On Monday, Jan. 29, 2024, Becton’s very own Lady Wildcats Girl’s Basketball team was able to bring home another NJIC Meadowlands Division Girl’s Basketball Championship banner since their last time accomplishing this feat back in 2006.
Days before the game, NJ.com made a prediction that Hasbrouck Heights would win the second meeting of the season, and that the teams would finish in a tie for the division, but they predicted wrong.
Once the Lady Wildcats found out that they were going to play against Hasbrouck Heights for the NJIC Meadowlands League Championship, they all came to the consensus it was going to be a tough game. Junior Sarah Ingraham expressed, “When I found out we were going against HH, I was nervous and excited because they are our rivals!” Junior Nina Buda added, “I knew we would be playing them for the league title and it would be challenging, but having a chance to put “2024” on the banner after so long gave us even more drive to win.”
Coach Mike Ryan could not be more proud of his team, “Winning is always fun, but seeing your players work hard to accomplish their goal is even better. We put in a lot of practice, time, and effort to get to this point. As a coach, it’s great for the players to see that hard work pays off. Hard work carries over into life, if you want to accomplish something you have to work hard for it. Nothing is given to you, you have to go get it!”
The team attests to how proud they are of one another and how big of an accomplishment this was. Junior Analise Feliz expressed, “Winning didn’t feel real at first. The win didn’t hit me until I was sitting down with my team celebrating. We are the NJIC Meadowlands League Champs… we are putting 2024 up on that banner!”
Junior Kaitlyn Reiner echoed, “As a team, we put in a lot of work and it was great to see it all come together. Our coaches deserve a championship for all their hard work too.” Sophomore Shania Healy also added, “That was one of the biggest games of our season, and we got the job done.”
With the goal reached of bringing home another conference champs banner, the team is preparing to conquer their next quest: states. Reiner stated, “The goal for the rest of the season is to win the rest of our games and take on a state group 2 championship.” Feliz adds, “The job isn’t done yet, our next goal is to win states, put another banner up, and bring home a trophy. Our effort is far from over, it’s only just the beginning.”
“The accomplishment we just made motivates us all to keep working hard the rest of the season– progressing mentally and physically to complete the unfinished business that there still is in these next few weeks,” Buda shares with hope.
Coach Mike Ryan concludes, “It’s hard to compare teams that I coached in the past, all I ask from my players is to give 100% every time you walk in the gym and look to be better than the day before. I have been fortunate with all the teams I have coached at Becton to get players that buy into the system to work hard. My job as a coach is to make them better players than they think they are capable of. Hard work trumps talent!”
We want to congratulate Coach Mike Ryan and the Girls Basketball team for this huge achievement!
