By Brennan Stebbins (For OzarksSportsZone.com)
At one point last season, the Neosho girls basketball team was off to a 9-4 start. The Wildcats lost 11 of 12 to end the year, but their final record of 10-15 still marked the program’s best season since 2017-18.
“We played fairly well at the beginning of the year,” head coach Ryan Madison said. “Defensively I don’t think we made the strides I would have liked to see. Offensively we didn’t have a ton of scorers last year, we focused more on one and that led to a lot of box-and-one. We did go through some struggles there that hurt our confidence. We lost a couple games later in the year that I won’t say should have been wins but they were definitely games we could have competed better in.”
Neosho graduated two starters from last year’s team and a third that would have started if not for an injury before the season. Gone are Olivia Hixson, who led the team with 13.4 points and 4.6 rebounds per game, and Michelle Lindsay, who averaged 5.5 points and 3.6 rebounds. Those players also led the Wildcats in steals, with Hixson recording 68 and Lindsay 47. Hixson earned honorable mention All-Conference honors in the COC and was named the Co-Player of the Year in Neosho’s district.
The Wildcats will also be without junior Baylie Bowers, who was injured during the softball season. She started in basketball as a sophomore and averaged 4.6 points and 3.8 rebounds while recording 46 steals.
The Wildcats do return a large junior class that features players like Reagan McInturff, a 6-1 center who started last year. She averaged 6.2 points and 3.5 rebounds.
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“I thought she improved quite a bit over the summer,” Madison said. “She’ll definitely figure in the lineup.”
Raine Harris is another junior who started off and on as a sophomore and battled an injury. In 12 games she averaged 4.6 points and 3.6 rebounds to go along with 12 steals. And junior Maelynn Garrett started often as a sophomore, too, averaging 1.4 points and 1.9 rebounds. She also had three blocks and 16 steals.
While those three juniors are the only returners with starting experience, Madison has plenty of others who earned varsity time. The Wildcats will have just two seniors in Taigen Mitchell and Emily Phillips, but the junior class includes three others that should also contribute in Meredith Baldwin, Karlee Ellick and Jayden Adams. Ellick averaged 5.8 points and 4.1 rebounds and also led the team with 10 blocks.
A pair of underclassmen, freshman Beclynn Garrett (Maelynn’s younger sister) and sophomore Courtney Thomason, will also be competing for varsity time.
“It looked like we were starting to buy in a little better and had a better idea of what we’re trying to do during the summer,” Madison said. “It remains to be seen how much this injury to Baylie is going to hurt us. Obviously it’s not going to help, she’s a dynamic athlete and one of the best I’ve ever coached. As far as run and jump and stuff like that she’s off the charts.”
Madison, who’s entering his second year, said the team is still in a multi-year process of getting to where he wants it to be.
“Record-wise I think we’ll be similar to last year or hopefully a little better but we’ll have to see with this injury,” he said. “One thing I was worried about before the season was depth and that doesn’t help that at all. We have good players who can rally around and hopefully we can improve a little bit on last year’s record.”
Neosho won’t play in a jamboree due to an early season opener against Lamar on Nov. 19, followed by back-to-back games against Seneca and Clinton on Nov. 22-23. The Wildcats will once again host the Neosho Holiday Classic.
