With Southworth playing just half the season, it is going to be impossible to get people to agree. As I said in my opening paragraph, I felt Southworth was the best player in the league through six games, but I think it would be unfair to not reward Jenny Grigsby's 14-game body of work that led her team to a gold ball finish. The problem with this thought process is the fact that it continues on down the list. Are we not going to give a 12-2 Unioto squad a first-team member? Are we not going to reward Charlene Stout for being one of the league’s best stories in leading her Lady Cats to a fourth-place tie after most people had them picked seventh or eighth in the preseason polls?
Continue down the list.
Do you adjust second team? Do you knock someone off of third-team who played a key role in their team’s season over the 14-game league schedule? The answer to all of these questions as far as I am concerned is “I don’t know.”
I can’t say how the coaches are going to handle this in the official vote. Really anything they do could probably be defended in many ways, and it could probably be viewed critically as well. As far as my list, I think this is a unique situation, and I like the way the league handled Mackenzie Arledge when she went through this similar situation a year ago. When the league has a player as talented as Southworth go through this type of injury situation, I think it is important to still celebrate her talent and her great career. I would simply make her a special mention, an honorary member, or whatever fancy term the powers to be want to use, and basically make her a 16th member of the all-league squad.
I realize some of the people in charge just cringed when reading the final sentence of the previous paragraph. They are going to fear setting a precedent that is going to have future situations adding all sorts of kids everytime we have an injury. If this is a concern, I would recommend trying to have some things in place. Perhaps have the coaches vote and say you need five out of eight to name a kid in this way. You could even set a number of games (such as a minimum of 11 out of 14 games) that a player must play to be eligible for all-league. I also think in this situation it is good to base the decision on the previous year. You look at Arledge and Southworth, they were both elite players in their junior seasons and were returning as Player of the Year candidates. They were not players who had the potential to just sneak on third team. Whatever the case, I think coaches in a league the size of the SVC can determine if a kid is worthy of this type of honor. Obviously Arledge was this type of player a year ago, and the very talented Southworth is this year as well.
Now that I have dodged this topic enough – and in all seriousness I am glad I do not have to make this call because it is a tough call – I am ready to start down my list. I will start at the top with my Player of the Year Jenny Grigsby of Adena. Grigsby is a great all-around talent. She can score, rebound, defend, and perhaps most importantly, she can make all of her teammates better as well.
Completing my first-team, I feel in my second slot that I must stay with the two-shade blue with Autumn Smith. Smith is a special talent who can do things with the ball that no other player in the league can do. Stats do play a role in all-league, but sometimes you just have to use the "eye test" when evaluating players, and when you watch Smith play her skill level is unmatched in the league. Next on my list is Zane Trace’s Kelsey Dunkle. Dunkle is a great shooter and great defender, but during her senior season, I was most impressed with how she developed the ability to handle the ball, create her own shot, and create shots for others too. In the fourth spot, I give the nod to Paint Valley’s Charlene Stout. Stout has been one of the league’s top scorers all year. She is asked to run the point offensively as well as the point of Paint Valley’s zone defense. Stout helped PV to a fourth-place tie as well as two league losses by a total of three points on free throws in the game’s final seconds. For the final spot on my first team, I think it should belong to Unioto’s Hannah Miller. Miller led a balanced Unioto team to a 12-2 finish. I know with Unioto’s balance there could be some debate on the order of the Lady Shermans; however, I think Miller is the player that showed up at the top of most scouting reports which helped take some pressure off of several young players.
As I move to second team, I head to Piketon. Sophomore K.K. Jenkins is a top-five scorer and rebounder in the SVC this season. In the next spot, I return to the gold ball winners with Natalie Cooper. Cooper is a stat sheet stuffer who dominates a game in several ways. The next two spots I will go with a pair of Unioto players in Alexis Overly and Tori Cox. Both are going to win a lot of basketball games before they take off the purple and gold for the final time. Overly is a great floor general and Cox is a solid rebounder and defender who is constantly improving on the offensive end. In the final spot on the second team I would go with Westfall’s Jess Miller. On our most recent stat update, only six players in the league averaged more than 11 points per game and Miller is one of them.
As I get to the final five, the third team becomes very difficult to complete. I start with Zane Trace’s Devin Unger. Unger had a great year that included 10 points per game and nearly seven rebounds per contest. After Unger, I feel the third team needs some Southeastern representation in Kylan Strausbaugh. The sophomore had a solid overall season, but she really had a nice second half of the year scoring double figures in three straight wins towards the end of the season. Next, I think the SVC champions definitely deserve a fourth player and that player is Michelle Ackley. Ackley, who scored 18 points in a key win at Unioto during the gold ball run, is one of the league’s top three-point shooters. As I get to the final few spots, I think Zane Trace deserves a third player when you consider the Lady Pioneers finished in third place – five games ahead of the next closest team. This spot on my list goes to Hayley Carle. Carle is a great athlete who was much improved on the offensive end this season, but it is her intangibles – especially on the defensive end - that make her a must for my third team.
Just like every year, the final spot is going to lead to all sorts of debate. If I go with the best player remaining, it would be Unioto’s Mallory Retherford. In fact if it wasn’t for Retherford’s injury, she probably is much higher on the list. If I go with the standings, perhaps Adena’s Alyssa Dawson would be the selection. With these two teams being so much better than the rest of the league, I even had some other names in the discussion that would have at least given them some honorable mention. For Adena, Alyssa Kennedy and Bethany Delong played key roles in Adena’s championship run, and with Unioto, you could read a long list of names such as Ashley Flautt, Morgan Gumm, Erin Bane, and Lauren Stout depending on what night you watched them play.
I would also say all the 5-9 teams have an argument for a second player. The problem here is that not all of them have a clear-cut second person. With Paint Valley you could debate Amber Lewis and Laci Stanforth. With Westfall, you could say Paige Swaggerty or Kayla Tackett. I also believe injuries have played a role in this third team because the injuries to Southeastern’s Keisha Brown and Piketon’s Aleah Pelphrey cut the season short for two all-league caliber players. These injuries had me think about SE’s Erin Uhrig as well as the SVC’s top rebounder in Piketon’s Elisha Manley. Finally, I in no way forgot about Huntington. Huntington knocked on the door two or three times in the league. They do not get a top-15 player on my list; however, Jackie Kellough is definitely a player I gave some thought and would be on my honorable mention list.
Lastly, I must pick a Coach of the Year. No doubt that we had several coaches accomplish more than many people had given their teams credit for in the preseason, but this award is a no-brainer. Adena’s Jeran Cox coached his team to a perfect season in SVC play. The Lady Warriors lost their first game of the year to Miami Trace and then rolled off 19 straight to finish 19-1 on the season.
The one last thought that I will give on my all-league selection as I bring this article full circle is that my final spot would belong to Southworth if the coaches decide not to use one of the other avenues I discussed. With her playing in nine league games, her numbers would warrant her a minimum of third team. Again, if coaches are going to choose to conduct the vote in a normal fashion then leaving her off the top-15 would make the overall list somewhat incomplete in my opinion.
