WALTON — David Sims is ready for the challenge of being a varsity girls basketball coach.
Sims was recently an assistant baseball coach under Greg Marschand, and an assistant boys basketball coach under Matt Carver in the 2009-10 season.
Now, Sims is stepping out on his own with the help of Erin Modisett, who is staying on as a varsity assistant coach. Lewis Cass’ school board recently approved Sims as the new girls coach.
“I have never coached a girls team before,” Sims said. “I coached middle school, freshmen and varsity boys, but never girls. What I have learned is it doesn’t matter if [you’re coaching] a boy or a girl. The bottom line is, if you can motivate them, then good things will happen.”
Sims, who is a 2001 Logansport graduate, will be taking over a team that had a total of four wins in two seasons under former coach Lindsay Leffert, who gave young players playing time.
“We have every single starter coming back except for Adrienne Ayers, who graduated,” Sims said. “We have a lot of girls coming back, so we will have a lot of experience.”
Those returning players include seniors Kristi Berlet, Peyton Klinkhamer, Abby Ropes and Rachel Aldridge; juniors Katie Mund, Kelsey Clark, Haley Clark, Kinsey Weaver and Kourtney Mayhill, and sophomore Brittany Cunningham.
Leffert resigned because of taking a job in Warsaw.
“The main reason is that I live in Logansport, and I work in Warsaw. Do the math, driving 55 miles to work one way, and driving back from Warsaw to Lewis Cass for practice,” Leffert said. “Getting up early for work the next day, and leaving for practice early. My career at Biomet in Warsaw is just more important to me at this point in my life. Coaching is also important to me, but traveling long hours is a lot. In my mind, coaching 100 percent and career 100 percent was putting a strain on both.”
Sims is taking a look at the team and implementing his style of offense and defense.
“I like to run offenses that suit the strengths of the team, but most of the time I will be running a motion offense,” he said. “We are working on not standing around, and looking for the open lane to cut to the basket during the summer practices. Quickness is the thing that we have to work on with a lot of guards coming back.
“We want to accept all opportunities teams give us. So we are going to run when given the chance, and hold off and not force it when there isn’t anything there. As a coaching staff we’re going to work hard to get our girls to understand that just because you’re pushing the ball up the floor doesn’t mean you have to rush a shot. You can always pull the ball back out and get into your offense.”
On the defensive side, Sims is implementing different kinds of defenses.
“Defensively we will play a little bit of everything,” he explained. “I like to change my defense up quite a bit to keep the offense off balance. We will play man-to-man, 2-3 zone and 1-3-1 zones. At times we will play them straight up, and other times we will trap out of them.
“We will also use the press when needed, whether it is to change the tempo of the game or to create turnovers. No matter what defensive set we are in, we will be an in-your-face and physical team. I believe that your defense sets up and fuels your offense. It gives you so many more options and creates offensive opportunities that you wouldn’t have had before.”
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