Halsey to implement family feel into Pines girls program

As the Northland Pines girls basketball team transitions into a new season under new leadership, head coach Jaclyn Halsey wants to create a family tie with her team that can translate to in-season success.
The Eagles return five letter winners from their sixth-place Great Northern Conference team a season ago, with Vienna Klemett and Eliana Smith as the two seniors on this year’s team.
Creating the culture she wants, Halsey wants to quickly implement a family feel to the program early on.
“I want where no one struggles to be dedicated to the program. Where they do feel like they’re a family,” she said. “They play for each other, not just for a coach, not for themselves, but they’re truly coming here every single day because they’re playing for a team.”
Halsey has been around basketball for a while, where she started playing in third grade. Since then, she has been a player and coach in some capacity at the youth or high school level, including Northland Pines for a decade.

Inserting a new coach into the mix isn’t always easy for players, but Halsey said the team is taking in all the new information she is throwing at them. She wants to bring in a new offense and is putting together a new defensive scheme to keep offenses off-balanced.
“I’m asking to change a little bit of the program and they’re responding to it really well.”
The main team goal for Northland Pines will be to hit a .500 record in the regular season with a smaller roster.
“That’s going to be a really big goal. It’s a tough margin. It’s something that we haven’t done in years past. Our team last year got very close,” said Halsey.
The Eagles will once again face teams like Lakeland, Rhinelander, Mosinee, Medford, Antigo and Tomahawk in the Great Northern Conference.
“We play in a tough conference with bigger teams from D2, but we definitely have a schedule that can provide that opportunity,” said Halsey about the chances of hitting that goal.
The Lady Eagles kick off the campaign with a game this Thursday, Nov. 21, at Mercer, before facing Three Lakes-Phelps in Three Lakes Tuesday, Nov. 26. Both games are set for 5:45 p.m.