Lady Roadrunners look for continued success, improvement

 The 2024-2025 State Fair Community College (SFCC) Lady Roadrunners basketball team will be made up of 12 new faces, to go along with four returners who helped SFCC to 22 victories and an appearance in the Region 16 Tournament Championship game last season.

Lady Roadrunners Head Coach Nicole Collier has an idea of the style of basketball she would like to see the team play this season.

"We want to have an up-tempo style play," said Collier. "We want to get up-and-down the floor and have a lot of free movement and some motion offenses. I think you will also see some versatility.

"We are really young," said Collier. "There's a lot of learning going on in practice. Our players are very encouraging to each other and eager to learn and get better. Practices have gone well, there is a lot of teaching and learning."

Collier has seen leadership come from sophomore guard Madison Johnson of Harrisonville, who was the captain on last year's team.

"We have some other good returners who have done a great job helping the new players navigate college, as well as college basketball. We also have some freshmen who are leading as well."

Collier has been pleased with what she has seen from her new student-athletes.

"I feel like we have some pretty talented newcomers," said Collier. "It is an impressive freshman class that has a lot of talent on both sides of the ball."

SFCC will face a challenging non-region schedule to begin the season. The Lady Roadrunners will open the season with their traditional McDonald's Classic, where they will take on Triton College at 5:30 p.m. on Friday, Nov. 1. The Lady Roadrunners will close out the Classic with a game at 5:30 p.m. against Rend Lake College on Saturday, Nov. 2.

The Lady Roadrunners will play three home games Thanksgiving week with a noon tipoff on Monday, Nov. 25, against Haskell Indian Nations University Junior Varsity. SFCC will host Spoon River College at 5 p.m. on Nov. 29 and Northeastern Oklahoma A&M College at 3 p.m. on Saturday, Nov. 30 to close out the Thanksgiving Classic.

SFCC will host Central Methodist University Junior Varsity at 5:30 p.m. on Dec. 3, and close out their first semester with a pair of road contests.

"I think every game on our schedule will help prepare us for Region 16," said Collier.

The Lady Roadrunners will return to action at home against Kennedy-King College at 5:30 p.m. on Saturday, Jan. 4. Region 16 play opens for SFCC at Moberly Area Community College on Wednesday, Jan. 8. SFCC will host Mineral Area College as part of the Homecoming celebration on Saturday, Feb. 22. SFCC will close out Region play on Saturday, March 1 with a game against Crowder College.

"There are two new coaches in the Region this year," said Collier. "We will have to figure out their style of play and what they're trying to do. The Region will be a battle as always."

Coach Collier has some goals she would like to see the Lady Roadrunners accomplish this season.

"I want to be tough defensively," said Collier. "I want us to be the most physical team in the Region. I want to own the boards. I want to use our depth to pick up full court and challenge the other team to use their depth. I want to be a more defensively minded team and use our defense to create more possessions offensively."

Coach Collier sees some keys to her team being able to accomplish those goals.

"We have to do a good job of rebounding," said Collier. "We want to win the rebounding battle, cut our turnovers and shoot 50% from the field. We have to be more selective in the shots that we take. I think we'll look like a different team in December than we do now. I think we'll be a drastically different team in March than we are in December. We want to continue to see growth from our team throughout the season."

David Rohrbach
SFCC Athletics