Niwot girls basketball set for second year under Jon Hill

The Niwot girls basketball team may be young, but second-year head coach Jon Hill believes the Cougars are well aware of his expectations.

In Hill's inaugural run last season, he was fortunate to have five seniors helping him with the transition. Those leaders are now gone, though, and with the 2022-23 season beginning Dec. 1, he'll be relying heavily on a talented group of team-oriented sophomores.

"Culture, being in year two, has been a big help," Hill said. "We're not surprised by expectations or what we do day-to-day. It's a pretty hard working group, a close-knit group who's excited to test themselves against some other teams."

Niwot's top two scorers from last year both return as sophomores: guard Rose Pacheco, who averaged 9.0 points per game, and 45% field-goal-shooter Evelyn Melis. The duo was also big on the defensive side of the ball with Pacheco recording 64 steals and Melis blocking nine shots. Now that they're no longer rookies, Hill said they've both embraced the art of leadership.

"They've stepped up a lot," Hill said. "It's great to have some good returners who played some big minutes. The biggest thing for them is they're now starting to step more into some leadership roles, not only being some of our more talented basketball players but being some of our more vocal voices on the court and (sharing) the expectations of culture. They've done a great job with it. They've been around a lot this offseason and put a lot of work in to take that next step forward."

Before suffering a season-ending injury last year, sophomore Cat Omer was another young standout for Niwot. She spent much of the past few months rehabilitating and Hill hopes her hard work will lead to some more sustained success.

Senior Peyton Burnett and juniors Chloe Mitchell and Molly Slupik enter as the Cougars' only upperclassmen, none of whom carry extensive varsity experience. However, Hill said that Mitchell has likely been their biggest leader while Slupik figures to be a strong post presence.

Hill added that both work ethic and coachability have emerged as strengths for Niwot, which began preseason practice Nov. 14.

"They're one of the most hard working groups and close-knit (teams) out there," he said. "Again, we're super young. Our core is almost exclusively sophomores and a couple of juniors sprinkled in. They've played a lot of basketball together and they understand what we're supposed to be doing. We had some issues with that last year, and I think that's where we're really going to excel. Our goal is to be the most fundamental team and work the hardest, and that should get us where we want to go."

Niwot will learn a lot about itself in a short period of time as the Cougars open the season by hosting a three-day tournament from Dec. 1-3. Hill's team will see Regis F. Groff High School, Battle Mountain High School and Denver North High School, respectively.

"It's an exciting thing - one, because we get the opportunity to play, which the girls are definitely getting to that point of 'we've had a pretty long preseason and practices and we're ready to go play somebody else,'" Hill said. "Both the challenge and the good thing are if we don't necessarily execute, we don't have time to practice. But if things go well or don't go well, we've got to respond the next day, which is going to force us to have some growth upon us early."