BB makes State Tourney for first time since 2003

This year the Broken Bow girls basketball team made a major step in the right direction. For the first time since 2003, the Indians made the state tournament and finished the year with a No. 7 rating in Class C1 by the Omaha World-Herald.

“It’s been pretty wild I am not going to lie,” Broken Bow Coach Kelly Cooksley. “We’ve won girl’s golf, we went to state in volleyball, and then football won four of their last five games. We’ve had a lot of momentum at Bow and it’s just continuing to try and grow from the experiences this season.”

Broken Bow has come along from where they started under Cooksley just four seasons ago. At that time, they were coming off back-to-back five winning seasons.

From there, they have made three straight district finals, won four straight conference championships, and qualified for the state tournament.

A big reason for the Indians success were the seniors, Kali Staples, Kassidy Cyboron, Emma Schall, Madison Jackson, and Gracee Oeltjen. They stuck with the process and found a way to lead and succeed on the court through the challenging times in the beginning and the major successes of this year.

“When I got here these seniors were my first class here and we had back-to-back five-win seasons,” Cooksley said. “It started with a .500 record and we somehow won the conference tournament that year. They have just continued to grow, and we have made three straight district finals. They are definitely pillars of this turnaround.”

Broken Bow was well represented on the Southwest

Conference All-Tournament team. Kali Staples who is the record holder for assists in a career and season and Kya Scott who is the record holder for three’s made in a career were first-team selections. Kailyn Scott was a second-team selection and Cooksley was awarded Southwest Conference Coach of the year after guiding his team to their fourth straight conference title and a record of 23-2.

Despite the fact the season ended with a 21-point loss to the eventual State Champions in North Bend, the Indians had so much to be proud of with this season. They should be poised for another good season next year with key starters returning and a strong underclassmen group coming up.

“We’ll be back,” Cooksley said. “We had to get that monkey off our back getting here and we finally figured out how to do that. We’re going to keep getting better with some young kids coming up and we go some good returners coming back.”