Lady Cats rise to free-throw challenge

Dream it, swish it, do it.

Bret Williams knew he needed to improve his basketball team's free-throw shooting percentage. Last year they shot a meager 32 percent from the charity stripe.

His solution was to challenge his Lady Cats, a seventh-grade girls select team, to shoot free throws to raise money for Omaha area Boys & Girls Clubs.

They called the fundraiser “Dream It, Swish It, Do It.”

“We wanted to get better at free throws,” Williams said. “I thought it would be really neat to generate some funds to help some kids around Omaha that like basketball as much as my kids but don't have the funds to play on a select team.”

Each girl was to find sponsors to pledge $20 for 200 made free throws, or a dime per free throw sunk.

The free throws were counted from practices and games between Sept. 1 and the end of November.

The team's goal was to raise $1,000. Instead, it raised $1,800 and was able to deliver to the Boys & Girls Clubs nearly 60 new basketballs, hundreds of dollars in educational materials and cash to use for the clubs' basketball teams.

Exceeding the goal was not a surprise to Coach Williams, who said he has a group of kids who are overachievers in basketball and in school.

“To have them go beyond was gratifying, but I wasn't surprised. That's what kind of kids they are and what kind of families they are from,” Williams said.

The Lady Cats improved their free-throw shooting, as well. At the halfway point in their season, the players are up 10 percentage points, to 42 percent, in successful attempts.

And Williams said he hopes that his players have learned something about serving.

“I was hoping they would get out of this that they could work at something they enjoy and impact someone else as well. … It might be a lesson they learn now but will pay off later in life.”

Contact the writer:

444-1264, kenton.krueger@owh.com

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