Lisle Girls Hoops Coach Murray Continues to Set the Bar High

Since becoming head coach of the Lisle High School girls varsity basketball team in May, 2010, has set the bar high for every level of the girls basketball program.

Be it at summer camp, playing in this year’s Lisle Girls Summer League or competing in tournaments such as the recently held Minuteman Classic at Riverside-Brookfield High School, Murray continued to emphasize to his girls the importance of putting in the time and work necessary throughout the summer to become better basketball players.

“It’s a little bit of a process, but I like the direction that we’re moving,” said Murray following one of the Lions’ contests at the Minuteman tourney. “It’s going to take time to get where I’d like us to be.

“This is very new to the girls. This is not what the expectation in the program in the past has been in terms of really needing to make a commitment in the summer to make themselves better players.”

The Lions’ 0-4 showing at the Minuteman Classic can be considered a glitch when compared to how Murray believes they’ve performed throughout the summer. In their final game of the Minuteman tourney, for example, the Lions had a number of girls out for various reasons. Five of the nine girls who did suit up for the game were incoming freshmen.

“It’s just kind of how it fell,” Murray said. “We’ve hosted a league this summer and we’ve had pretty good attendance from our players. Turnout, for the most part, has been very good. We have been competitive. We were really competitive in the league that we played in.”

The Lisle Girls Summer League featured 11 teams from around the area.

“We’ve had our periods of ups and downs, but we’ve also been playing various competition which I think is good for the girls to see because it continues to stress what type of talent is actually out there,” Murray said. “Obviously that’s what we’re inspiring to take our program (to that level). It’s important for them (Lisle players) to not become complacent and try to push themselves to higher levels.”

Murray has been able to settle in more this summer as opposed to last summer when was busy getting to know his players and implementing his offensive and defensive systems.

“To be honest, this summer is really the first summer where it is the type of summer that I want us to have,” he said. “This (summer) is definitely another step forward for them. For me personally it’s good because I get to see the kids that are going to make the commitment to making themselves better basketball players, and hopefully being an integral part of the future of our program.”

The Lions, 18-11 in Murray’s as coach, should be competitive once again when the 2011-12 season commences in November. They lost starting forward Tara Sarb, starting point guard Nicole Urban and spot starter Stephanie Petkovsek to graduation, but return senior forwards Darian Payne and Shelby Kretman, both starters. Kristina Fernette, a junior guard, also saw playing time off the bench and as a starter.

Junior Kelly Urban started in the backcourt with her sister before suffering a torn ACL late in the season. Kelly hasn’t been able to take part in any summer action with the team as she continues to recover from the injury.

“She has not been able to play with the ACL, so she’s still kind of a question mark,” Murray said. “From there, we have a number of kids who were on our varsity team but probably were not in our top seven or eight last year. So they’re getting some valuable experience this summer in showing themselves.”

One player who’s impressed Murray during the summer is junior guard Skyler Tomko, who’s also an all-conference player for the Lisle girls soccer team.

“I’ve been really pleased with her,” he said. “I’ve also been given the opportunity to look at some of these younger kids. There’s some very good young talent coming into the school that I’m pretty excited about. The future is pretty bright for us. We just have to get the right frame of mind; that’s the biggest thing.”