Youth reigns on the varsity girls’ basketball team as 5 freshmen, Amanda Alessandria, Zoe Del Rosario, Jessi O’Reilly, Ashley Thoms, and Haley Van Dyke, have made the varsity roster.
According to senior co-captain Rachel Sniderman, there have not been this many freshmen on the varsity team before during her career. “It was unusual, but earned,” said Sniderman.
“We just evaluated the girls not based on grade but just on skill level,” said coach Art Thoms, who is Ashley Thoms’ father. “Everybody was told they were on equal ground and they had to earn their spot,” he said.
Alessandria believes effort earned her a spot.”We all worked really hard before tryouts. I’m friends with a lot of the other freshmen. We worked our butts off over the summer, and it really paid off,” she said.
Coach Thoms said 10 out of the 22 girls who tried out for the team were freshmen. “[I] knew we had a lot of freshmen coming in this season and I wasn’t sure where they would grade out during evaluations,” he explained.
In addition to 5 freshmen and 1 junior, there are also 5 seniors. The lone sophomore on the team, Rebecca Hull, is currently out with an injury.
O’Reilly is excited about the diversity on the squad. “I think it’s pretty awesome, especially because of all of the freshmen that made it. I think that it’ll be interesting to see how it plays out because there are 5 seniors as well – a big age group,” she said.
“We’re going to look to our seniors for their leadership, and we hope they’ll learn from the upperclassmen,” Coach Thoms said.
So far, Alessandria said she has enjoyed practices. “Everyone’s really supportive and encouraging there. And I really like my coach, and everyone’s just been really awesome so far,” she said.
Sniderman is happy with the contributions of her rookie teammates. “I think they’ve been doing great. They’re working really hard, they hustle, they communicate, they’re supportive of their teammates,” she said. “This season we are focusing on uniting as a team and working together, and I think the freshmen are contributing well to that.”
The girls’ team is currently 1-3, with there first win against Aptos High School.
