Andrews – For Tim Wood, this was the perfect time to make the jump to coaching at the varsity level.
He finished his bachelors’ degree in educational studies at Western Governors University in January, and the girls basketball job at Andrews High School opened up a few months later. It was the right opportunity at the right time.
“I want to see if I can help the girls,” Wood said. “I really do. We’ve got potential, we’ve got some good girls up here. We’ve just got to figure out a way to develop them work with them and get them excited about playing basketball.”
Wood graduated from Hiwassee Dam but today lives in Andrews with his wife and two children, and has another son serving in the U.S. Air Force. He’s been coaching basketball at the youth league and middle school levels almost every year since 2001, including the Andrews Middle School boys team last season.
This will be his first time coaching girls sports.
“I’ll be learning from the girls as much as they’re learning from me,” Wood said. “Absolutely. There’s no doubt about that.”
Wood is excited about the opportunity, but knows the challenge ahead. Andrews girls basketball may be the hardest coaching job in the 1A West.
The Big Smoky Mountain Conference is probably the toughest 1A-only conference in the state. Four teams in the conference won playoff games last year, matching the split 1A/2A Western Highlands Conference for the most in the 1A bracket.
The Lady Wildcats did win the first-ever N.C. High School Athletic Association girls basketball 1A state championship in 1977, but the team struggled in recent years. Andrews has finished at .500 just once in the last 16 seasons with a 12-12 record in 2015-16, and never over .500.
The Lady Wildcats have not had a winning record in conference play over that span, and have lost 40 straight games to Big Smoky Mountain Conference opponents dating back to 2019. Only one of those losses has been by single digits.
“I love working with kids; I can teach, I can coach,” Wood said. “And to be able to try to do something and take these girls from where they’re at now and try to help them better and be something better. And to compete, because we haven’t for a long time. And that’s something I’m really interested in seeing if I can do.”
Wood does have some goals in mind. He knows Andrews needs to have continuity in order to make the teams as competitive as possible.
To start, Wood wants to focus on making sure his teams have solid fundamentals. Andrews struggled with turnovers last year, especially against a pressure defense. When watching film, Wood saw how the turnovers damaged the team’s confidence.
To combat that, Wood said he and his staff will be working as much as they can on fundamentals throughout the summer. There aren’t many scrimmages on the schedule, as for Wood it’s more important to see the girls gain confidence in the basic tenets of the sport.
Once they master the fundamentals, Wood said that should give them more confidence, and in time, make them more competitive. With a more competitive team, he hopes more female athletes will want to play basketball at Andrews, which former head coach Eric Duong said he didn’t do a good enough job of making it happen.
Getting more athletes to play, however, starts at the youth levels. Wood said he’s been in touch with the girls coach at Andrews Middle, and he’s looking to get in touch with youth league coaches once those leagues start up again. That way, he can have coaches focusing on certain aspects of the game, and it will flow well once they get to high school.
However, those goals only start with what Wood can do right now. Andrews projects to have a team of mostly freshmen and sophomores this year, which gives him an opportunity to build with that group. That includes establishing a culture to show what the Lady Wildcats could become.
“It’s not going to happen overnight because we’ve got a lot of work to do,” Wood said. “But we’ve got some great athletes, and we’ve got some girls that really want to play, they really want to learn and work. So I think we’re going to get there.”