Val T.

15 hours ago6 min read

Culver girls basketball preview: ‘Success breeds success:’ Lady Cavs hope combining best of soccer, volleyball teams can spill over to hoops

BY VAL TSOUTSOURIS

Sports Editor, RTC

The Culver girls soccer team went 12-3-1 and averaged over five goals per game this fall.

The Culver volleyball team had a historic season. They went 28-6 and won their first sectional title in 13 years and their first regional title ever.

So what would a team look like that combined the best athletes from both teams?

Culver girls basketball coach Adam Neace thinks he has that group with this year’s Lady Cavaliers.

It leads to Neace, a 2009 Culver grad, recall a saying from former Culver football coach and athletic director Andy Thomas: “Success breeds success.”

Grace Sieber, last year’s point guard; Elexa O’Brien, one of the team’s top 3-point shooters; and reserve guard Giselle Villegas graduated, but returning starters include guard Maddy Hamilton and forwards Brooke Davis and Amiyah Williams.

Hamilton and Williams are among the soccer stars playing hoops. So is Eliana Andrzejewski.

The volleyball players playing basketball include senior Brynn Berndt, who is back after not playing last year, and freshman guard Ashlynn Berndt.

Ava McCune is a freshman who was third in the state with 45 goals in soccer but also played volleyball and received playing time against South Newton in the semistate.

“We wanted to get the best athletes in our school to come out and play basketball,” Neace said. “The wonderful thing is we had a great volleyball season and a great soccer season. And now we get to mix both of those groups together and see what comes about it. We have the HNAC volleyball MVP (Brynn Berndt) and the HNAC soccer MVP (Ava McCune) on the same team. We’re really excited about the athleticism that we’re bringing to the table this year that we did not have last year.”

Neace will be the only head coach this year. He and his brother A.J. were co-coaches last year. A.J. Neace will return to the staff as an assistant coach this year, and assistant Jessica McCuen also returns to the staff. Brett Berndt, who is also the school’s principal, rejoins the staff as an assistant after not coaching last year. Auston “Reno” Zehner and J.B. Overmyer will also be assistants.

The Neace brothers did not take over last year until after summer activities were over. So this summer was their first with the girls. He said “every Cavalier you can think of” helped with this summer.

Culver went 4-18 last year.

“It was huge for us,” Adam Neace said of the summer. “Again, we got to throw the young kids into the fire last year, so they got a really good grasp of the system. This summer, we really just hit it running. We repped as hard as we could game-like. Again, we had some great coaches coming in and working with our girls too, again, to give us good reps. So we didn’t have to go play random teams all over the place. We were getting good reps in practice every day.”

Neace is careful not to delineate between point guards and shooting guards on the team. He simply uses the word “guards.” He said he is comfortable with any of six different guards bringing the ball up the floor.

“We want to mix different groups,” Neace said. “Again, we probably have eight to 10 different groups we can play.”

Neace raves about the leadership ability of Williams, a 5-11 senior, and last year’s leading rebounder.

“She’s taken a lot of strides,” Neace said. “Again, leadership-wise, I’d say she wasn’t where she’s at now when I first got a hold of her. We really kind of stuck it to her on the leadership role. Last year, she was a junior captain for us, one of the only returning varsity players that we had. So again, she was thrown into that role a little bit, but … she excelled last year.”

Brynn Berndt played as a freshman and sophomore but not as a junior. She is an IU Kokomo volleyball signee.

“Missing Brynn, it hurt, it did hurt,” Neace said. “But again, having her back from club volleyball… she’s excited to just come back and play with her sister and be with her dad.”

Juniors include Brianna Schlemmer and Ivon Torres-Escobar. Neace said Schlemmer has worked to branch out from a spot-up shooter role and can take an opposing defender off the dribble.

Torres-Escobar is a “hard-nosed player” and a “great program player for us,” according to Neace.

“The girls love being around Ivon,” Neace said. “She’s a great teammate. She hustles every single day.”

Sophomores include Brooke Davis, Haylie Parker and Andrzejewski. Davis is known for her quickness, Neace said. Andrzejewski is one of the team’s guards, though she is recovering from an injury from soccer season, according to Neace.

Neace said Parker is a top defender who has also become more comfortable with the ball in her hands.

As for the freshmen, Neace complimented Ashlynn for her competitive spirit.

“She’s a very fiery player, probably one of the most fiery freshmen that I’ve been around,” Neace said. “When she brings it every day like that, it only picks all the other girls up. A lot of kids see how important stuff means to this girl. Again, very mature for her age. We’re excited about her.”

Neace called McCune a “freak athlete” and “one of the fastest athletes I’ve been around” and compared her to famous Culver grads Jack Rodgers and Carson Krueger.

“Beast in the weight room,” Neace said of McCune. “The great thing that we loved that we saw from her in soccer season is she was getting doubled, tripled, quadrupled and still was able to find alleys, find ways to get through it. We loved when we saw that as basketball coaches because now we’re thinking, hey, four or five guys in the paint, she can weave right around them.”

Chloe Lewis is the third freshman on the varsity. She played JV volleyball this fall, and Neace raves about her mind for the game.

“Chloe Lewis, a 5-foot-10 forward, extremely intelligent for her age,” Neace said. “We break something down – it’s one time (and) all we’ve got to do is tell her and it’s right away she’s full speed. That’s an amazing thing to have as a coach, especially at the freshman level. It’s a great thing to see. Credit to our middle school coaches for developing those girls and getting them ready. Hey, they can jump right in right away.”

Defensively, the Neace brothers introduced a zone to the team that they learned when they were assistant coaches for Kyle Evans on the Culver boys team. This year, with greater depth and athleticism, Adam Neace wants to extend that zone.

“This year, our offense has picked up, but the defense has stayed at that same nasty pace that we want to play at,” Neace said. “Now we’re going to extend it. We’re going to try to play you in the full court a lot too. Again, we want to play this thing up and down. We want to control the pace every single night. That’s our goal. That’s our mindset going into every single game.”

Neace said enough girls came out for basketball that Culver will have a JV, a “C” team and a freshman team in addition to the varsity.

“During practices, we’ll have two sets of 10 running side by side,” Neace said. “Two full games. I don’t know any other 1A school that’s got that.”

Culver girls basketball schedule (all times Eastern)

Nov. 16 – at Westville, 6:30 p.m.

Nov. 19 – vs. Winamac, 7:30 p.m.

Nov. 21 – vs. Elkhart Christian, 7:30 p.m.

Nov. 23 – at Pioneer, 7:30 p.m.

Nov. 26 – vs. Argos, 7 p.m.

Dec. 4 – at Rochester, 7:30 p.m.

Dec. 6 – at Lakeland Christian, 6 p.m.

Dec. 7 – at South Central (Union Mills), 8 p.m.

Dec. 9 – vs. Trinity Greenlawn, 7 p.m.

Dec. 10 – vs. Oregon-Davis, 6:30 p.m.

Dec. 13 – vs. Culver Academy, 7 p.m.