The South Loup Lady Bobcats began their 2024-25 season with back-to-back home games. Unfortunately, they couldn't capitalize on their home-court advantage in their season opener on Dec. 6.

Ali Goodenow stepped in as head coach for the Lady Bobcats this year. She was an assistant coach at North Platte for two years. She is joined on the sidelines by fellow first year coach Kalen Dockweiler.

The Lady Bobcats lost several players to graduation last year and have only two returning letter winners; sophomores Addison Stump and Asa Starr.

Coach Goodenow said she has several underclassmen in the program this year as the team looks to rebuild. They include six freshmen, Emma Stallbaumer, Rae Hagler, Danielle Duponcheel, Taryn Rohrbough, Delanie Weinman and Olivia Fitzgerald. “We have two seniors who are out this year for the first time, Ivy Tullis and Réalta Leach,” the coach added.

Goodenow shared some specific goals that her team has set for the season. “We had the girls set individual goals for themselves and then set some team goals as well. Most of the team goals are to work hard, improve on their basketball skills and fundamentals, work together as a team and to have a winning record. However, with that last goal being said, the girls are fully aware that we are a very young team with a lot of room for growth and improvement, so if we do not meet the goal of having a winning record, as long as they are improving from the beginning of the year to the end of the year and learning new things that will help them in upcoming years, that the winning record goal could potentially be met in future years. We also asked the girls to pick a “word of the season” and the word that was decided and voted on was ‘family’. The girls are now working on the definition of that word and what the word family means to them.”

She shared that the strengths of the team at the moment are that every single girl is motivated to work hard and are all very dedicated to this team.

“They understand that there is a lot of growing that needs to be done and are willing to put in the hard work to improve throughout the season,” said Goodenow. “Areas that will impact us are things like the simple fact we are a very young team with not a lot of basketball experience, especially VARSITY basketball experience. There is a lot of basketball knowledge and fundamentals that needs to be learned, but these girls are willing to work hard and work together, so that will go a long way in rebuilding this program.”

Coach Goodenow said the team was not able to devote a lot of time to off-season preparation this year as they are a new team with a set of new coaches who are working to rebuild the program. “We weren’t 100% sure on who all would even go out, how many girls we would have, and what our ability would look like,” she shared. “Because of those factors, we didn’t feel comfortable throwing together a team for leagues or camps until we were able to see what all and who all we had.

“We did have open gyms twice a week and agility and conditioning as well, all in the month of June,” she continued. “We had a decent turn out for those, but there wasn't 100% attendance every time.

Moving forward there will be more off-season things we do during the summer to help continue to show growth in our new program that we are rebuilding from the ground up.”

The Lady Bobcats opened their season on Friday, Dec. 6 against Twin Loup. The Wolves apparently hadn't forgotten their loss the last time these teams played back in December of 2023 and avenged that loss by beating the Lady Bobcats 50-23.

The Bobcats did not get a break after their opening game, and played the very next night as they hosted the Amherst Lady Broncos. Amherst is a very solid, quick-moving team, and proved to be just too much for the Bobcats to handle.

South Loup was beaten by a final score of 57-15.

“Although we have started our season off with two losses, I am still proud of the girls for their hard work and dedication,” Coach Goodenow said. “We are a very young team that has a lot of basketball knowledge to learn. The girls work hard every day at practice and will continue to show growth and improvement every game. We may not win a lot of games this year, as we are completely rebuilding the program from the bottom up, but these girls have a passion and love for the game that I appreciate. We play a lot of Class C schools, who have a lot older experienced players than we do. Starting two freshmen, two sophomores and a junior shows just how young of a team we truly have. I hope that not too many people pass judgment on our team this year because as the years go on we will progress in the right direction and as long as the girls keep having fun, working hard, and are willing to learn, that's all we care about. A loss is a loss, the score doesn't matter. Losing by 40 points or 2 points doesn't change the end of the season record. We encourage our girls to focus on the good things they do in each game and come to practice the following week ready to work on the things that need to be worked on. Hopefully community members and other fans can find the positives in every game as well, not just look at the score and pass a negative judgment when they don't know the heart behind our team.”

The Lady Bobcats will have their first road game of the season on Friday, Dec. 13, as they travel to Cambridge. Tip-off is set for 6 p.m.

The girls will be back on the road on Saturday, Dec.

14 at Pleasanton. That game is slated for a 3:30 p.m. start.