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Butler head basketball coach Larry Just talks to his players during a time-out in the KHSAA 6th Region Girls Basketball Championship. 04 March 2017
This week, the Butler High School girls’ basketball team isn’t just trying to win its third state championship in four years, the Bearettes are also chasing history.
If they can lift the gold ball trophy at the end of the St. Elizabeth Healthcare/KHSAA Sweet 16, it will be the program’s record sixth state title.
Butler currently has five championships (1975, 1980, 2008, 2014 and 2016), which ties them with Ashland Blazer and now defunct Laurel County for the most in state history.
The Bearettes (32-2), who are No. 1 in The Courier-Journal’s Litkenhous Ratings, begin their quest for six at noon Wednesday, when they face fifth-ranked Sacred Heart (29-5) at Northern Kentucky University’s BB&T Arena in Highland Heights, Kentucky.
►GAME PREVIEW: Sacred Heart vs. Butler
This season’s squad has been led by five seniors – Jaelynn Penn, Tasia Jeffries, Teri Goodlett, Bre Torrens and Janna Lewis. The quintet, all of whom have signed letters of intent to play in college, have been key contributors since they were freshmen. Penn and Torrens were starters, while the other three came off the bench, on the team that beat Elizabethtown 49-38 in the 2014 state title game. Jeffries joined Penn and Torrens in the starting lineup last season, which the Bearettes capped off with a 62-36 rout of Franklin County in the Sweet 16 championship.
While Butler’s current run isn’t unprecedented – the Valkyries (2002-04) and Laurel County (1977-79) each won three straight state titles while Ashland Blazer won three in four years (1921-22 and 1924) – the accomplishments of the Bearettes senior class hasn’t gone unappreciated by the competition.
“Their ability to step up on big stages throughout their career has been historic in my book,” said Franklin County coach Joey Thacker, whose team suffered one of the most lopsided losses in championship game history last season.
►MORE COVERAGE: Top scorers, rebounders, 3-point shooters in Sweet 16
This season Butler, which has also benefitted from the emergence of 6-foot-3 junior center Molly Lockhart (whose scoring average has increased six points from 2015-16), has outscored its opponents by an average of 30.7 points per game. The Bearettes lone losses were to No. 4 Male, 68-62 in their season-opener and 58-49 to Sacred Heart on Feb. 8, despite having a target on their collective backs all season.
“They’ve been terrific,” Butler coach Larry Just said. “We haven’t really talked so much about the target as much as just playing as well as we can play each day. They’ve been through (it), they know what it’s all about, it’s just a matter of us trying to go one step at a time.”
Added Goodlett, who has joined Jeffries, Penn and Torrens in the starting lineup this season: “The journey has been really fun, especially with my teammates.”
But the Bearettes hope their journey isn’t over just yet. They hope it continues four more games and ends with a historic outcome.
“I just want us to relax and go have some fun and play hard,” Just said. “When they do that they’re usually a very good basketball team.”
