If the faces on the court for the Lady Rebels this year look familiar, it’s probably because they are. The Juanita girls basketball team returns this year after losing just one senior starter last year.

“We’re going to have a little more depth this year,” said head coach Sam Lee, counting the fact that the sophomores are now a year older and the team has a new crop of sophomore talent to draw from. “Our post play should be pretty good this year. We’re seasoned in the post, both our post players are seniors coming off all league years. The other thing is we’re going to have a lot more speed then we’ve had in the past.”

Those two, Molly Grager and Kate Cryderman, are the team’s captains and only seniors this year.

“We’re working on being intense and making sure we practice like a championship team,” said Cryderman. “We’re taking it one game at a time, and we want to get the team together as a family. And working to help everyone improve.”

But the big goal this year won’t be a possibility for another four months.

“The goal we have is to be playing at 8 p.m. on March 5 (to the state championship),” said Lee. “We’ve got to beat a lot of people. That’s really what it is. We have to play well in every game and have to execute well and see where it ends in every game. It’s all about execution.”

To get there the team has lots of games to play and even more practices to get everything in place. Early on, Lee said the focus has been conditioning to make sure everyone can physically be as prepared as possible.

“All season condition and getting stronger,” said Lee of the first weeks focus. “These girls have spent hundreds of hours in the weight room in the off season and that’s been good. That’s one of the things we’ve got. Plus we have so much varsity experience that’s going to help in game situations.”

The team began it’s season with a non-conference game against 4A Eastlake on Nov. 30 before kicking off the regular season on Saturday, Dec. 3 against Bellevue at 5:30 p.m. at home.

The nice thing, Lee said about KingCo, is it’s a close league.

“I think we have such a nice group of schools in our league. We’re generally fairly close,” he said. “Come out and support girls basketball, no matter who you are going to, we need the support.”

Get a full schedule on the KingCo website.