Edwardsville on Nov. 30 (55-19) and Belleville West on Dec. 30 (61-28).

A lack of consistent scoring was the biggest contributor to Highland’s early struggles, while getting steady offense represented a season-long challenge.

“Our biggest thing was scoring and getting kids confident with the ball in their hands and I think we still have quite a bit of work to do on that,” Hamilton said.

Also, not having the services of senior Krista Rittenouse and sophomore Lauren Maas due to injuries hurt the Lady Bulldogs’ depth and left them a bit thin on the bench only able to play six or seven players most games.

Despite those issues, Hamilton noted sophomore post Larissa Taylor, sophomore forward Abby Schultz, and junior guard Grace Wilke began to develop into a consistent scoring core down the stretch.

“I think Larissa Taylor, Grace Wilke, and Abby Schultz took some good strides being confident with the ball in their hands and hopefully this summer we can build om that,” Hamilton said.

Wilke averaged a team-high 9.6 points per game. Taylor averaged 7.5 points per game while Schultz averaged 4.1 per game.

Wilke constantly showed the ability to find her own shot, but Taylor’s emergence in the post in the second half of the season made Highland’s offense have more flow as the 6-foot sophomore began to emerge as a steady inside scoring threat.

“From the beginning (of the season) we just challenged her to be more aggressive (with the ball) and the games where she was aggressive but didn’t score, our offense was much more free-flowing and we got good looks,” Hamilton said. “The last three weeks (of the season) she really got that confidence about her that ‘I can really step up and I can be a handful’ and hopefully she’s kind of seen that and we don’t have to dig that back out of her next year.”

Defensive strides

Taylor showed her potential in a season-ending IHSA Class 3A regional title loss to Triad on Feb. 15 as she pumped in a team-leading 12 points with eight rebounds.

Overall, throughout the season, Hamilton said he felt the team made its biggest strides defensively.

“I thought defensively the last 3 1/2 to 4 weeks of the season that we were pretty tough to score on consistently,” Hamilton said. “Especially in the half-court defense, I thought the girls did a really nice job.”

Departing seniors

Looking ahead, the Lady Bulldogs lose outgoing seniors Abby Huelsmann, Rittenhouse, Emma Warner, and Lydia Hadowksy to graduation.

“Losing our seniors will hurt, especially the kids that had the varsity experience like Abby (Huelsmann), who was a two-year starter for me,” Hamilton said. “We’ve got to find that next kid that’s going to have the ball in her hand and be confident with it, but I think we have a couple of kids coming that can maybe take that role.”

Looking ahead to next season

Assessing the 2022-23 campaign, Hamilton believes better health and getting his younger players more confident on offense will help the Lady Bulldogs get back to winning consistently and having strong postseason runs.

“One, we need to stay healthy, and I’ve got to get these younger kids confident with the ball in their hands so they can step up into the varsity role and get everybody where they have a scoring mentality and dealing with some pressure and having some shots go in the basket,” Hamilton said.

“If we can develop a couple of scorers from the perimeter to go along with Grace and Larissa and get a couple of other scorers we could be similar to what we were the last few years.”

This story was originally published March 6, 2022 at 12:00 AM.