Photo by Kyle Parmley.
Alex Johnson has improved immensely and is now one of the Lady Cougars’ top players.
Despite competing with an eight-player rotation for the latter half of the 2015-2016 season, the Clay-Chalkville High School girls basketball team made up for what it lacked in depth with heart and effort.
The Lady Cougars stood up to and battled a more-talented Shades Valley team toe-to-toe in the Class 6A Northeast Sub-Regional, falling just short in the final minutes.
“I think the kids kind of took that as a positive thing and will learn from it,” said head coach Justin Haynie before the 2016-2017 season began. “They definitely don’t want to be satisfied with that same result. They want to get past that. I think they have the confidence that they can do it.”
For the cast of players returning this year, the lessons learned from that game, and from last season as a whole, morph into experience.
The Lady Cougars boast a pair of seniors who already have decided on their college futures. Point guard Raven Omar accepted Mike Morris’ offer to play basketball at Samford University, while forward Alex Johnson will head to Alabama A&M to continue her academic and athletic ventures.
“Both these kids are pretty happy with what they got. I’m happy that they’re signing early,” Haynie said.
Omar is a diminutive point guard in stature only. Her ability to drive into the lane and convert around the basket rivals players much taller than her at times. She appears to be the emotional leader of the group, but she missed the first several days of practice due to Clay-Chalkville’s volleyball postseason run. This allowed some other players to step into that void.
“It’s given the other kids a little bit of an opportunity to have to step up,” Haynie remarked. “Somebody had to do it. And they have. We have five seniors this year, and they’ve done a really good job with it.”
Johnson also has begun to fill the shoes required of a senior, and Haynie said, “her personality’s coming out a little more,” on and off the court.
On the court, Johnson has improved immensely over the last two years, rising from a seldom-used role player who struggled in the post to a player the Lady Cougars have ultimate confidence in dumping the ball to in the paint to get much-needed baskets.
One player Clay-Chalkville will rely on is not even in high school, yet she already has varsity experience. Amiya Payne played last year as a seventh-grader and performed well in spurts as she adjusted to the high school game. She scored nine points in the season’s final game and is poised for a big season.
“Last year, she was kind of shy about taking shots. Heck, she was 12 years old,” Haynie said. “You can tell a difference in her. She’s going to have to get a lot more shots up this year.”
Haynie sees the potential for this year’s unit to shoot the ball much better than last year, as Payne’s shooting ability is combined with the likes of Darci Champion, Mekaila Hill, new backup point guard Kaley Johnson and Erica Lockhart, a transfer from Huffman.
That offensive ability will give Haynie something he has not had in years past: diversity in the scoring department.
“We’ve been kind of top-heavy in scoring,” he said. “I think this year, our leading scorer will change from night to night, which will help. It’s a good ingredient to have.”
