ROCKINGHAM – A changing of the guard has occurred within the Richmond Senior High School varsity girls basketball program with first-year head coach Teddy Moseley being introduced in June. And with him, come big expectations for the 2018-19 season.
The Lady Raiders wrapped up their preseason play over the weekend in the Terry Sanford High School Jamboree, and now their eyes are set on the regular season which is slated to begin following the Thanksgiving holiday. It may be Moseley’s first season at the helm of the program, replacing former coach Rosalind McDonald, but his up-tempo personality and grit may take the Lady Raiders back to the top of the conference.
A season ago, Richmond went 6-15 overall and finished in sixth place in the Sandhills Athletic Conference standings with a 3-11 mark against SAC opponents. The one highlight was defeating Jack Britt High School in the opening round of the conference tournament, but Moseley believes that this year’s squad can accomplish far more than it did last year.
“With the talent we have this season, a realistic goal would be to win the conference title,” Moseley shared during Tuesday’s practice. “That’s how skilled we are and we have the ability to do it. The games that were lost last year, (Richmond) was in them and had a chance to win every time. The girls are a year older now and have another year of experience under their belts, so hopefully that pays off this year.”
The Lady Raiders haven’t been crowned conference champions since 2010 when they went 19-2 overall and 9-0 in the 4A Conference 4 under former head coach Nellie Harrington. With the conference championship banner hanging in Richmond’s gym, it will serve as a reminder to Moseley and this year’s team what the ultimate goal is.
Richmond went 2-1 in the preseason, and it gave Moseley and assistant coach Andrea McIver an idea of where the program is without the likes of former seniors Saleemah Brown, Jordyn Horne and Lexyona Ingram. This year’s team is a solid mixture of returning varsity starters in seniors Dannon Shepard and Taliah Wall, and juniors Allexis Swiney, Hailey Miller and Layne Maultsby and sophomore Jakerra Covington.
There are also plenty of fresh faces at the varsity level, starting with sophomore Jayla McDougald. Freshman Allyiah Swiney is also expected to pick up a lot of minutes, while junior Bree Wall adds to Moseley’s defense.
“As a head cach you’re never going to be where you want to be,” Moseley said. “But starting out, I’ve seen a lot more positive things than negative. We’re young, we’re fast and very guard-oriented. We need to learn to take advantage of our strengths. At this point, we’re still doing a lot of teaching, but we’ll be doing that all season. The main thing early in the season is for us to execute (in games) what we’re doing in practice.”
There will be plenty of opportunities for the Lady Raiders to put into action what they’re practicing in the gym, but it will be the Pinecrest High School Lady Patriots they’ll be chasing for the SAC title. Last season, Pinecrest swept SAC competition, finishing a perfect 14-0 ahead of Lumberton (11-3) and Jack Britt (9-5) high schools.
“We’re mainly going to be chasing Pinecrest,” Moseley noted. “They went 14-0 last year, so of course they’re the team that we want to compete with. Jack Britt looked good when we played them (this preseason), but we were missing a couple of players. I think we have a real shot at winning the conference if we can compete with those couple of teams.”
Hoping to institute a slight culture change and make the season a productive one, Moseley, a former Raider player on the 1996 state runner-up boys team, is looking to use a revolving door of players to help the Lady Raiders reclaim conference glory. He’ll be the first to tell anyone that he’s not set on using the same starting five players if it doesn’t mean what’s best for the team.
“We don’t have a starting five — we have a starting team,” he explained. “I want to have a team where I can put two or five players in and sub them out and not see a drop off. My thing is for the girls not to get too concerned with who starts the game, but who’s able to help us finish the game. We want to finish as a team and win games.”
At starting point guard will be Miller, who as a sophomore last season came off the bench. Allexis Swiney led the team a season ago in points per game, netting just over nine points per contest, and Moseley hopes to use her in a role that “penetrates to the hoop.” In the post, it will be a combination of Shepard and junior Jardai Tillman taking shots down low.
McDougald brings some range from beyond the three-point line, and she showed that last year in the conference tournament as well as in the preseason scrimmages. Bree Wall and Taliah Wall, Moseley hopes, will use their speed on defense to help shut down opposing offenses. When it comes to who he’ll send out on the floor “will depend on matchups” Moseley explained, adding that Covington will be one of the better players on the floor.
“Most of our points will come off of turnovers,” Moseley concluded. “Our defense is looking really good, and we’re looking to speed teams up this year. We want to take them out of their comfort zone and play fast and in a hurry. If we can make other teams make mistakes, we should be able to capitalize.”
The Lady Raiders will continue to practice over the next two weeks before opening the season at home against non-conference opponent Whiteville High School on Tuesday, Nov. 27. Tipoff is scheduled for 7 p.m. inside Raider Gymnasium.
