By Phil Gibson
The Hewitt-Trussville girls’ varsity basketball team beat Moody High School convincingly Saturday, 44-27. After a slow start, the Lady Huskies took the lead just before the end of the first quarter and never looked back.
The Lady Huskies are starting to look comfortable playing head coach Vincent Stuedeman’s “32 Minutes of Mush” style of basketball, and it made it difficult for Moody to get anything going offensively. Adapting to a full-court press defensive style has not been easy.
“They’ve never pressed before like we want to press,” Stuedeman said. “We want 32 minutes of Mush. That’s our call sign. From baseline to baseline, we want to make cowards of people with our defense.”
The leadership of senior Dee Dee Jones has been crucial to the team’s progress.
“I’ve been really impressed with Dee Dee,” Stuedeman said. “She took to us from the start. She’s been a positive leader for us, and really stepped in and said, ‘Guys, this is new, but let’s stick with it. We want to be great, and it’s a long year.’ She’s really stayed the course with us all year.”
Jones, who has proven to be one of Hewitt-Trussville’s best scorers, has impressed her coaches with her character and work ethic, too.
“She is a high character kid,” Stuedeman said. “She loves basketball, loves to work hard. They could have a chair out their coaching the team and she’d find a way to adapt to it.”
Despite a tough first half of the season, Stuedeman believes his team can continue to win.
“We want to get better every single day,” he said
. “We want to reach our potential as a team. We are going to compete for an area championship this year, so that’s our focus. Whether that means we win the area tournament, or the area regular season, that’s our focus no matter what our record is. But the top priority is getting better every single day, moving forward and never taking steps back.”