The Bangor High School girls basketball team has a new coach and a veteran team, and is looking to improve upon last season’s 13-7 record.
Bangor reached the Class AA North semifinals where it was beaten by top seed Oxford Hills of South Paris 53-41.
Kristin (Baker) Hermanson, a former University of Maine basketball captain and a 1,701-point scorer at Valley High School in Bingham, has taken over for Jay Kemble, who will be coaching the Bangor boys basketball team.
The Rams will be led by four seniors who are coming off their second consecutive state Class A soccer championship.
Avery Clark ranked in the top five in five Class AA North regular season categories on the basketball court a year ago.
She was second in steals with 3.1 per game, third in rebounds (7.3), fourth in scoring (15.1 points per game) and tied for fifth in assists (2.5).
Dalaney Horr led the division in steals (3.2) and was tied for second in assists (3.2), seventh in rebounding (6.3) and 14th in scoring (8.8 ppg).
“We put a lot on Avery and Dalaney’s shoulders,” said Hermanson. “Hopefully, others will step up and give us some good things.”
The other seniors are Gabby Roy, who averaged 3.7 rebounds a year ago, and Clara Oldenburg, who averaged 1.8 steals.
“I love this team. They are hard workers and they come in and get after it,” said Hermanson. “They’ve had some experience being successful and we just have to put the pieces together. We have to show up and get to work every day because it won’t be easy. But I know we’re up for the challenge.”
The coach said the Rams have a lot of positive elements that they’ll need to put together this season.
“We have a bunch of athletes and we’re trying to be basketball players, too,” Hermanson added. “We have length. We have taller guards, but we don’t really have a ton of height. We have lankiness and some good defenders with speed.”
Horr thinks the team will be “really good” this year, and reliant on its speed.
“We’re going to be really fast,” Horr said. “We’re small, so we’re going to have to be.”
Clark also mentioned the team’s quickness.
“We’re going to work well with each other,” Clark said. “We’re really close-knit and that’s really important.”
The senior also credited first-year head coach Hermanson, who previously was an assistant on the coaching staff.
“We have a really good coach. She pushes us really hard in practice which is also really important,” said.
Roy said the team has a “lot of strengths” including its team speed. And she expects the Rams to have an outstanding season.
To go with the four seniors, the Rams also have four juniors, a sophomore and a freshman.
Juniors Lucy O’Connell and Emily Caulkins are guards and Avery Fullwood and Kya Smith are forwards.
“This is Avery Fullwood’s first time on the varsity,” Hermanson said. “She has worked hard and we’ll definitely need to use her and her height.”
Sophomore Kaylee Folsom and freshman Daphne Derdowski are guards.
The Rams have always been a solid and tenacious defensive team, and Hermanson expects that trend to continue. Bangor gave up an average of just 40.1 points per game a year ago.
The Rams scored 47.9 points per game and Clark said they have a “lot of people who can score.”
Bangor, which went 83-33 during Kemble’s six seasons on the bench including the COVID year, opens the season away against Brunswick at 12:30 p.m. Saturday.
