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South Fayette the right fit for Bennett

By Eleanor Bailey almanac Sports Editor ebailey@thealmanac.Net 5 min read
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Eleanor Bailey/The Almanac

Bryan Bennett discusses strategy with his players. Bennett is in his first season as head coach of the South Fayette girls’ basketball team.

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Bryan Bennett walks through a drill with his players. Bennett is in his first season as head coach of the South Fayette girls' basketball team.

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Eleanor Bailey/The Almanac

Bryan Bennett

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Maura Castelluci is one of South Fayette's four seniors. She is also the team's top returning scorer with an 11.8-point average per game.

South Fayette proved the right fit at the right time for Bryan Bennett. After a hiatus from coaching girls’ basketball, the 42-year-old Cecil Township resident is back in action as the Lady Lions’ head coach.

A yeoman, having spent time at Sto-Rox, Jeannette, Southside Beaver and Hopewell, Bennett most recently has seesawed between his duties as an assistant coach at Upper St. Clair and his tasks as head coach at Seton-La Salle. He coached the Lady Rebels to two WPIAL title games between 2007-10 before joining Danny Holzer’s staff at USC. The past two years, Bennett sat on the bench as the Panthers’ head JV coach.

“I enjoyed my time at USC but at the end of the day I had the itch to be a head coach again,” said Bennett.

When Matt Bacco resigned in February after the Lady Lions’ 12-9 campaign, a golden opportunity opened for Bennett.

“This was the right situation at the right time. The tradition the school has in academics, the arts and athletics is similar to the schools where I used to work at,” said Bennett, who teaches mathematics at USC.

USC and South Fayette share similar success, particularly with their football programs having produced 12 WPIAL and four state titles combined, but Bennett does not measure those programs against what he hopes to achieve with the girls’ basketball program.

In six months, Bennett has taken positive steps toward restoring the program that under Bacco won the 2016 WPIAL title and fell one game shy of competing for a state title in 2017. However, the Lions have lost Sam Kosmacki to graduation. The 5-11 point guard registered 1,000 points in her scholastic career. Last winter, she scored in double figures in 16 of 18 contests. She averaged 14 points 6.4 rebounds, 2.8 assists, 2.3 steals and 2.6 blocked shots per game.

“I don’t think one kid can replace her,” Bennett said, “but we teach team mentality here. We have a collection of individuals that based on how we have performed so far in practice and during the summer appears to be someone different each game making the contributions.”

Because he expects to utilize a different line-up based on the variety of different styles the opposition is playing, Bennett doesn’t have a starting line-up etched in stone.

“I expect everyone to contribute,” he said. “We have a nice mixture. We can go inside and push the ball or shoot from the outside, depending upon the team we are playing.”

From the top, Bennett will depend on his four seniors, especially for leadership. They include Skylar Aitken, Jordan Head, Karyssa Larson and Maura Castelluci. While Head and Jordan averaged seven and six points respectively last season, Castelluci managed 11.8 points and 3.2 rebounds a game.

The junior class features Madison Burroughs, Meredith Gutierrez, Gabby Mariano, Claire Relihan and Peyton Yater.

While Jessica Stabile is the lone sophomore on the varsity roster, two freshmen, Mia Webber and Giuliana Gaetano, will also aid the Lions in their quest to achieve their objectives in a section that features powers such as West Allegheny and Chartiers Valley.

West-A won the division last season while the Colts were the 2017 WPIAL champions. They return two of the top players in the league in Meghan McConnell (18.5 ppg, 4.0 assists) and Mackenzie Wagner (16.7 ppg, 7.8 rpg).

Additionally, the Colts will benefit from the return of Gabby Legister.

The 6-2 senior center, who is committed to Kennesaw State, missed last season due to a torn ACL.

“Our section looks to be one of the most brutal in the WPIAL this year,” Bennett said. “There are going to be no nights off in this section.”

There are going to be no practices off either for the Lady Lions plan to improve with each passing day. It’s the little progress that will pay big dividends in the end.

“Our goal is to try to get better every day. If we go out and play as hard as we can, then we are going to be successful this season. The kids have bought into this philosophy. We want to work hard and outwork everybody and be disciplined,” Bennett said. “We do that, then definitely, our goal of making the playoffs is within reach. After that, you never know what can happen.”

All South Fayette knows is that there is a reign of winning at the school and that motivates Bennett and the Lady Lions.

“There is definitely a tradition here. The kids know it and I know it. The district has a lot of pride and we are going to do all that we can to be at that (playoff) pairings meeting,” Bennett said of the Feb. 11 gathering that announces the match-ups for the WPIAL tournament.

Whether male or female, Brian Bennett has discovered through coaching, both sexes have game, especially when it comes to basketball.

Whether as the new skipper of the South Fayette girls’ team or as former floor boss of the Upper St. Clair boys’ junior varsity, Bennett approaches coaching in the same manner.

“There is no difference. I treat them all as athletes. To do so in any other way would be a disservice to the girls. I push the girls and coach them the say way.”

Basketball and education have played keen roles in Bennett’s life. Scholastically, he excelled at Freedom. While he had the choice to play in college at the Division III level, he opted to earn his degree and teaching certification at Penn State University. The 1999 alum is currently a mathematics teacher at Upper St. Clair.

“I love the game of basketball and I love working with kids so this was a way for me to keep these two together. When I decided to go into education and coaching it was a positive moment for me. I have a passion for working with young adults and teaching lessons along the way.”

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