The Alabama women’s wheelchair basketball team is a force to be reckoned with nationally. With a history of success and a new coach taking over the program at the end of the season, some of the best players in the sport are vying for a position on the team.
The Crimson Tide is the two-time defending national champion. The team made it to the national championship game in 2008, only to have the game-winning shot rim out and lose by one point to Illinois.
The co-captains of the team are Annika Zeyen and Kimberly Champion, a senior studying exercise science.
“[The 2009 and 2010 championships] were awesome,” Champion said. “Coming off of that one-point loss in 2008, to come back and get the championship was great.”
Despite the high demand of defending the national championship win, the team has not lost sight of its values.
“We have goals for the year,” Champion said. “We want to win it all, have a team grade point average of 3.0 or higher, have each other’s backs at all times, get better each day.”
Current head coach and Director of Wheelchair Athletics Brent Hardin is handing over the head coaching position to Matt Buchi, the current assistant coach, at the end of this season.
Hardin draws some similarities between his team and the championship-winning football team.
“I think it’s tough to compare us to football, just because that’s a completely different animal,” Hardin said. “I think the biggest similarity is in recruiting. When we approach who we are going to target, we both ask ourselves, ‘Who is the best in the world at what they do?’ Also, we have the luxury that a lot of people want to be here. People want to come to Alabama to play wheelchair basketball just like they do with football.”
Hardin described the team as a “superclub.” Not only does the team recruit worldwide, but it also travels nationwide every year, and both coaches are on University payroll.
“We’re a little bit different,” Hardin said. “We’re somewhere in between the National Collegiate Athletic Association and a normal club team, just because we recruit and give out full scholarships to come play here, we just aren’t recognized by the NCAA.”
There are players who even garner comparisons to the football players.
“We have a Lithuanian, Karolina Lingyte; she’s our Trent Richardson,” Champion said. “She’s a beast. We have to kick her out of the weight room sometimes.”
It won’t be long until the players have the rings to show off the hard work of last season.
“As far as I know, they’re in the mail,” senior Katie “Peaches” Harnock said. “I’m Canadian, so we don’t have the whole championship ring tradition thing, so this will be pretty cool.”
Hardin said, “We’re going to get them. We’re going to have a ceremony and it will either be before a men’s basketball game at Coleman Coliseum or before our first home game this season.”
And if you ask the players why Alabama is the best club, they say it comes down to dominating opponents.
“We are so dedicated,” Harnock said. “We work hard everyday; we change our diets and we change our schedules to play at the highest level. We play 40 games a season, and it’s a tough season, but we work so hard that we succeed.”
