Girls All-Area Basketball Player of the Year: Richards finds basketball late, but helps put Coahulla Creek program on the map

Published 7:10 am Saturday, April 17, 2021

VARNELL — Katelyn Richards never thought she would play basketball, let alone find so much success in it.

Softball was the sport of choice for the Coahulla Creek High School senior, but, when she kept growing taller — she now stands 6 feet, 1 inch — coaches at North Whitfield Middle convinced her to pick up a basketball in eighth grade.

“I just started playing, but I was really kind of iffy about it,” Richards recalls. “As I started to practice more, I started to love it. I quit softball, and played basketball all year long.”

Entering her senior season in November 2020, basketball had already secured her a spot on the basketball team at Shorter University, where she had committed in August. With that out of the way, she could just play.

“I was able to focus more on just me and the team,” Richards said. “I didn’t realize how much that stress would go away. I didn’t really have to worry anymore about looking so good on a film, and I could focus more on being a leader and helping out my teammates.”

That worked out.

After a season in which she helped lead Coahulla Creek’s girls basketball team to a 23-5 record and a berth in the Sweet 16 of the Class 3A playoffs, Richards finishes off her high school basketball career as the 2021 Daily Citizen-News Girls All-Area Basketball Player of the Year.

Growing her game

With the increased attention that her success in basketball had been getting her from opposing teams, defenses began to change the way they’d guard Richards.

“She’s a huge part of what we did,” said Jody Bacchus, the head coach at Coahulla. “We would come down and throw it inside to her right away just to see how the defense is going to react.”

More often than not in her senior season, Richards would turn to find multiple defenders between her and the goal.

“We try to place good shooters around her, when she’s getting doubled and tripled,” Bacchus said. “She did a good job this year of facing double and triple teams, just catching and feeling the defense and kind of getting the ball where it needs to be.”

That’s part of the reason Richard’s scoring took a slight dip in her senior season. She averaged 14.6 points per game — down from the 16.2 she averaged in 2019-20 — in her senior season, but the attention she drew opened up opportunities for Creek’s stable of guards, like Jillian Poe, Ema Turner and Kenley Woods to knock down open shots and drive to the goal.

Richards also said she feels like she improved her rebounding in her senior year, helping to end possessions on defense and create more on the offensive end. She grabbed an average of nine boards per game in 2020-21.

“I know that I have the size advantage over a lot of girls, and I just wanted to use that,” Richards said. “I was focusing a lot on my individual performance, just because I know how much was expected of me.”

Heightened expectations

Richards’ individual play was a catalyst for a Coahulla Creek team that entered the year with high expectations — both from inside and outside the team.

“The expectations were higher than normal, and at some points in the season it felt like more pressure than normal,” Bacchus said.

Richards, along with Turner and Woods — two fellow seniors that are also bound for college basketball — had led the Lady Colts to three straight state playoff appearance and a Sweet 16 berth heading into the 2020-21 season.

“We’ve been playing together for a really long time, and we were really excited for our senior season,” Richards said of the trio of teammates. “It was super exciting.”

Despite facing “every team’s best shot,” Bacchus said, those high expectations were mostly delivered upon. The Lady Colts finished the regular season with just three losses, two to Region 6-3A power Sonoraville, which had denied the Lady Colts a shot at the region title a year before.

When Coahulla Creek breezed their way into the region tournament finals again in 2021, it was none other than a hot-shooting Sonoraville that met them again, handing the Lady Colts a big defeat.

“We’ve been just building up to this season,” Richards said. “We just played so good this year, other than the region tournament, which didn’t end how we wanted. It was just excited to be a part of that.”

Still, Coahulla Creek recovered and reached the Sweet 16 again, where they were ultimately eliminated by Stephens County.

The four-year run spearheaded by Richards, Turner and Woods has been by far the most successful stretch since program began in 2011.

“Her and her teammates kind of put us on the map,” Bacchus said. “They’ve meant the world to us here. I just happened to be the coach at the right time when those girls were coming through. It’s kind of been the perfect storm.”

Way back when she was a softball player, Richards said she never could have imagined that kind of success she’d find in another sport.

“I didn’t think that I would be anywhere near where I am today. I never expected it,” Richards said. “I just worked hard, and here I am.”