Fort Zumwalt West Basketball Player Brings Her 'A' Game

girls basketball player Kelsey Jones knew she needed to make some improvements in her game.

Never mind the fact that she was a key figure on a team that went 26-5 last year, and made it to the Missouri Class 5 Final Four.

Jones also didn’t put much stock in all the recruiting letters or high praise she’d been getting from college scouts and coaches.

The 5’8 dribbling and scoring whiz kid just knew she had to make some improvements if she and the Lady Jaguars were going to reach their ultimate goal of winning a state title.

“I came into this season focusing on working on my shooting,” Jones said, following Fort Zumwalt West’s 48-20 sectional round win over Fort Zumwalt South on Wednesday evening at Maryville University. “I just came in thinking if I’m going to be better, I need to be able to shoot better from outside. Lay-ups could not be the only shots that I can take.”

Perhaps Jones came to that realization after Fort Zumwalt West’s disheartening loss to eventual state champion Incarnate Word Academy in last year’s Final Four.

The Red Knights were a nationally ranked team with four Division I players on their roster, who completely dominated Fort Zumwalt West that night at Mizzou Arena.

Jones had 14 points to lead the Lady Jags in that game. But sometime afterward, she decided she needed to be a better player, if the team was going to be able to beat better teams.

“I had to be more versatile,” Jones said. “I knew I had to work on my game, get better ball-handling skills, and just be smarter.”

Jones put all those skills on display Wednesday night, while earning our selection as O’Fallon Patch's Spotlight Athlete of the Week.  

She made several great passes that led to easy baskets for her teammates, and was a key contributor to a defensive effort that held Fort Zumwalt South to less than 30 percent shooting and forced 21 turnovers.

Most spectacularly though, Jones displayed her new-found three-point shooting touch, knocking down three of the four long range bombs she attempted, for a game-high 17 points that helped the Lady Jags put away the Lady Bulldogs pretty quickly.  

“She’s got games where she’s not using her legs like she should,” Fort Zumwalt West head coach Monica Tritz said. “But for the most part, she really has worked on that and gotten much better.”

So much so that Jones, who plans to study business administration in college, was offered and accepted a full athletic scholarship to Morgan State University in Baltimore back in October.

Jones joins teammates Janna and Jasmine Swopshire, who are headed to the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, as Lady Jaguar players who’ll be playing in college in next season.

“We’re all very proud of Kelsey,” Tritz said. “She’s an even better person than she is a basketball player. She does a great job in the classroom. She’s a great role model for all of the girls.”  

Wednesday’s win means Fort Zumwalt West is just one win away from duplicating last year’s success of reaching the Class 5 Final Four. To get there though, the Lady Jags (25-4) will have to get past an old nemesis in defending state champ Incarnate Word (24-4).

That quarterfinal contest will take place this Saturday night, at the site of last season’s greatest victory, a Final Four appearance-clinching win over Cor Jesu Academy, at the University of Missouri-St. Louis’ Mark Twain Gym.

“Last year, I guess you could say we kinda got stagefright when we played Incarnate Word,” Jones said. “I mean they are a phenomenal team, we respect their game. We’ve just got to come out focused and be ready to go.”

Jones will have to be at the forefront of that. Incarnate Word is widely respected for its ability to force opposing guards into making mistakes that lead to easy baskets for the Red Knights.

That means that Jones, along with junior backcourt mate Paige Westbrook, will have to handle Incarnate’s pressure, while also still managing to get their team into the offensive sets Tritz wants to run.

“Her calm presence will be more important than anything,” Tritz said. “We have to come out and be ready to execute. Like I told the girls, we have to have our ‘A’ game.”

Tip-off Saturday night is at 7:45 p.m.