By Jamie Thomas
The Sevenoaks Suns have once again been an unstoppable force this season in the WBBL Championship and their captain Cat Carr has been at her irrepressible best throughout the reigning champions’ unbeaten start.
Averaging a double-double and already having secured a ‘Player of the Month’ win this season, Carr appears to only be getting better and better, and we caught up with the reigning WBBL MVP recently to find out more.
“I’m really focussed on my nutrition and finding better ways to recover – that is something you certainly get more conscious of as you get older. In the past I may have thrown myself in the gym for three hours and worked on a bunch of different things, but now I go in there for an hour or an hour and a half and really hone in on specifics and things the team needs me to be better at.
“I’ve worked really hard to develop new parts of my game as well, because I’ve always been labelled as a scorer, so I’ve worked hard to improve my passing, rebounding, trying to develop a floater, and this has been the work I’ve been doing the last couple of years to not be as one-dimensional.
“My biggest ‘metric’ for success is if we’re winning, because there’ll be nights where the ball doesn’t go in the basket, but there’ll be other things I can do to help the team. I used to be a really bad loser when I was younger and made it all about me, figuring if I had a bad game then I let my team down, so I’ve definitely grown in terms of figuring out that some days won’t be my day and that’s ok.”
“The beautiful thing about our team is that we can all share those roles.”
Bringing back some Suns legends this year, Head Coach Len Busch has another high calibre cohort of stars to call upon as they look to retain their crown in perhaps their most testing season at the top of the table for some time.
Whilst Carr has consistently put up big numbers on the boxscore during the season, her teammates have all been incredibly efficient and had their own nights where they’ve led the way statistically on the floor, and the veteran discussed the strength of the team’s roster.
“We all have roles on our team and that’s what makes teams successful, with this person doing this and this person doing that, but the beautiful thing about our team is that we can all share those roles – especially scoring – when we need to.
“Bringing everybody back together, such as Judit (Fritz), Julia (Koppl), Janice (Monakana), and adding Jamila (Thompson), Frankie (Wurtz) and other pieces alongside the core that is already here, we all support each other and that’s how we grow. Using Judit as an example, she’s super-efficient and does what she needs to do, and that goes down the line for the others as well.
“We have still taken time to gel back together, but that’s natural, reminding each other how we play with each other, but as I said we all buy into each other’s roles and whoever has that big night in terms of scoring or leading the team statistically to those wins is fine with all of us.”
“It is such a long year and anything can happen, but we know who we’re up against.”
At the top of the standings alongside two other teams with undefeated championship records at the time of writing, the Suns face significant challenges from the London Lions and Sheffield Hatters to retain their crown.
Clashes between those three sides in league action will have to wait until the new year, but the rivalry between this trio will certainly be one of the main storylines of the season as Carr discussed how the competition is benefitting women’s basketball in the country.
“I’d be lying if I said we don’t know who our biggest competition is, but we’re ok with that and we’re up for the challenge. We don’t focus on it, we don’t look ahead to the finals or playoffs or anything like that, because it is such a long year and anything can happen, but we know who we’re up against.
“This is what the league has been building towards though, of course, to have so many competitive teams that can win trophies, and as well as London this year you’ve got Sheffield who have been great competition for us in the past and will be again this year, I’m sure.
“There have been other teams over the years too, such as Nottingham, and Newcastle obviously last year when they upset us in the playoffs, as well as Leicester who are always a pretty solid team. There is more competition this year than in previous years, and it is great to bring that to the forefront of British basketball.
“I was upset about that result and it took me a while to get over it.”
The Suns are accustomed to being one of the biggest stories of the post-season, but last season for the first time in a number of years they were on the wrong side of one of those stories, as the seventh-seeded Newcastle Eagles knocked out the WBBL Championship winners, and the reigning MVP discussed her reaction to that loss and how she’s looking ahead to this year’s post-season.
“I’m sure some of my teammates were upset for a long time, many will have watched back the game and critiqued themselves and the rest of the team, but for me as I’ve gotten older I’ve gotten better at processing moments like that.
“I do try and keep in the back of my mind that every time I’m not going to win. I was upset about that result and it took me a while to get over it, but I am much better at just moving on and figuring out what to do to make sure it doesn’t happen again now.
“I always look forward to the playoffs, but it is so far in the future and with the way things are at the moment, I just hope we can all get there. We’ve just got to enjoy each moment between now and then and appreciate this opportunity to play.”