The East Limestone girls basketball team has made it to the sweet sixteen in the regional playoffs with second year coach Jessica Thompson at the helm.

“Making it to the sweet sixteen was a goal of ours from the beginning of the year. We’ve been working very hard for the past year to this spot that we’re at and there’s a lot of excitement from the girls and the coaching staff seeing a goal to come to life,” Thompson said. “Seeing all the girls hard work have some benefits has just been a cool experience.”

She said the season has been one of ups and downs despite their dominate record of 20-8. There have been some big wins like beating teams by more than 20 points. They also played in a nationally televised tournament in December when they beat a team from Ohio who was highly ranked. They have also had some tough losses like losing the championships in the county tournament to Clements and the area tournament to Madison Academy.

“The main thing with this group is they’re resilient. That’s kind of what you have to do in order to be successful as a group and as a team. You have to have that resiliency of learning from your losses but not letting you get so discouraged that it doesn’t detour you from trying to go after your goals,” Thompson said. “They’re extremely hard working. They are such a fun group of girls to be around. They have a lot of personality. They get in practice every single day and it’s just a joy to be around them.”

She spoke highly of her talented group of players. There are three seniors on the team: Tyjah Duncan, Shauna Fletcher, and Niya Witherspoon.

Thompson said Fletcher is averaging around 19 points and 8 rebounds per game. She added that Fletcher is close to hitting her 2,000 point mark.

“She’s a great leader. She does whatever she needs to do for her team to win,” Coach Thompson said.

“There’s some nights where she’s getting double-triple teamed and she’ll have six or seven points but she’ll have 10 assists or she’ll have 12 rebounds and eight assists and six points,” Thompson said. “Even though she has the ability to score whenever she wants – to her, her team’s success is more important than anything.”

That’s an example for others in the program too, Thompson said.

“We say team over everything and it’s hard sometimes to get people to buy into that but she really walks the walk and talks the talk with that,” she said.

In the West Point sub-regional game the girls just won on Monday to get to the sweet sixteen, Thompson said Duncan pulled through in a big way.

“She hits two clutch threes in the second half to extend the lead and she shot 80 percent from the free throw line that game,” Coach Thompson said. “She’s a great leader.”

Duncan told The News Courier she’s confident going into the rest of the playoffs. “It’s a very amazing feeling. This is my senior year so I really want my team to go the farthest we can to win it all and I’m very confident that we will.”

Another stand out in the stats is Junior Taylor Farrar. Thompson said recently she’s had three games scoring double-doubles and just scored a career high 31 a couple weeks ago.

“She’s just starting to play with a lot of confidence. She just has a natural knack for scoring the ball,” Thompson said. “Plays both sides of the court … we’re asking her to score a lot of points but also play defense against some of the toughest players.”

One player Coach Thompson says doesn’t jump out on the stat sheets but is always a factor on the court is Molly Thompson.

“She creates a lot of things off the ball because she’s so tall and has really good defense. She’s kind of a calming presence on the court because if anyone is confused Molly’s going to be able to help them out,” Thompson said. “Her stats may not show it but she’s a very integral part to us winning.”

Thompson says she knows this team can win and take themselves further into the playoffs.

“When we have really been focused we have been extremely hard to beat and we have beat some really good teams this year. It would not surprise me to see this team in a state championship game. We have the ability,” she said.

For this being her second year coaching the team, she came in to build off of the foundation that the girls had and establish a mentality of winning the games they needed to get them to this point.

“Anytime you can coach a program and reach a milestone like regional, like a sweet sixteen you feel proud of all the work that you put in, especially doing it in such a short time,” Thompson said.

With three seniors on the team, Thompson said she knows next year they’ll be able to keep building the program with the juniors who have this playoff experience no matter how far they go. and as for the three who are graduating, she knows they will find success in their futures no matter what they do.

“On the court I have high expectations of them. Off the court they’re great people,” Thompson said. “When the ball stops bouncing for them I hope they take the lessons we’ve tried to teach them for the last year and half and apply them to their life.”