When compared to the previous season, at least on paper, last year was a rebuild in kind terms for the Gainesville girls basketball program.

The team went 8-19 and while the Red Elephants made the state playoffs, they were ousted in the first round; the results a far cry from coach Vanessa White's first season at the helm of the program where her team went 23-6 and returned to the state quarterfinals for the first time since 2015.

The seasons were stark contrasts, the numbers even more so; each of those truths mere however when the perspective is building a sustainably successful program, not having a winning season.

What was gained last year will prove to be more important for the success of the program than what was achieved in coach White's first year when she had a team full of confident shooters, attacking slashers, and irreplaceable experience. A team that lost 90% of its offense and experience to graduation learned to compete in spite of its circumstances and grew in the game through a crash course in their coach's core philosophy: a team can't beat you if they score fewer points than you so while we'll grow skill daily until it can be relied upon, defense and effort are the only controllables and require no skill, so there's no excuse not to bring both regularly.

While the successes were few in the win-loss column, there's an understanding that those few wouldn't have happened without a philosophical buy-in, and it's one this year's seniors Julia Payne and Mattie White are intent on instilling according to White.

The 2024-2025 Gainesville girls basketball team returns three regular starters in Payne, White, and junior Kelsey Lester, and experienced players in Tara Trimmier, Jana'e Garrett, and Jaylah Mintz. There are players returning from injury, a new face or two, and five freshmen, each of whom will be relied upon to carry the program forward, who are learning that their skill will improve daily so control what they can in the meantime.