Arlington enters the girls state tournament with a 21-2 record. We spoke to Coach Tara King about the upcoming tournament, the Cardinals climb to the top of the state, and what it means to this community.
First off, what are your overall thoughts on making the state tournament?
Yeah, we are really excited. Obviously the last couple years we fell short of even getting to the SoDak 16…Something with our team that over the years we’ve gotten a little bit older, so having the same team the last couple of years, we’re just a little bit more experienced and that’s [state] something we’ve been looking forward to and working towards and so it was exciting to finally get it done.
Yeah, so talk about having a young team, and not getting to that level, not necessarily falling short but not quite getting to state, how has that helped these girls be motivated and develop toward accomplishing this amazing goal?
Yeah I guess these girls have talked about going to stay ever since they were in elementary school. This is my 10th year coaching in Arlington so they were kind of my first group as elementary girls and getting together to do camps and skill sessions. Arlington’s got a lot of banners in the school so it’s something that we’ve talked about wanting to do for a really long time.
Again falling short has just kept them going just wanting them to get a taste of what that felt like. They spend a lot of time in the gym. Basketball is their passion. Before mornings, before games, they’re shooting on weekends, just never content and so you know I think sometimes falling short of your goals a little bit does motivate you and I think that that was the case for our girls.
You talked about how you’ve worked with these girls for a long time. What’s it been like watching these girls grow up and develop as basketball players and just student-athletes?
A lot of fun, they’re a great group. I think we’ve kind of become more of a family and I teach fifth grade so you have them as young girls in elementary basketball and then they’re in my classroom in my 5th and 6th grade classroom and I was coaching the junior high team for a while as well as the varsity team and so I think they’ve had me for the whole life.
We’ve just spent a lot of time together building those relationships. and I coached track as well so I think that any of the memories that they have related to sports and school memories I’ve kind of been there with them and so we’ve just been through so much together and it’s really become more than just basketball.
Yeah, you talked about having a young team, just one senior with Harley [Johnson]. What can you say about her and also your junior group just having to step up and take that leadership role?
Again they’ve been in this position for a while, Harley and the juniors. Some of them have gotten some varsity experience since 8th grade so it’s been fun to watch them continue to grow and mature and their roles of change a little bit. They have always been willing to fill whatever we need to do, whatever we need.
Harley has kind of always been our starter on the defensive end. She kind of creates the intensity and she guards the ball handler and just really just creates that spark for us on the defensive end and you know others feed off of that. She’s great on the offensive end but really great with her leadership on the defensive end and getting us all started is probably what we most value her for.
And you guys have just been knocking down right and left the whole season. You know with that kind of record, people start to take notice. What have you been telling your girls this year with the wins and what has lead to that success for you guys?
I guess our focus has just been taking it one game at a time. Again obviously you have goals of wanting to make it to a state tournament now that we’re there we have more goals. But we really haven’t talked too much about what ahead of us just one game at a time.
They’re again very deserving of their record and they deserve this number one seed that we’ve gotten for ourselves, but now that we’re kind of in that position, I don’t think we’ve really stressed it any much more than “hey this is fun and our hard work is paying off.”
Yeah and on the court, what do you think has led to your guys’ success this season and what’s kind of been your name to your game?
We talked a lot about defense. Defense is our starter. Creating lots of turnovers. We like to play fast, trying to get teams to take either a quick shot or make an uncharacteristic turnover so we can feed off those.
Again these girls have been playing together for so long that they they just kind of know what to expect from each other and what each person can bring and that kind of helps them as well.
#1 seed, coming into that SoDak 16 game in Madison versus Gayville-Volin, what were the emotions like and what were you telling your girls coming into that game?
Well we knew Gayville-Volin was not a guarantee by any means at all. They’re a young team and it was kind of fun to talk about them in a way that that team kind of reminded us of us a couple years ago.
So we definitely did not go into the game thinking this was a guarantee. But we did enough to create turnovers and transition points that we were able to pull away.
Yeah and when that final buzzer went off and you guys knew you were going to state, just talk to me about the feeling of that.
It was awesome. Just something I’ll never forget are the looks on their faces, the hugs, the high fives. They even asked me at one point what are we supposed to do how do we celebrate this!
And again we’ve been on the other side of it so much and so it was definitely fun getting to be on the other side. The feeling of knowing that the hard work paid off kind of makes it memorable when you’ve been defeated many times and you finally get to have a chance to taste what it feels like.
Now, you guys ran undefeated through the Dakota Valley Conference. What can you say about that and also taking home a conference championship?
We’re actually back-to-back Dakota Valley Conference Champs so that’s wonderful. Nothing that an Arlington school team has ever accomplished in the regular season and so that was something that we got to talk about last year of how fun it is that the Dakota Valley Conference representative has represented the state of South Dakota really well in all sports.
We often have the schools from our conference representing us well and so we’ve had a couple coaches reach out to me since we’ve won and we are looking forward to continuing to get to represent the Dakota Valley Conference because we have some great teams, great athletes that we get to compete against every night and so it’s definitely a huge accomplishment for our team to go undefeated in their conference.
This is the third time in school history that you guys have made state, what can you say about your community this year and just their support and just the feelings going into this tournament?
My biggest thing is the elementary kids and seeing their excitement. I have a daughter of my own who’s a first grader who gets to enjoy and have a taste of what this is all like.
And that just creates a spark and an interest and helps them instill goals just for those elementary kids to grow up and say I want to do that someday. So it’s fun for the fans for the girls and for the community and fun for those little kids;
Final question, what are you most looking forward to this weekend in Rapid City.
Oh boy, just the time spent together with the team. I think that’s what I’m looking forward to the most. Getting to go to the practice before getting to watch the other games you know just going on the bus for six hours knowing that this is something that we worked really really hard for and I hope that we can just cherish every little part of it.
This article is our part of our coaches’ interview series presented by The Move Group. To see the complete list, check out our website below.
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