Throughout the month of December, Reina Kempt, a sophomore forward for Louisiana Tech University’s
Lady Techster basketball team will
write a weekly blog on her teams progress and what it's like to be a student-athlete in-season. Check back each Monday to read a new entry.
Monday, January 3, 2011
Hi this is Reina Kempt with my final blog.
This past week has been a real test for us. We went to the
Fun and Sun classic in Miami, Florida to play Georgia and Marquette. With
Georgia being a SEC team, we were the underdogs but we pulled out the 77-62 win
with hard work. We played against Marquette in the championship but couldn’t
pull out the win. I guess we weren’t used to playing two days in a row, but the
experience will help us once we get to the WAC Tournament.
After the tournament, we enjoyed our night in Miami with
shopping and exploring the city. A few of my teammates ran into Dave Chapelle
down in South Beach and took pictures with him. We came back to Ruston for the
New Years and for a day off before our next game. My teammate and I, Jelena Vucinic,
decided to bring in the New Year together with an all-you-can-eat buffet at
Ryan’s and a movie, ‘The Little Fockers’. We had a great time and then decided
to leave 2010 where it’s at and move on to 2011.
Coach ‘Spoon had similar plans as she came in to practice on
New Year’s Day stating that today was a fresh start for us and we had to start
it off right against Southern Miss. Last year, we had come-from-behind victory
against them in Hattiesburg so we knew they had payback on their minds. We had plans
of our own as we played a great game and won 83-61.
We plan to take the energy from this win into the Western
Athletic Conference games as we head into a three- game road trip against San
Jose State, Hawaii, and Fresno State, respectively. It’s going to be a
challenging task, but we know what we are capable of doing. We plan to play
with great energy and focus.
Happy New Year to you all and thanks for reading my blog.
Monday, December 27, 2010
This is Reina Kempt with my 4th blog…Happy
Holidays!!!
My team was given the week to go home and enjoy the
holidays. I have spent the past week in my hometown of Baton Rouge, LA to be
with my family and friends. I had plenty of fun going to the mall, watching
movies and playing basketball with friends.
There is a big size difference from Baton Rouge to Ruston,
and it being the holidays I was welcomed back to a world of traffic. It’s been
so long since I’ve seen traffic that I thought something must be really wrong
down Airline Highway, and not that is was just simply 5:00 pm.
The malls were filled with people doing last-minute shopping
and socializing. I was there a total of three times this past week; I didn’t
beat my record of visits in a week but I made each visit worth it by buying
gifts for my family and friends. I even bought myself some gifts just to show
myself that there is nothing like buying for you.
In Baton Rouge, everyone was talking about the game we just
played against LSU last Sunday. I wasn’t planning to think about our past
losses while on vacation but that was nearly impossible. Despite that, my week
home was much needed and appreciated and I hope all the athletes had a great
vacation as well.
We returned to school Sunday as we get ready for our
tournament in Miami, Florida. The break was nice but now it’s time to get to
work.
We have the Georgia Bulldogs on the schedule this Wednesday
in the first round of the Fun and Sun Classic hosted by Florida International.
They will be our third SEC foe this year.
Thank you for reading my blog.
Reina Kempt
Monday, December 20, 2010
Photo Gallery - Bone Marrow Donation Awareness
Hi this is Reina Kempt with my 3rd blog. This
past week has been a great test of our season. Playing four great basketball
teams in eight days can be challenging and draining.
Before we could set off on our games, we had an early
Christmas get together. It started off the week before with all of us drawing a
name from a basket. Whoever’s name you received, you had to get them a small
gift. We met up and exchanged gifts and played a competitive game of
Pictionary. My team won! We had so much fun that night, even Coach Spoon was
crying with tears of laughter.
After beating a good Arkansas State team by 30 at our place,
we departed on a road trip heading to New Orleans – a place that I’m fond of
being that I’m from Baton Rouge and my father and all his family hail from New
Orleans. We walked down Canal Street to the Bubba Gump Shrimp Restaurant and
enjoyed some good seafood while having a heated debate on whether or not the
movie Forrest Gump was a true story. The evening was filled with Forrest and
Bubba impersonations and famous quotes from the movie.
Tulane is a very good basketball team; they are conference champions
and they defeated LSU. However, we are a good team too and that night we proved
just how great we can be. We defeated Tulane 78-72. We went into the locker
room hyped from our tough win and started celebrating doing the Cha Cha Slide.
Coach walked in on us as we quickly stopped and sat down but a smile crossed
her face and positive energy filled the room.
Our next stop was LSU.
We didn’t head straight to Baton Rouge Saturday; instead, we
took a detour as we had other business to take care of.
We stopped in Franklin, LA, Adrienne Johnson’s hometown for
a special event. Her mother is in need of a bone marrow transplant and the
whole team, including coaches, players, support staff and even our bus driver –
Mr. John, signed up to be a donor. It was a great day to show how much we care
for each other as people and not just as basketball players. A lot of people
from the small town showed up for support also as it went from a donor sign-up
to an autograph session.
As we left Franklin, we got our minds ready to play against
LSU. Our plan was to take over Louisiana again. The plan started off right with
us defeating Tulane, and we needed to finish strong with a win over LSU. We
reminisced on last year’s game against them as we lost by three points in a
hard fought-game but we planned to finish victorious this year.
That plan didn’t work out well. We played hard but LSU played
better and went on a shooting spree in the last six minutes. We went into the
locker room and talked about learning from our past while getting ready for the
future. We go home for the holidays for a few days but come back for a
tournament in Miami, Florida where we will open with another SEC school in
Georgia on Dec. 29.
Thank you for reading my blog. Merry Christmas!
Reina Kempt
Monday, December 13, 2010
Hi this is Reina Kempt with my second blog. The team has had
a week to practice before our next game; and it was just what we needed.
Looking back at our past six games, we knew exactly every aspect of the game we
needed to tighten up. Every day, practice has been long and hard yet beneficial
and now we are even more confident that we are going back in the right
direction, the WAC title.
Also this week, our coach, Teresa Weatherspoon, had a
birthday. The team decided to get her a card and each of us signed it and wrote
a heart filled message showing how much we cared for her. We presented it to
her right before practice and it got her pumped as we had a great practice.
Later that evening we had a little get-together to further celebrate her
birthday. Although coach wasn’t too pleased with our music selections, she was
still happy to spend her birthday with her favorite people and eating some of
the best barbeque Ruston has to offer.
As this week came to an end, we specifically prepared to
play a home game against Southern University; but adding to that is the
challenge to play four games in the next eight days. We know there is a lot
demanded from us in this following week but we also know that we can do
anything if we stick together and want it bad enough. We want it…
Thank you for reading my blog
Reina Kempt
Monday, December 6, 2010
Hey! My
name is Reina Kempt; I’m a sophomore forward for Louisiana Tech University’s
Lady Techster basketball team. I was born and raised in Baton Rouge, LA, only
about four hours away from Ruston, LA where the school is located but with a
short distance, surprisingly, comes a big culture shock. Baton Rouge is the
state’s capital and Ruston is … well
let’s just say it’s a little smaller. However, the town is very
beautiful and the people are the friendliest in the world. The weather is much
more unpredictable and the people all live and die for the outdoors and Tech
Athletics.
Why did
I choose such a small town and school to continue my education and basketball
career? It’s true that the smaller the town, the closer the citizens are
knitted. On my official visit back in spring of 2009, everyone from the
professors to the clerk at the local store greeted me like they knew me and was
excited to find out I was potentially joining the basketball program. In all
honesty, before my official visit, I researched the educational program and
basketball program and made up my mind that this was the school for me. There
was nothing more perfect than a small town to help you focus on school work and
a prestigious program with three national championships.
As I
have begun my second year at Louisiana Tech, I can look back at the past 15
months and see the growth in myself as a student and an athlete. My professors
promised they would make me a better student and they did that, and Coach
Weatherspoon promised she would mentally prepare me to be able to compete on
this competitive level, and she’s doing that. Any student-athlete can tell you
how mentally and physically stressful it is to play for a Division 1 team. I
came in unprepared for this challenge and if it wasn’t for my teammates and
coaches encouraging me and pushing me, I would’ve easily quit. My bond with my
teammates is what makes me fight through the 6 a.m. practices, the sore
muscles, the hectic schedules and the bad days where I can’t seem to make one
jump shot.
Our bond
is what kept us together the past two weeks as we suffered through a dry spell
of a three game losing streak. With all odds against us, we had to have a
meeting. No coaches; just players talking about what we needed to do to get
back on track – to get back to winning. After losing three games, our last game
was against Mississippi State Wednesday night, a team we lost to last year and
a team that made the Sweet 16 of the NCAA Tournament. Not only was breaking our
losing streak on our hearts, but so was a little revenge. We came out and
proved to ourselves and the sports world that we came to win, and that we
wouldn’t give up until we did just that.
We beat
Mississippi State 69-61 on their home floor, and boy did the bus ride home feel
good.
Thank
you for reading my blog.
-Reina