Lady Panthers to rely heavily on defense
The Benton Lady Panthers are going to have to count on senior Italei Gray and junior Makenzy Davidson to carry the offensive load as they head into the 2017 season. “[Gray] and Davidson are our two best scorers returning,” Benton head coach Jerry Chumley said. “We are pretty much going to go offensively how they go. “We played a lot this summer, and they’ve gotten much better. So we look for them to carry most of the load most nights offensively.” Benton finished 17-14 last year, making it to the first round of the state tournament before losing to Mountain Home. Benton returned two other starters in juniors Kati Morrow and Caitlin Ginther. “They’ve showed signs from time to time that they can score the ball, but the other two (Gray and Davidson) are our top scorers and have been so far this offseason,” Chumley said. He said Davidson had the best summer of anybody, playing in about 100 games. “She has really improved her physical game, and she’s grown up mentally, too,” the coach said. “She and Italei have a chance to be all-staters.” He said Davidson should average double figures and is very versatile, with the ability to play inside and out. “She wants to be good and plays enough on her own,” Chumley said. “She wants to be the next one to come through. “She’s gotten herself where she should average double-figure scoring. And Italei should be right there, too. We need both of them to average 10 or more.” Chumley said Gray works hard as well, but differently than Davidson. “[Gray’s] temperament — she’s so laid-back,” he said. “She’s so smooth, she looks like she’s not even working hard because she’s so smooth. “She’s got another gear. She’s going to find it this year, and I think she will.” Chumley said that as a team, the Lady Panthers played around 20 games this summer. “It was up and down,” he said. “We’ve got such a young team, we only won about half our games, but we competed well.” Chumley said the Lady Panthers are not an explosive bunch offensively, but they play defense well enough to stay in games. “I don’t think we are going to score a ton of points, but we are going to stay in it with how hard they compete and how well they play defense,” he said. Chumley said the team’s defense is definitely its biggest strength. “We don’t score a whole lot, but we do hold teams down,” he said. “On average, we only gave up 43 points a game. “So that’s going to be our strength.” A lack of size and a lack of scoring ability stand out as weaknesses for Benton. “We’ve got to get more scoring out of more players,” Chumley said. “When nobody on your team averages double figures, you aren’t going to score many points. … “I can’t remember the last time when we had two players average double figures on the same team.” Chumley said girls just don’t work on scoring the basketball like boys do. “They’ll take open shots and make the most of their free throws,” he said, “but they just don’t get to the basket like we need them to.” Also returning this year is senior Anna Davis,
who missed most of last year because of an injury. “She’s been a bit injury prone, but she’s back, and she provides good shooting and leadership,” Chumley said. He said 5-10 sophomore Rhema Riley will start at post for the Lady Panthers. “This is just her second year in basketball,” Chumley said. “She is really coming on this offseason. “We look for big things from her as far as rebounding and guarding the lane area for us. She’s really the top newcomer.” Benton will play Nov. 4 against Little Rock eStem in a benefit game; then the regular season will begin Nov. 7 against Searcy. “We play a lot of 5A schools,” Chumley said, “but it’s the top of the 5A chain. In our blended district is [Watson] Chapel twice, and we also have Little Rock Parkview and Little Rock Christian. “We stack our nonconference games — that’s one thing that we do, especially early on. It’s brutal with Parkview and Little Rock Christian and at Beebe. Those are some of the best 5A teams around.”