The following article is sponsored on behalf of the Souderton girls’ basketball team by Millennium Administrators. To read about their services, please visit their web site by clicking on the following link: http://www.millennium-tpa.com/
By Mary Jane Souder
Souderton’s players walked out of the locker room after Friday’s season finale wearing smiles, and as endings go, this had been an especially good one.
The Indians celebrated Senior Night by defeating Central Bucks East 44-36, their third win in the last four games.
“I’m super excited that we won, and I’m so happy with the night the girls put together to honor us,” senior Sarah Derstein said. “It’s nice to see them appreciate us so much.
“At the same time, I was really sad last night after what could potentially be our last practice. Just a lot of emotions.”
Most of them good emotions.
All three of the team’s late season wins avenged losses, and all three came over teams that earned berths in the District One Tournament. The Indians – the 34th-ranked team in the final power rankings – just missed out on earning a spot in the 32-team tournament.
“It’s felt so much more natural,” senior Noelle Noble said of the Indians’ late-season surge. “Everybody just really started to click, and I feel like everybody was starting to play their best basketball at the end of the season.
“I think everybody was so excited for Sarah to be back, and I think that just helped everybody to really put forth everything they worked on this season. It really turned out to be an awesome end of the season.”
The Indians avenged a 46-36 loss to CB East with Friday’s win. Three days earlier, they upset Central Bucks South 50-36 after falling to the Titans 52-45 in the initial meeting. It was the same story with Pennridge. The Indians fell to the Rams 41-38 in the first go round but came back to notch a 50-41 win the second time around.
The Indians’ strong finish coincided with the return to the lineup of Sarah Derstein. The all-league center had been sidelined since suffering a concussion during her AAU team’s final tournament game on Sept. 27. She returned to the lineup on Jan. 28 against Pennridge, and the end of the season read like a storybook.
“It’s been so great to be able to come back and support my team,” Derstein said. “I was able to support them off the court, but being able to support them on the court is so different just to be able to give them my help in any way. Even if I’m not scoring, just being able to help defensively and just offensively creating looks.”
Derstein wasn’t the only senior sidelined for the better part of the season. Renay Landis missed the entire season after tearing her ACL on Jan. 28, 2014.
“It was kind of hard to stomach, especially going into your senior year,” Landis said. “You don’t want to miss out on anything.
“Everyone was really supportive, so they made it easier that way.”
Landis never made it onto the court, but she found a way to contribute in a most unexpected role.
“Over the course of the offseason, we talked about what her role would be,” coach Lynn Carroll said. “We’re down to three coaches this year.
“We didn’t really have a jayvee assistant coach, and we thought she would be great in sliding right into that spot. Basically, she’s been Ben Bowman’s assistant all season. It’s great for Ben, and Renay has been so good at it. There’s no doubt in my mind if she wants to – she’s going to be a coach one day.”
For Landis, it turned out to be a perfect fit.
“I wanted to be part of the program,” she said. “I didn’t want to lose this part of me when I got hurt.
“When coach came to me and told me I could help with jayvee, I was all over that. I was like, ‘Yes, definitely, I want to be there. I want to help the freshmen coming in.’ It was really fun. Bo is a great coach, the girls are great. They’re there to learn, so it’s really easy to help them. It was a good experience.”
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The 2014-15 season didn’t exactly go as planned for the Indians, and Carroll certainly had not game planned her all-league center to miss all except the final four games. Players had to assume new roles.
Noble was one of those players.
“Obviously, Sarah leaves some pretty big shoes to fill, and I don’t think Noelle could have done a better job given the circumstances,” Carroll said. “She’s not a year-round basketball player. It’s her second sport – she’s cross country, she’s a runner, and she devotes most of her time to that.
“She really – starting in the fall – stepped up for us. I can’t tell you how many times she was coming directly from cross country practice or even a meet sometimes to come to one of our offseason workouts.
It was very clear to me – I could tell that she was doing it because she knew it was a role we needed her to fill and that we wanted her to be a leader for this team, and she was.”
Although Noble plays basketball only during the season, she has a genuine passion for the sport.
“I don’t know what it is about it, but I just love the game,” she said. “I would never not be able to play it in high school.
“I like to run, but basketball is really where my heart is at. There’s no way I could give it up.”
Carroll, for one, is glad she didn’t.
“I think she averaged eight rebounds a game,” the Indians’ coach said. “She’s playing against some post players that are good, experienced post players, and this is the best basketball she’s ever played.
“More than ever, we have seen her be a little bit more aggressive, and one thing we needed from her were rebounds. We are a small team, and we needed somebody to go out and grab eight or nine rebounds every night and she’s done that consistently for us.”
Noel also has provided positive leadership for a young Indian squad.
“She’s soft spoken,” Carroll said. “She’s not the kind of kid that’s going to be verbally demanding of her players, but she’s so well liked and respected by her teammates and I’m sure by everybody that knows her.
“She’s just a nice genuine kid and has a way of kind of keeping things light which is great because we lost a lot of games throughout the season, and I think her positivity – she’s a glass half full naturally, and I really think it was exactly what this team needed this year.”
Landis, according to Carroll, also was a positive presence.
“When she came to us as a freshman, she had very little experience playing basketball,” the Indians’ coach said. “This kid shows up for everything and always has. You certainly like to hope that most kids come through the program and you can see development and the change from the time they’re a freshman to a senior, but for Renay because she had such limited experience - man, was it obvious.
“For her, it didn’t matter what happened the season before you knew if there was something scheduled, she was going to be there. Basketball stuff, off-the-court stuff - she was one we could always rely on to show up.
“She’s another nice, kind, positive kid who just has a joy for life. She’s quiet and soft spoken but has come out of her shell a lot over the last four years, especially this year. As a senior in high school, to come to almost every game and practice and to basically be an assistant coach, I’ve never had that before. I’ve never had a student do that before, and I just think it’s really neat.”
Derstein’s return was a happy ending for not only the senior captain but the entire team, and it was a life lesson for players and coaches alike.
“I think it’s a good reminder that tomorrow on the basketball court is not guaranteed,” Carroll said. “Both Sarah and Renee have been reminders of that for everybody.
“Some days it’s not fun to play a sport. You’re getting yelled at by your coach, and you have to run, and it’s not fun. How kids handle going through something like that just speaks volumes about who they are, and Sarah has set a great example of what to do under pretty rough circumstances.
“She didn’t want that last AAU game to be her last game and was determined to not let that happen. She comes back as if she hasn’t missed the last four months. She just handled the situation with so much maturity and positivity.”
Whether it’s because of the adversity they went through or in spite of it, there is no mistaking the bond this year’s group shared.
“Last year I loved our seniors so much, and I miss them so much, but this group of girls is so nice,” Derstein said. “There’s zero drama, and we all connect so well.
“It’s neat because a lot of the girls are freshmen, and we’re seniors and we’re still good friends with them. It’s nice to bridge the gap sometimes. When I was a freshman, I was always nervous to talk to the seniors, and I don’t want them to feel that way at all.”
“We’re all really close,” Noble added. “We all know each other outside of basketball so that helps us be even better friends on and off the court, and I think that’s what contributes to us being so close to each other.”
On Friday night, the Indians went through their game-night traditions for the final time. They leave with the best kind of memories.
“My favorite part about the year is just getting closer with the teammates you already have and the new girls,” Landis said. “The freshmen coming in were all really friendly, and it’s great to have that bond.
“I love that team feeling. That’s part of the reason I wanted to stay so bad.”
That ‘team feeling,’ according to Carroll, was created in no small way because of this year’s senior class.
“These three girls together – without a doubt – they are the kindest group that I think I’ve ever coached,” the Indians’ coach said of Derstein, Landis and Noble. “To have three just good-hearted, kind people as the leaders of your program, it’s just great. They care about people. I think it’s the first word people would use to describe all three of them. They’re just kind people to the core, and it’s nice, it’s really nice."
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