One 'Last Ride': Senior core of Bixby girls ready for another chance at a title

By Buck Ringgold 

Photo of Bixby seniors, from left, Meredith Mayes, Gentry Baldwin, Gracy Wernli and Alyssa Nielsen

BIXBY - For the last two seasons, Bixby’s girls came up one game short of winning a state championship. 

The Lady Spartans, especially an experienced core group of senior starters, are ready to make another run at an elusive gold ball when they begin postseason play at home on Thursday night.

But even continuing as one of the favorites in Class 6A, things haven’t gone exactly as initially planned for Bixby.

In an early December game, one of the Lady Spartans’ veteran starters - senior post and three-year starter Meredith Mayes - suffered a season-ending ACL injury. It was a devastating blow to the team, which brought back both experience and athleticism inside and outside.

“With Mere’s injury, we are all heartbroken about the situation, but we know we need to put in that much more work,” said senior point guard Gentry Baldwin, another three-year starter. “Everyone is going to have to step up for the rest of the year. Nobody can replace Meredith, but as a team, we are working on overcoming this and everyone contributing to what she did on the court.

“Every person on our team has such an important role; scoring, rebounding, assists, hype, defense, etcetera, and right now, we are just focused on everyone perfecting their role to the best of their ability. It’s not going to be easy, but we have a great team mindset and we say, 'Family,' for a reason in our huddle because we are going to be there for Mere and each other no matter what and continue to strive for the same goal from the start of season.”

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And even with Mayes’ injury, it hasn’t deterred the Lady Spartans one bit from the mindset they had entering the season.

In fact, a mindset that sprouted the moment they walked off the court at the Lloyd Noble Center in Norman last March after falling in overtime to Edmond North in the 6A title game, the second straight season Bixby lost in the finals, having also been defeated by Norman in the 2021 6A title game.

“We had the (Edmond North) game, and then gave it up in the end, and I think it was more of an angry, kind of upset that it ended that way, so it kind of puts more of a bitter taste and a chip on our shoulder going into this year that we’re here to prove something at this point,” senior shooting guard Gracy Wernli said.

“Not having Meredith this year is causing us to make major adjustments and we definitely miss her court presence. The team and I still have the same goal and intend to reach it with Mere right along side of us. ... I know she wishes with everything, we all do, that she could be on the court with us, but she has no idea the impact her positivity and energy still bring to the team.”

Even with Mayes’ injury, the goals for the Lady Spartans are still in front of the table.

“(The 6A title game loss last season) really just gave us motivation and just a reason to work hard and work for each other every day because we’ve come so close that now, we’ve seen what it feels like to be on the opposite side of the winning team,” senior center Alyssa Nielsen said. “So we just know exactly what we want and we know what it feels like to come up short, so we’re very motivated I think.

“We talk a lot about striving for excellence, and I feel like that’s kind of our motto for the year, is just be excellent and be the best we can be and hope that’s enough.”

There’s also the bond between Baldwin, Wernli, Nielsen and Mayes. They have been together since the third grade and have even been longtime teammates in AAU and summer league ball.

“It’s extremely special,” Baldwin said. “We’ve always had it through AAU like this, and it doesn’t happen very often where a team actually stays together from third grade till 12th; it’s pretty unheard of, so I think we’re very blessed that we all get to do this last ride together, like it’s exciting and I’m ready to go play with my girls.”

Another thing the four seniors have in common is all have signed to play at the next level: Baldwin with Oral Roberts University up the road in Tulsa; Nielsen with Drury University (Springfield, Mo.); and both Wernli and Mayes with Abilene Christian University in Texas.

“It’s a lot of weight taken off because at this point, we’re really just playing for our team like solely for our team,” Wernli said. “We’ve got what we’ve worked for since we were little and we want to finish it out with all of our dreams since we were little kids was to win a state championship and now that’s the sole mission, like that’s the sole goal at this point.”

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Wernli has another personal incentive to cap her Bixby career with a gold ball. Her mother, Kara, who is also the seniors’ AAU coach, went through a similar experience while playing at Sapulpa in the late 1990s.

Kara Wernli’s Lady Chieftains came up short of a title before finally winning it all in her senior season, 1998.

Another common denominator: Kara Wernli’s coach at Sapulpa was Tina Thomas, now coaching Kara’s daughter as the head coach at Bixby.

“I’ve been following the (Bixby senior core) around since third grade probably,” Thomas said. “I took over head coach about that time. … The chemistry I think is what’s unique about this group and how they lay it all on the line for each other. I’ve never had kids that work harder than this group collectively.

“What they’ve really done this year is embraced their leadership roles and sometimes that’s hard but each one of them are so unique they have different gifts and strengths in the leadership capacity so I think that blend is working really well.”

In turn, the senior core admire Thomas’ coaching approach.

“I think she’s a very personable coach, and she had said this (recently), that some coaches think that the girls are there for them, but some coaches are there for their girls and I really think she lives that out really well,” Mayes said.

In the first game for Bixby after Mayes’ season-ending injury, the Lady Spartans lost in the championship game of their annual tournament in a rematch against Edmond North. They also started the season 5-4, still adjusting without Mayes.

But lately, they have rounded into the kind of team they were expected to be come postseason time.

Bixby (16-7) has won eight of its last nine games, capped by an impressive 65-49 win at Tulsa Booker T. Washington in the regular season finale on Feb. 17, avenging a home loss to the Lady Hornets.

The Lady Spartans have also won 11 of their last 14 games. Their three losses in that span came to the No. 1 ranked teams in 5A and 4A, respectively, in Sapulpa and Lincoln Christian along with the loss to BTW.

"We have adjusted at this point,” Thomas said. “We had some struggles trying to re-identify who we are without her on the court. (Mayes) is still an integral part of who we are.

“We have had to re-invent a few things, especially on the offensive end and the way we do things with the girls as a step up to the challenge.”

The Lady Spartans begin the 6A playoffs by hosting a 6A East regional. They have a first-round game against Enid at 7:30 p.m. Thursday.

“We’ve got to have like that hunger; we’ve got to stay hungry,” Thomas said. “In every game, you’ve got to play it like it’s THE game, the last game, and we’ve just got to use every game to get better.

"Every day, every practice and every game, we’ve got to get better.”

But it’s what the Lady Spartans, especially the experienced group of seniors, want. Especially when trying to make it back to the title game for a third straight year, and keep their mission intact of bringing back a gold ball for the first time in program history since 1957.

“I think just understanding that we’ve been here before and knowing what it takes to get there, and understanding that it’s not necessarily pressure, it’s more of a privilege that we get to be the team we are and have another run,” Baldwin said. “There’s a lot of good competition this year, and I think we’re just going to have to show up ready to play every single game.

"I don’t think we’re going to be able to (overlook) any team. Good girls, good coaches, but we want to win it for us, we want to win it for Coach Thomas; she’s been great to us and she deserves this just as much as we do, so I think we just need to go in every single game one at a time and not get too caught up with the end.”