Flowing Wells basketball celebrates 50 years of Lady Cabs with a win

The Flowing Wells High School girls basketball program celebrated its 50th season on Friday night with alumni, flowers, a speech, photos, cake and a blowout.

Flowing Wells (8-2) beat Casa Grande 55-33 to win its fifth straight, although the focus was on the halftime 50 years of Lady Cabs Basketball celebration.

“It was absolutely amazing, my heart is completely full,” said Flowing Wells head coach Michael Perkins.

“To see the number of women to come back here to their high school basketball team, their basketball gym with their coaches, we have so many coaches and players here tonight; I was thrilled.”

At halftime, the current Lady Cabs gave the alumni flowers, senior captain Nevaeh Urenda gave a speech about how special the program was and Flowing Wells personnel posed for a big team picture at center court. They had special “50 years Lady Cabs Alumni” shirts and even cake after the game.

“It was cool, actually, I had a really good time,” Urenda said. “It’s interesting to see all the different generations like come back and see how we evolved or you know things like that, it was fun.”

Urenda said she was a little nervous at first giving the speech but people often say talking comes naturally to her.

“Oh, she was amazing,” Perkins said. “Absolutely natural with the microphone in her hand, and like she said, we talk about doing all this stuff, right?

“Not just playing basketball, that’s part of her leadership development to be able to do some public speaking in front of a large crowd like that, she killed it, she was awesome.”

Urenda was first-team All-4A Kino last year.

Perkins didn’t count everyone on Friday, but they had more than 55 RSVPs.

“It was really, really nice to see everybody,” said Laura McGeary, who graduated in 2015. “We shared stories and some of our best memories, on and off the court.”

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McGeary was one of the many Flowing Wells alumni who played in college, at Wellesley College in Massachusetts.

Flowing Wells girls basketball started in 1975-76 and went 10-6, winning the region championship and reaching the AAA-AA Quarterfinals. They’ve won 19 region championships, been to 11 state finals fours, were state runner-up six times and won the 2008 state championship.

“Just having looked through all the stats and the history of the program and think about all the amazing women that have played here and that achieved amazing goals and accomplishments, to give them the opportunity to look how happy they are, hanging out is so cool,” Perkins said.

McGeary credits the state of the program — since 2019-20, Flowing Wells has won three region titles, reached the quarterfinals four times and finished runner-up twice — to Perkins.

“It’s probably one of the coolest things I’ve ever been part of in my entire life and I think a lot of that has to do with our coach Perkins,” McGeary said. “Probably one of the best people I know, really pours his heart and soul into helping us develop into really strong players and women.”

Flowing Wells impressed the alumni with its win on Friday. It jumped out to a 23-1 lead after the first quarter and held the Cougars to 16 points in the second and 10 in the third.

“It was awesome,” McGeary said. “They came out ripped a couple 3s like right away and never looked back and I saw a lot of positivity among the team, which is always part of the Lady Cab way.”

Urenda led all scorers with 16 points, followed by junior Nadia Hernandez, who had 11, and by sophomore Allison Verdugo, who had 10.

“I think we’ve had a good start so far,” Urenda said. “We’ve had a couple losses, but we’ve learned from them and we’re getting ready to grow.”

Up next for Flowing Wells is a home game against Ironwood Ridge on Tuesday before it hosts the Flowing Wells Holiday Shootout starting on Dec. 27.

“We’re off to a great start,” Perkins said. “We’re learning new roles, new responsibilities, but I like the way that we’re coming together, we’ve had a great week, three wins this week and we’ve developed a lot on our defensive intensity.

“You could see that in the first quarter how they came out and locked in defensively and I love that.”