Hi, I'm Rachel Whitaker, sportswriter at the Lake Charles American Press, and welcome
to this week's Prep Spotlight.
I'm coming to you from Lackasin High School.
Behind me, you'll see the Lackasin High School Gym, which in October was renamed for legendary
Lackasin Girls Basketball Coach, John Juno.
We never had enough, because we always wanted to be better, always wanted to be better.
And Mr. Juno made us feel so proud of our team, you know.
Basketball was everything.
The girls who were capable with sports, who love sports, basketball was what you did.
Here at Lackasin, everybody just loved the sport of basketball.
They loved their team, they loved our coach.
They just loved it, and we always had great fans.
In Lackasin, Girls Basketball is queen.
Juno carried the once-half court game to full court press by turning the Lackasin Lady Cardinals
into one of the most successful girls basketball teams in the state.
In 17 seasons, from 1968 to 1985, Juno guided the team to six state championships and three
runner-up finishes.
We spoke to Coach Juno about how his iconic coaching career got started.
Following year 1968-69, the boys' coach already was coaching the girls and the boys for two
years, and the principal asked me if I was interested, I said, well, I never did enjoy
girls that much, but let's see what happens.
And that was the beginning in 1968-69, but that in the 70s was our decade, I guess you
could say that we dominated girls basketball in the smaller classifications, C and B. We
won three state championships in C and C and three in B, and two runner-ups in C and one
runner-up in B, so we were competitive in all of them.
Football board members and Lackasin residents spearheaded the effort to name the gym in
Juno's honor.
It took only two days to get the required number of signatures to pass the motion.
Well, there's deserving in my eyes because he was my coach, and he won all of the awards
in a time where I got to see, and national coach of the year, he was my coach at that
time.
You know, it's an honor to say that I was John Juno's player.
This season, the Lackasin Lady Cardinals are again setting the pace for a great finish
in Class B. They're 23-1 so far in Coach Eddie McAlcoe's sixth season, and he gave
us some insight into Coach Juno's impact at the school.
Coach Juno just took the whole thing to another level, and you know, it's kind of, you wonder
what kind of coaches will show up here because they have that to try and emulate, and it's
really difficult at times.
I mean, it's a great thing to shoot for, but you got somebody that has six state championships
under his belt, and it can be kind of daunting to anybody else.
But the kids around here, they grow up playing basketball, and it's just one of the things
that people expect you to, you know, if you're from Lackasin, you must know how to play basketball.
Thanks for watching another edition of Prep Spotlight on AmericanPress.com.
Keep checking AmericanPress.com for more prep stories and features, and pick up an American
Press print edition every day for exclusive coverage of high school, college, and professional
sports.
For now, from Lackasin High School, I'm Rachel Whitaker.
Thanks for joining me, and I'll see you in the next one.
