By Jeremy McDonald

jeremymcdonald73@gmail.com

SALEM, Ore. — On the court, there was more of a sense of aggressiveness and physicality.

Something that you won’t expect a 0-13 team like the North Salem Girls Squad to be, but Vikings Head Coach Brent Turner likes how his team has picked up the pace over the course of the season.

“The positives that I see is that, individually, we’re getting better,” said Vikings Brent Turner. “The scoreboard is not showing that, it’s something that doesn’t show up on the scoreboard.  It’s not something you’ll read in the newspaper, it’s something you have to come and see.”

For North Salem, said Turner, if you follow the team often throughout the season, you can see an improvement.

“When you come to the game, ‘ok I’ve seen this team from the beginning, they’re a lot better than they were’,” he said.  “It’s hard to show (because) our league is tough.  Your going up against McNary, South Salem and West Salem.

“They’re going deep into the playoffs, those three teams should make it out of the first round.  So we’re going up against those teams.  It doesn’t look like we’re improving, but if you’ve seen us from beginning to the end, we’re improving.”

The key to success of finding a groove to this point was how Turner and his staff sat down and game plan on their next plan of attack.

“I’m a young coach; I don’t claim to know everything.  What I do claim to know is if I need help, or you suggest something, we’re going to go with it.  See if it works,” said Turner.  “What we came out with was:  We’re going to keep doing the same type of drills over and over until it locks into their brains.”

With a young and inexperienced team like the Vikings, it’s takes some time for the team to work on one thing at a time.  Repeat the same drill and get enough reps with the drill that it’s ingrained inside the kids minds.

Moving into Forest Grove at Forest Grove Friday night after having a week off from their last game versus West Albany, it gave an opportunity for North to go over the small stuff a little more.

It’s a love-hate relationship said Turner from a coaches perspective.

“We had a bye, which I love it,” said Turner.  “I hate it ‘cause we don’t have a game, but I love it because it gave us two-and-a-half hours to go over something and to work on our original skills.

“I just want to make sure our fundamentals are so tight and so good that next year we’re building instead of going back and fix cracks in our foundation.”

As the Vikings continued to sharpen their breaks, their passes and shots; it’s just a matter of time before the North Salem Lady Vikings get win number one of the season.