B1

By BILL HUNT
hunt.bill@dailygleaner.com

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The Leo Hayes 1 Stop Countertop Lady Lions are a work in progress this weekend, and indeed, this season.

Lady Lions co-host the 14-team Lion's Den Invitational basketball tournament, beginning Friday at Leo Hayes and Fredericton High School. The Lady Lions are part of the six-team girls tournament, booked into the A division with the Woodstock Thunder and Horton High School Griffins of Wolfville, N.S.

Fredericton High School Lady Black Kats, Kennebecasis Valley Crusaders and Seminaire St. Francois of Quebec City make up the B division.

The Lady Lions kick things off Friday at 1 p.m. against Woodstock at FHS, with their male counterparts, John Hickey's Leo Hayes Northside Pizza Delight Lions, battling Sussex at 2:45 p.m. in their tourney opener.

The Lions, Sussex, Kennebecasis Valley and Dalhousie Condors are grouped in the A section of the boys tournament, with FHS, the St. Stephen Spartans, Woodstock and St. Francois in the B division.

Teams play a round robin within their own division, with semifinals Sunday morning at 9 a.m. and 10:45 a.m. at both venues.

The girls final takes place at 2:30 p.m. Sunday, with the boys final to follow at 4:15 p.m.

Whether the Lady Lions will make get there...we'll see.

"It's early," said head coach Charlene Woolaver, noting that the Friday tourney opener and their Saturday evening fixture against Horton at 7:45 p.m. at the Leo Hayes Gym will be games two and three of a busy winter schedule.

"We've been focusing on things we want to do well early, and most of that has been defence. I wouldn't say we're where we want to be yet, but we're on our way."

Woolaver believes the Lady Lions have the parts in place to challenge the Fredericton High School Black Kats for south west conference supremacy, and the right to host a regional championship tournament this season. But there's work to be done to achieve that lofty ambition.

"For us, this will give us an idea as to where we're going to be," she said. "You get to see where you're at and what you need to focus on."

Lions boast good balance - four Grade 12, four Grade 11 and four Grade 10 players and good depth - they'll dress 12 for the first time "in about three years," said Woolaver, and good speed.

The Grade 12 backcourt tandem of Maggie MacTavish and Becca McIsaac will be responsible for running a high tempo offence.

Five-foot-ten senior Christian Hynes starts in the post. Grade 11s Taylor Allen and Rhiainn Coulombe complete the starting lineup.

But Woolaver likes the idea of being able to look down her bench and plug in Grade 10 guards Morgan MacGregor and Tori McCarty as necessary, or moving the five-foot eleven Coulombe into the post and working in Grade 11s Olivia Sorensen or Jayden McLaughlin, Grade 12 Katie Keenan, or Grade 10s Nicole Lafleur or Ellen Woodworth.

"In the early part of the season at least, we're just going to shift people through," she said. "We think we can take somebody off and whoever we put on will just pick up where we left off."

The Lady Lions will run for their lives this season.

"We don't want to let defences set up," said Woolaver. "We want to get the ball out and go and run. I'll tell them the same things this weekend as I did last weekend...rebound, run and attack. We have the feet, we have the speed to do that."

There's a price to be paid: turnovers. That's why Woolaver has been stressing defence in the early going.

"Defensively, we're a little quicker than we have been, so we can gamble and do some things," she said. "I'd like to have a little more pressure defence than we have in the past."

If all goes according to plan, the Lions will improve as the season unfolds. She knows their closest competition in the conference, the venerable FHS Lady Black Kats, will.

"I think they're vulnerable," she said. "But I know their coaching, too. Where they are now is definitely not going to be where they are in the end. I'll never underestimate them. But I'd like to think we're going to cover some ground this season too."