KANSAS CITY, Kan. — The Sumner Sabres girls basketball team have flown under the radar the last few seasons. Last year, they fell to the Leavenworth Lady Pioneers in the Kansas Class 5A Sub-State championship game. The Lady Sabres are having yet another fantastic season and already look like they're in tournament form.
The Sabres have six seniors on their team. Center Shenice Canady is one of them that's making a huge impact for the team. In the last three games, she's averaged 17 points per game (16 against Wyandotte, 19 against Atchison and 16 against Harmon), 8 rebounds and 5.3 blocks per game.
Head Coach Todd Wassman is in his first year as Sumner girls basketball head coach. In that time, he said he's seen her grow by leaps and bounds. He attributes her success to her hard work in the offseason.
"It's no surprise with Shenice. She had a great summer," Coach Wassman said. "I kind of saw this all along. I told her this summer she was gonna have a big year. And, she's amongst five other seniors that do really well. And, she's really bought into the concept of defense and she's done a great job for us."
Shenice attributes a lot of her success to her other teammates. However, she said that her Head Coach has had the biggest impact in her gaining incredible focus and discipline on the floor.
"It just comes from my coach because he kind of pushes one thing. So, it just makes everything else fall into place," Shenice said. "It's basically him being the way he is with focusing on one thing [rather] than letting us just go free with everything else. So, it just falls in."
Shenice believes that this could be the year the Lady Sabres make some serious noise in the high school basketball tournament.
"I think we can take the state championship to be honest. Just like, the way we are now, we're gonna keep bonding more. So, it's just gonna help us more so we can go all the way to state."
NOTE: The Hy-Vee 41 Five-Star Athlete of the Week segment airs every Wednesday during the 10 p.m. sportscast through the entire school year.
