The Becton girls hoops team is looking to have a big year especially with it being the last year of senior center Jessica Knapp.

Knapp, along with the likes of Karen Lassoni and Denee Vadell in previous years, have brought back Becton girls basketball into prominence.

The Lady Wildcats finished with an 18-6 record last season and third in the division behind BCSL co-champions, Secaucus and St. Mary’s. This coming a year after the Lady Wildcats had won the league title.

While Becton has had success in the league and some in the state tournament, the Lady Wildcats have been snake-bitten in the Bergen County tournament. The squad has lost their first county tournament game the last three years by a total of five points.

In Knapp’s last year the goals are to break out from that county slump and to win a league title. "She played a lot of perimeter game in the off season because she expects to be a number two (shooting guard) in college," said Ryan who said that she is looking at some Ivy League and Patriot League schools to attend college. "She can do everything on the court."

Becton has a couple of elements that hopefully will go well with Knapp in senior point guard Lauren Cosentino (5-3), who has had a full year of playing the position behind her.

"She has improved her ball handling and is a lot more comfortable," said Ryan about Consentino who expects to collect more than the four assists a game she registered last season. "I feel very comfortable with her at the point and she can break the full-court press."

Along with Knapp and Consentino, Ryan will look to senior shooting guard Deana Dedovitch (5-1) and senior forward Chelsea Mara Elias (5-6). Expected to see time at power forward spot are senior Kelly Bailey (5-8) and senior Rita Owusu (5-4).

"We’ll have a motion offense and try to get Jessica the ball," said Ryan about the team’s offense this season. "The other teams are going to try to stop her with double teaming so the other girls are going to have step up."

Defensively, Ryan said that with several seniors on the team this season that he will switching from zone to man-to-man.

Coming off the bench are junior Ewelina Marut (5-4) and sophomore Keri Ryan (5-4), the daughter of the head coach.

Preparing for the season, Becton has taken on the likes of Holy Angels, Indian Hills, New Milford, Cresskill and Dumont in scrimmages.

With a senior dominated team, Ryan is hoping for one of his starters to break out offensively as a second option for the Wildcats. If that happens or Becton gets some balanced attack, the Lady Wildcats could return to the top of the BCSL National that they won two years ago. Becton is expected to battle Secaucus and St. Mary’s, co-champions last season for the league title.

Last season, Becton was dumped into the Group 1 North 2 state sectional that includes teams like University and Bloomfield Tech that are Group 1 schools that can bring in students from towns like Newark and Bloomfield that are Group 4 size.

But this season, the Lady Wildcats are in Group 1 North 1 going up against the likes of Cresskill, New Milford and Belvidere, so Becton will also look forward to going far in the state tournament.