"It's just like I never left."
Loralyn Murdoch needed no introduction when she returned this summer to her duties as head coach of the UNBC Northern Timberwolves women's basketball team.
She was there at beginning, when UNBC hired her from the College of New Caledonia in August 1997 to coach the T-wolves in their inaugural season playing an exhibition schedule in the B.C. Colleges Athletic Association, now known as PACWEST.
After 12 full seasons at the helm of her UNBC team, family life took precedent over Murdoch's job in 2010 and she left her post for a full season to attend to her baby daughter Sophie, born 16 weeks premature, weighing just one pound three ounces.
"She's doing really well and she's on her way to catching up, she's our miracle baby for sure," said Murdoch.
Murdoch is the face of the UNBC women's basketball program, a fixture at courtside from the fall of 1997 to the summer 2005, when she took a year's leave of absence to upgrade her coaching credentials at the University of Victoria. She returned in 2006 to begin a string of successful seasons that led to the T-wolves first BCCAA championship in 2008 and their first appearance at the CCAA national championship. The following year they won provincial silver, they were regular-season champions in 2010, and last season, with Murdoch as a part-time coach, claimed bronze in the BCCAA playoffs.
This afternoon at 5 p.m. at the Northern Sport Centre, Murdoch will unveil this year's T-wolves squad in their first game action of the season, taking on a T-wolves alumni team fortified by a several players who have never suited up for UNBC.
"We're not anywhere near prepared to play a game but it'll be fun to play, the girls have been training hard," said Murdoch.
The varsity team doesn't open its PACWEST season until November. Once again, the T-wolves are expected to be one of the top teams in the province with 10 returning players. That list includes fifth-year post Erin Beckett, Mercedes VanKoughnett, Kady Dandeneau (coming off knee surgery), Emily Kaehn, Jennifer Bruce, Jennifer Clyne, Jennifer Knibbs, Sarah Robin, Maria Neumann, and Chelsey Thorne.
New to the T-wolves are D.P. Todd secondary school graduates Ashley McMillan and Danielle Steel, and former Duchess Park Condor Nicole Schlick. Knibbs, Steel and McMillan, who played college basketball last season for NAIT, face the onerous task of trying to replace graduated All-Canadian point guard Christine Kennedy.
"The three young ones coming in have had some good coaching and have been around the program long enough so they know me and the girls, and there hasn't been a big transition period," said Murdoch. "We're moving forward a lot quicker than in previous years with new players."
Dubbed the Friends of the Alumni, the UNBC outsiders set to play the varsity T-wolves are Emily King, Natasha Cruz (nee Johnson) and Indy Seehra. There won't be many alumni reserves. Heather Hausot, Christine Kennedy, Laura Beeksma-Cochrane, Erika Johnson and Soili Smith are the only former UNBC players on the alumni squad.
"A lot of the girls are having a child and some of them have two, and a lot of them still doing post-secondary education, either their masters or their doctorate, and this time of year they can't get here," said Murdoch.
"The older and further away you get from playing, the less likely you want to come out and get run up and down the floor by a bunch of young'uns."
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