MONROE - The brightest minds couldn't further illuminate if they were always held to the standard curriculum. Even AP Calculus would have felt rather elementary to a young Albert Einstein.
Similarly, the local girls hoops stars that hold six of the 10 spots on the cat's meow of hoops teams joined Wisconsin Hoops Select's program to further the skills that bought them such a prodigious spot.
Chuck Chandler is the coach of a 16-and-Under ballclub whose ballplayers reside within about a 45-mile radius of Verona and has watched several players on his roster pool their talents in AAU play for as many as five years.
"It allows the best players to practice against and play against kids that are as talented and, most often, even more talented than them," Chandler said.
"You're not gonna get any better playing against kids that are less talented than you."
Chandler's daughter, Kimee, is the well-tenured point guard while Brodhead junior Kristin Ruchti and Monroe junior Emily Rufenacht have put in five rewarding seasons.
"It helps having a point guard like Kimee and a good true post player like Kristen, that you can build a team around," Chandler said. "Emily's just got the best motor of any kid I've had the privilege to coach. She plays herself into exhaustion and most kids pick up fouls when fatigue is a factor, but that's not the case with her."
The club also boasts Brodhead sophomore Dana Lewis, a fellow 6-footer alongside Ruchti. Monroe sophomores Gwen Sutter and Ashley Hermanson joined the squad fresh off their WIAA Division 2 state title.
The club played two recent tournaments in Wisconsin before finishing 4-1 in last weekend's prodigious Adidas Deep South Classic set along Tobacco Road in North Carolina, its only loss coming against the eventual champion Carolina Lady Knights.
The Select squad trailed by 16-plus points in two of their victories, most notably by 16 at halftime before roaring back to defeat the Columbus Comets, 49-46 in the ninth-place game.
"I have no idea how, something turned on after halftime and we just got it going," Ruchti said.
Members of coaching staffs from across the nation attended the event during open recruiting month to see the 248-team event. Members of UW-Milwaukee, UW-Green Bay, Butler and Xavier's coaching staffs were, as Chandler put it, "mainstays" at all his team's games.
Sutter and Rufenacht didn't make the East-Coast trip as they were helping win the Monroe Softball Invitational last Saturday.
"We'd rather have one of our kids win a high school state title than anything else," Chandler said.
While not clashing with teams from Virginia, Carolina, Cincinnati, the team relished the social and cultural experience. They also experienced some heckling when they committed a fashion crime in hostile territory.
"Some of our kids wore North Carolina shirts on campus at Duke and got hooted and hollered at a little bit so we had to go in the book store and buy new t-shirts," Chandler said.
The seething rivalry between the ACC powerhouses stems from the sort of proximity to which Pec-Argyle fanatics can relate.
"Between Duke and North Carolina, it's like driving from Blanchardville to Argyle, that's how close it is," Chandler said.
Chandler admitted his team was starry-eyed upon entering such basketball chapels as the Dean Dome and Cameron Indoor.
Waunakee's Emily Decorah scored 20 points in a tourney game, but that's the aberration, not the rule for the heady, balanced squad. Fellow Warrior Cassie Hetzel, Oregon's Kayla Crowley and Sauk Prairie's Kelsey Budd, all Badger Conference standouts, round out the roster.
The bright-eyed Kimee Chandler has seen the value of the program, never more vividly than when UW-Milwaukee coach Sandy Botham offered her a scholarship to play for the Lady Panthers after the sophomore graduates.
She knows where a lot of the instrumental exposure came from.
"These tournaments are huge and you're playing against the better players in the country," Kimee Chandler said.
Her father, with whom she admits she has her on-floor differences but says she "understands it's for the better," cut the tourney schedule down from nine decent-caliber tourneys to the six-event high wire act that he hopes will get each of his players consideration for scholarships.
"That's kind of what it's all about with our schedule this year," Chandler said.
Similarly, the local girls hoops stars that hold six of the 10 spots on the cat's meow of hoops teams joined Wisconsin Hoops Select's program to further the skills that bought them such a prodigious spot.
Chuck Chandler is the coach of a 16-and-Under ballclub whose ballplayers reside within about a 45-mile radius of Verona and has watched several players on his roster pool their talents in AAU play for as many as five years.
"It allows the best players to practice against and play against kids that are as talented and, most often, even more talented than them," Chandler said.
"You're not gonna get any better playing against kids that are less talented than you."
Chandler's daughter, Kimee, is the well-tenured point guard while Brodhead junior Kristin Ruchti and Monroe junior Emily Rufenacht have put in five rewarding seasons.
"It helps having a point guard like Kimee and a good true post player like Kristen, that you can build a team around," Chandler said. "Emily's just got the best motor of any kid I've had the privilege to coach. She plays herself into exhaustion and most kids pick up fouls when fatigue is a factor, but that's not the case with her."
The club also boasts Brodhead sophomore Dana Lewis, a fellow 6-footer alongside Ruchti. Monroe sophomores Gwen Sutter and Ashley Hermanson joined the squad fresh off their WIAA Division 2 state title.
The club played two recent tournaments in Wisconsin before finishing 4-1 in last weekend's prodigious Adidas Deep South Classic set along Tobacco Road in North Carolina, its only loss coming against the eventual champion Carolina Lady Knights.
The Select squad trailed by 16-plus points in two of their victories, most notably by 16 at halftime before roaring back to defeat the Columbus Comets, 49-46 in the ninth-place game.
"I have no idea how, something turned on after halftime and we just got it going," Ruchti said.
Members of coaching staffs from across the nation attended the event during open recruiting month to see the 248-team event. Members of UW-Milwaukee, UW-Green Bay, Butler and Xavier's coaching staffs were, as Chandler put it, "mainstays" at all his team's games.
Sutter and Rufenacht didn't make the East-Coast trip as they were helping win the Monroe Softball Invitational last Saturday.
"We'd rather have one of our kids win a high school state title than anything else," Chandler said.
While not clashing with teams from Virginia, Carolina, Cincinnati, the team relished the social and cultural experience. They also experienced some heckling when they committed a fashion crime in hostile territory.
"Some of our kids wore North Carolina shirts on campus at Duke and got hooted and hollered at a little bit so we had to go in the book store and buy new t-shirts," Chandler said.
The seething rivalry between the ACC powerhouses stems from the sort of proximity to which Pec-Argyle fanatics can relate.
"Between Duke and North Carolina, it's like driving from Blanchardville to Argyle, that's how close it is," Chandler said.
Chandler admitted his team was starry-eyed upon entering such basketball chapels as the Dean Dome and Cameron Indoor.
Waunakee's Emily Decorah scored 20 points in a tourney game, but that's the aberration, not the rule for the heady, balanced squad. Fellow Warrior Cassie Hetzel, Oregon's Kayla Crowley and Sauk Prairie's Kelsey Budd, all Badger Conference standouts, round out the roster.
The bright-eyed Kimee Chandler has seen the value of the program, never more vividly than when UW-Milwaukee coach Sandy Botham offered her a scholarship to play for the Lady Panthers after the sophomore graduates.
She knows where a lot of the instrumental exposure came from.
"These tournaments are huge and you're playing against the better players in the country," Kimee Chandler said.
Her father, with whom she admits she has her on-floor differences but says she "understands it's for the better," cut the tourney schedule down from nine decent-caliber tourneys to the six-event high wire act that he hopes will get each of his players consideration for scholarships.
"That's kind of what it's all about with our schedule this year," Chandler said.
