A new coach and new players means that the Kennedy girls’ basketball team will face a lot of change after fall open gyms. Head Coach Tony Vis is happy with the turnout for the fall open gyms and looks forward to practices. The season starts Monday Nov. 5 and the team will vote on captains after practices start.

During the summer, the team had open gyms focusing on skills twice a week and intra-squad scrimmages once per week. “I was a little bit mad at first because it seemed like we couldn’t get a lot of games in,” Vis said. “What ended up happening with that was it allowed us to practice more.”

The fall has not been much of a change for the team with open gyms once to three times per week, depending on the volleyball schedule. “In the fall, there has been some concern at times. Sometimes we’d have under 10 kids,” Vis said. The open gyms have recently had about 20 people come which has allowed the team to do more drills and scrimmaging.

“I think it [open gyms] will help us shoot the ball better, maybe handle the ball a little bit better early on. Maybe a little bit of conditioning, but not much,” Vis said. “Some of those things I think will help us hit the ground running a little bit faster than what you would if you hadn’t touched the ball since the end of July.”

The team has their first game Tuesday Nov. 27 at Cedar Falls High School. The team then hosts Dubuque Wahlert Catholic High School Friday Nov. 30. Following this game, the team will travel to Pleasant Valley High School Saturday Dec. 1 and then to Linn Mar High School Tuesday Dec. 4.