Gatling joins Lady Panthers' staff

n The former Van Buren, Ark., standout will coach ninth-grade girls.

NWA Media file photo Former Van Buren and University of Arkansas standout Erin Gatling, left, has been hired as the new ninth-grade girls basketball coach at Siloam Springs High School.
NWA Media file photo Former Van Buren and University of Arkansas standout Erin Gatling, left, has been hired as the new ninth-grade girls basketball coach at Siloam Springs High School.

One of the recent top scorers in high school girls basketball in Arkansas is joining the basketball staff at Siloam Springs.

Erin Gatling, a former Van Buren standout and Arkansas Razorback, was hired as head ninth-grade coach Thursday by the Siloam Springs School Board at its June meeting.

Gatling replaces Rebecca Ault, who had been head coach for several years but recently resigned her coaching position.

Gatling was an assistant coach for Springdale High School in 2015-16 under Heather Hunsucker and will be a valuable addition to the Lady Panthers' staff according to Siloam Springs head coach Tim Rippy.

"I think she'll be a great addition and will fit right in with our staff and be a tremendous ninth-grade head coach for us," Rippy said. "We're very excited. We think we got a good one."

Gatling graduated from Van Buren in 2008 and scored 1,127 points in her high school career with the Pointerettes. She is the all-time leading scorer in Van Buren history since Van Buren moved up to the state's largest classification in 1991.

Following her high school career, Gatling played two seasons at Southern Mississippi before transferring to the University of Arkansas, where she played the 2011-12 and 2012-13 seasons.

The Razorbacks advanced to the NCAA Tournament in Gatling's redshirt junior year. As a senior, Gatling was a starter for the Razorbacks for a significant portion of the season and the Razorbacks advanced to the WNIT.

Gatling said she is excited to join the staff at Siloam Springs.

"Siloam reminds me a lot of Van Buren," Gatling said. "Everybody grows up wanting to be a Panther. I think that's pretty cool. It's a place I could see myself retiring and fitting in there for a long time. I want a place I can grow. I think Siloam is that place."

Gatling said she's looking forward to working with Rippy. Gatling said growing up a basketball fan in the River Valley she was familiar with the accolades of Rippy's dad, Ron Rippy, who is a hall of fame coach and guided Ozark to three state championships and played in two more title games.

"Obviously, you can't be a girls basketball fan in Arkansas and not have respect for that name," she said. "I never played against his dad or anything like that, but I've been a basketball fan since I was old enough to watch. Five state championship games? That's pretty impressive. Tim Rippy doesn't have quite that resume yet, but I think he's going to get there. He's got good genes."

Gatling added that having this past year she got a up-close look at Tim Rippy's Siloam Springs girls team when Springdale played them twice.

"I've got a ton of respect for (Tim Rippy)," she said. "I like the way he runs his team. Siloam's always got athletes."

Gatling will not officially be on the varsity staff, but she is welcome to join in with the varsity team as much as her schedule allows, Rippy said. Gatling said she will want to be with the varsity as much as she can as well.

Gatling will teach at the middle school and will have a spring sport still to be determined.

Lady Panthers compete in Rogers

The Lady Panthers competed at a team camp at Rogers High School last week.

The Lady Panthers competed against Van Buren, Fayetteville, Springdale, Springdale Har-Ber and Bentonville, and were defeated in all varsity games.

"We competed well for stretches," Rippy said. "Part of it is we only got to practice three times before camp. The sophomores, their eyes are spinning right now. They're not 100 percent comfortable yet."

Rippy said the junior varsity went 2-3 overall and a lot of those same kids competed in varsity games as well. The only ones to not participate in junior varsity were returning varsity players Morgan Vaughn, Hadlee Hollenback and Sidney Henry.

The Lady Panthers practiced on Monday and Wednesday following team camp and Rippy said he could see improvement.

The Lady Panthers will get some practices in this week as well before the Arkansas Activities Association dead period, which is June 27 through July 9.

Once the dead period is over, the team will practice one day before heading to Harding Team Camp in Searcy on July 11-13.

Rippy said the eighth, ninth and varsity teams will all be at Harding.

"It's really good for team bonding," he said. "We get to go there and stay focused on basketball. It's a good time for our coaches and players to support each other and spend time together."

Sports on 06/15/2016