Over 20 years ago, Rob Kovac guided the Panther Valley girls to its only district championship.

After leaving and helping turn Jim Thorpe’s program into a recent power, Kovac is back with the Panthers.

The longtime mentor, who has accumulated 252 coaching wins during his career, doesn’t want the emphasis to be on him, however. Instead, he wants the attention on his players.

“It’s exciting to be back,” said Kovac. “It’s really a thrill to work with the kids, they’re such good kids. They’re eager to learn. But again, I’ve been trying to emphasize to the kids it’s not about me being back, it’s about them being here. It’s about them, it’s not about me. Hopefully, we can teach them some things and put them in a position to become better basketball players.”

The Panthers will be without one of the better players in the team’s history with the graduation of the program’s all-time leading scorer Erika Dubosky, who averaged an area-best 18.7 points per game and finished her career with 1,572 points.

But if a young core of players continues to develop and take the next step forward, the future could be bright for PV down the road.

“Sera Robin (a junior), and Maddison Maynard (a sophomore) are both gym rats,” said Kovac. “They spend a lot of time in the offseason playing basketball. And I think from a statistically standpoint, you’re going to see big jumps from both of them on the offensive end. I think you’re going to see their numbers go up.

“It’s not going to be easy to replace the school’s all-time leading scorer, but we’re confident that if Maddison and Sera can become the offensive players that we think they can be, then we’ll be able to score points.”

Two other sophomores, Mikayala Yuricheck and Kaidence Krapf, are expected to be in the starting rotation, along with the team’s only senior, Abbey Vermillion.

“Mikayla is going to play a lot for us as a sophomore,” said Kovac. “She’s a super athlete and I think the basketball part will catch up for her at some point, and when it does I think she’s going to become a nice player. She has all the physical tools you need to be successful.

“Kaidence is real solid. I don’t think she does anything great, and I don’t say that as a non-compliment, but she does everything pretty good. To round out a starting lineup, I think she’s a kid that’s solid and dependable, and we’ll take that.

“Abbey has had some success on the court as a player, and she’s had some success with her team ... She’s been in a district playoff game, and I think her teammates respect her. Sometimes you can be a quiet leader, and I think Abbey is that. I think her teammates look at her and they see that.”

What Panther Valley fans may see on the court this season may be a little different than the past, at least the recent past.

“We’re going to play faster than a year ago, at least that’s the hope,” said Kovac. “I think from the time I’ve coached we’ve always tried to get up and down the floor. We want to put pressure on the other team defensively. We want to be more aggressive defensively. On offense, if we have a chance to run we’re going to take it ... We want to play with our foot on the pedal a little bit, on offense especially.”

An uptempo style usually means you need depth, and Kovac is confident he can go at least eight deep.

“Natalie Vermillion will probably come off the bench as a freshman,” said Kovac. “She can flat out shoot the ball, and if you can shoot there’s always a place for you on the court. (Freshman) Brenna McAndrew is a real good athlete. She can run the the floor, is super athletic and has great length. And then (sophomore) Kylie Eidle will also give us minutes inside as a physical presence.”

Kovac doesn’t want to speculate on wins and losses, but is hopeful to better last season’s record of 6-17.

What’s most important to the veteran coach, though, is daily progress.

“We’re improving, but like everything, there are steps forward. We’ve been emphasizing no steps backward. Some days, you may take a step sideways, and that’s ok but we’re really trying to stress that we don’t want to take steps backwards. We’ve gotten better since the start of the season, but when you have a change in systems and a change in coaches, there’s always a transition period.

“We don’t have a lot of seasoned veterans on the team, so we’re going to be very raw and that’s to be expected ... The key is just to have kids that want to learn. If the kids are open to suggestions and if they’re open to advice, and if they desire to get better, then success will follow. We keep saying to them if you get better at something every day and if we all do that, at some point you become pretty good. It may not happen in a day or a week, but it happens at some point. And I’d like to think that we’re on our way.”