There’s still more to prove.
The South Shore girls’ basketball squad has won three-straight city championships, and its first-ever New York State Federation title, but star guard Earlette Scott and her fellow Lady Vikings don’t believe the job is done.
The rising senior has made remarkable strides in three seasons, but this year, Scott and her teammates will be assigned increased roles on and off the court.
But if she feels the pressure, Scott isn’t showing it. In fact, she’s confident the squad new crop of seniors will continue to be successful in 2017-18.
“Losing seniors affected the team, however it’s time for others to step up, grow and mature and fulfill what the seniors left for us,” Scott said. “I think I’m going to handle it, just by having other seniors to lean on.”
She made it clear, that even after three city titles in three seasons, the Lady Vikings are taking nothing for granted. Scott said she’ll be driven by the fact that other squads will seek to block the team’s march to another championship. “Motivation is knowing we can lose, that’s the motivation,” she said.
Expectations for the Lady Vikings to achieve a fourth straight title will be high, but Scott is convinced that if the team takes it one day at a time, good things will happen.
“The expectation is just to get better every day,” she said. “We can’t worry what other people think and say; we can only live by: ‘We just gotta make our game better.’
So far this summer, Scott has certainly lived up to that “get better every day” mantra. She recently played the final game of her AAU career with the Lady Gauchos, a team from the Bronx, and made sure that her final season was a memorable one. The Lady Gauchos 17U team finished in the top five at the 2017 Adidas Uprising Championships in July, and got a chance to participate in the 2017 Nike Tournament of Champions in Chicago.
The summer experience not only afforded Scott a chance to further gel with some of her South Shore teammates, but it also allowed her to face off with some of the top competition in her age group that the country has to offer. In turn, she was able to impress representatives of some big-name schools that were surely in attendance.
“I got a chance to get a great relationship with my teammates for this upcoming season,” Scott said. “Also, I got a chance to display my talents for Division I schools.” Already, she said, she’s gotten offers from Providence, Georgetown and Seton Hall.
For now, Scott says she’s just taking it all in, and having fun on the court.
“I enjoy it. I play as if I had zero schools watching me,” she said. “It elevates my game a lot.”
