Should I or shouldn’t I? Fairbanks junior Carly Lehman may be thinking that as she eyes the basket. Lehman has helped the Lady Panthers to a 15-5 record so far this season.
(Journal-Tribune photo by Tim Miller)
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Lady Panther basketball coach Landon Fraker watches game action.
(Journal-Tribune photo by Tim Miller)
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Anyone who has spent the past several days digging out from Winter Storm Landon knows what kind of havoc it created.
Girls high school basketball teams that have faced another Landon-led storm this winter have seen what kind of damage that can do.
The Fairbanks Lady Panthers, led by fourth-year head coach Landon Fraker, are coming through with one of their best seasons in a number of years.
Going into tonight’s contest at West Liberty-Salem, the Lady Panthers have won 15 out of 20 games and have a solid lock on second place in the Ohio Heritage Conference’s North Division.
FHS is 11-4 in the conference, behind the 14-1 mark of Mechanicsburg.
After tonight’s game against the Tigers (who are 9-5 in the division), FHS will conclude the 2021-22 regular season on Wednesday with a non-conference game at Centerburg.
Both are games that were postponed from earlier dates.
Fairbanks isn’t that far removed from Fraker’s first season of 2018-19, when it limped to a 2-21 record.
Since that time, however, FHS has exponentially improved with each ensuing season.
The Lady Panthers posted a 7-16 mark during his second year and a 12-11 finish a year ago.
Just what has sparked such a huge advance in such a relatively short period of time?
Actually, Fraker and his coaching staff saw improvement throughout that difficult first campaign.
“The girls got better from the start of that season until the end,” he said. “Over the past three seasons, we’ve just been refining the things we want to do.”
Fraker said the biggest key to the Lady Panthers’ success has been a complete acceptance of what the coaching staff has been teaching.
“Right from the start, we wanted the girls to buy completely into what we want to do and we’ve watch them grow in that,” he said. “It’s been throughout the entire program… the attention to detail on fundamentals of setting screens, playing defense and looking for good shots.”
That mindset has manifested itself into solid statistical numbers this winter.
The Lady Panthers are allowing only 35.7 points per game, while scoring 54 each outing.
They are shooting nearly 40% from the floor, which shows their shot selection has advanced remarkably over the past few years.
Fraker said he has seen huge improvement in all of those categories from the fourth-grade travel team on up to the varsity squad.
The biggest season jump, prior to the current campaign, came in 2020-21 when FHS went from seven to 12 victories.
Fraker put a lot of credit for that success on last year’s seniors.
“Our senior post players – Emma Gugel, Megan Rausch and Lillian Miller – greatly improved and were good leaders,” he said, adding that set the stage for future success.
The Lady Panthers of a year ago also relied on younger players, such as sophomores Carly Lehman, Macy Miller and Elaina Lahmers.
They, as juniors, have been among the team leaders this season as well.
Miller is leading the team in scoring with 12.2 points per game and in rebounds with 10.9.
Lahmers and Lehman are respectively averaging 11.8 and 10.1 points per contest.
While the trio seems to have received the most attention from opposing teams, others such as Ellie Carter, Reese Poling and Anna Poling have been valuable contributors.
Fraker also praised the leadership that has been provided by the current seniors Anna Poling, Kate Ruff, Avery Groves, Katelyn Vollrath and Gracie Pyers.
Pyers, who was another solid player a year ago, has not been able to play a single minute of this season due to a knee injury suffered during the 2021 soccer campaign.
“Even though she hasn’t been able to play, Gracie is with us every day and provides leadership,” said Fraker.
Another factor in the team’s success, according to Fraker, is camaraderie.
“Everybody is happy with their role and what they can do to help us,” he said. “There are girls who don’t get to see a lot of playing time, but they still come to practice every day and work hard to help us get better.”
Fraker hopes to end the regular season on winning notes this week.
The Lady Panthers will then have a bit of a break before jumping into Division III tournament action as the No. 5 seed. They will host Johnstown on Saturday, Feb. 19, at 7 p.m. in the post-season opener.
Regardless of what the post-season brings this year, Fraker is already thinking about how the program can progress during future campaigns.
“We want to upgrade our non-conference schedules in the coming years,” he said. “The OHC is what it is, but we want to schedule a couple more Division I teams in the non-conference.”
Playing bigger squads, Fraker said, can only help in the long run.
“Playing bigger teams will also hopefully prepare us for Division III tournament opponents,” he said.