Dec 18, 2023 By John Sacco 3 min read

It is a fresh start for the Carmichaels High School girls’ basketball team in the 2023-2024 season.

Carmichaels has a new coach, Joe Sabolek, who was hired during the spring.

The Lady Mikes went 8-11 overall and was 6-6 in section play.

Carmichaels top performers, according to Sabolek, are senior guard Meg Voithofer (5-8), senior guard Alayna Simon (5-1), senior guard Arianna Plavi (5-7), junior guard Duski Staggers (5-8), junior center Ali Jacobs (5-10).

He added that in addition to those five starters freshman guard Avery Voithofer (5-6) “will compete for time, too.”

Other team members include sophomore forward Kylie Simon (5-1), sophomore guard Abagail Cuppet (5-4), senior forward Chloe Mitchell (5-6) and freshmen guard Shalyn Pyle (5-5) and guard Maya Adamson (5-5).

“We have really prepared ourselves and gotten better individually from 1-12,” said Sabolek. “We’ve been going at it since mid-summer, so we’ve seen a lot of improvement from a lot of people. Unfortunately, we don’t have a ton of depth right now, Ashton Batis tore her ACL (anterior cruciate ligament) early in volleyball season and another one of our likely contributors decided to pursue softball.

“I’m confident in the girls that we are putting out there and they’ve put in a lot of work to be better. Those losses individually aren’t excuses, no one is going to feel bad for us, so we need to be a very well-conditioned and mentally tough team. I truly think we have the talent to be a very good basketball team.”

The bottom line is winning games and that will take team play and individual progression, and improvement.

“Clearly we want to win basketball games,” Sabolek said. “This year I’d like to see our girls become better basketball players. We need to develop a culture that allows our girls to play freely and, more importantly, with confidence so we can have a free flowing, smooth offense that doesn’t require a million and one plays to be successful.

“I’d also like to be better communicators, a lack of communication can lead to a poor season, not only on the court, but off.”

Carmichaels competes in Section 4-AA with Bentworth, Beth-Center, California, Chartiers-Houston, Frazier and Washington.

“Washington is clearly the team to beat,” Sabolek said. “Chartiers-Houston will be good and I know (Coach) Melanie Greco will have California ready to play. There weren’t a lot of losses from other teams, so I think it’s going to be highly competitive all around.”

He said Carmichaels will need a total team effort to reach its goals.

“We’re counting on everyone,” Sabolek said. “We need production out of everyone, from our seniors to freshmen in a variety of ways, obviously on the court but during practices and film, everyone has a role to play and that last girl off the bench will be just as important as our leading scorer.

“Meg and Alayna are our leaders, we need them to be vocal, direct the offense, and be that senior leadership every good team needs to be successful.”

Sabolek is excited about his opportunity.

“I’ve always loved sports, being an educator, it works out perfectly that I’ll be able to teach the next generation of athletes how to become better basketball players,” Sabolek said. “However, we are trying to instill in these girls that hard work, commitment, accountability, and communication are not only valuable on the court, but in every aspect of life as well.”