Lomen promises ‘on-the-job’ training for young team
By Dan Truttschel
Correspondent
Basketball has been in the bloodlines for first-year East Troy girls coach Maurya Lomen her entire life.
From her roots in Milwaukee, where she was part of three state title teams at Milwaukee Pius, to a Hall of Fame playing career at the University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh to her post-playing days as an AAU coach, teaching the game is what she loves to do.
And now she gets to do it on a whole different level.
Lomen takes over the East Troy program from former coach Jeff Brown, who left at the end of last season to take over at Elkhorn, where he’s also a social studies teacher.
When the position became available, Lomen, who lives in East Troy with her husband, Danny, and their four daughters, said she decided to throw her hat into the ring.
“Right around the time we decided to come here, I had some friends who lived here, called me and said, ‘Maurya, you have to apply,’” she said. “It kind of just fell into place.”
And now that practice officially has started – Monday was the first day across the state for high school girls programs to get going – Lomen couldn’t be any more excited to get to work.
“I’m excited,” she said. “They’ve done a nice job (at East Troy). They didn’t have a feeder program necessarily, but they did have a program. There were a lot of people that were involved just getting into the gym in the summer, some parents who were working skills and drills with the kids.”
Early numbers within the program show plenty of youth, Lomen said, as just one senior and one sophomore are playing, which means a slew of freshmen may be getting a lot of quick “on-the-job” training.
Making the experience an enjoyable one will be a huge emphasis, she said.
For the full story, see this week’s edition of the East Troy Times.
