Seniors to lead Tribe girls

The Tribe girls basketball team has had 11 straight seasons with 10 or more wins.
To make it a dozen, the Indians will count on their four seniors — Tori Lennartz, Cassidy Rammel, Kara Jutte and Haley Knapke.
“Obviously we’re looking to them for leadership,” said first-year coach Brian Patch, who spent the last 11 years leading the Tribe boys. “Besides the seniors, we don’t have a lot of experience from the varsity standpoint in meaningful minutes besides Kendra (Siefring).
“We’re looking to them to lead those battles and those tough games on our schedule with the (Midwest Athletic Conference).”
The Indians will be without senior Caley Schoenherr, who will miss her final season because of a knee injury. She was penciled in as the starting point guard.
“Any time you lose your floor general out there it’s going to hurt a little bit,” said Patch, whose team opens its season at 6 p.m. Saturday at St. Mary’s. “I guess if there’s a good thing about it … it happened now versus later in the year when we’re getting ready for a tournament.”
What Fort Recovery does have, however, is Lennartz, a two-time all-MAC first team player and Saginaw Valley State University commit. She averaged nearly 15 points per game in her junior year, helping the Indians to a 10-11 record and an appearance in the sectional final.
Rammel and Jutte — the latter of which averaged 8.8 points per game and earned All-MAC second team honors — saw a ton of minutes last year, and Patch will count on that trio of seniors to contribute yet again.
“Those three have been on the court a lot for us over the years,” he added. “We’re going to count on them to provide some of that spark for us.”
Rammel averaged just 2.5 points per game a year ago, and Patch said he will look to her to contribute more offensively in addition to using her long wingspan on the defensive end of the court.
Siefring, one of four juniors on the squad, scored more than eight points per game on her way to earning All-MAC honorable mention as a sophomore. Patch is hopeful the 6-foot-2-inch post player can create matchup issues for opposing teams. Siefring and Rammel, he added, can also shoot from the outside and will be used in that capacity as well.
Sophomores Whitney Will and Jocelyn Kaiser will round out the starting lineup, as Kaiser will fill Schoenherr’s role.
“We expected her to be a contributor, but we weren’t expecting it at the point guard spot,” Patch said of the Kaiser. “We still want her to be aggressive yet she still has to be able to handle the ball, get other people involved and try to get her own shots.
“So far she’s handled (the switch) well. It’s a change for her a little bit, especially at the level she’s playing it at.”
Knapke, the final senior, appeared in only one game last season before hurting her knee. Patch said she will be used off the bench to spell Rammel, praising her skills defensively and her intelligence on the court.
Also on the roster are freshman Grace Thien and juniors Kelsey Evers, Mikayla Post and Caitlyn Huelskamp.
The biggest challenge Patch and his team face leading up to the season opener was getting used to each other, something he feels may slow down their preparation.
“For us, we’re behind, especially with trying to learn a new system,” he noted. “We’re trying to learn (the players), they’re trying to learn us. Every chance we have at practice or in a game we have to get better at our system, our style and just overall learning of everything.”
The Tribe opens its conference schedule Dec. 11 at Marion Local hoping to win a MAC championship for the first time in more than two decades. And while Patch faces another challenge of learning the girls’ programs in the conference, he said no matter who is lined up across the court the Indians have to be prepared.
“You’ve got to show up every night ready to play,” he said. “If you’re not ready to play on any given night you’re going to get beat. We have to be prepared, come ready to play and not take any game for granted.”