With a key player sidelined for the first half of the season, the Forest Park Lady Panthers were still able to remain above the .500 mark.

Now with junior point guard Kayla Potts back in the lineup (she officially returned Tuesday and finished with nine points and five assists in a 57-9 rout of Ola) after recovering from an ACL knee injury, Forest Park hopes to stay ahead of sub-region 4A-AAAAA.

“I’m very ready to help my team out,” said Potts before practice last Thursday. “I just want to get the kinks out before the playoffs start. I believe my knee is ready.”

“With Kayla coming back we are going to get a leader on the court,” Forest Park girls’ coach Steven Cole said. “We’re going to get a person who knows the system inside and out. She’s going to bring back a lot of experience to the team.”

Potts’ return will allow Shakira Thompson to play more of a backup role and relieve Tiffany Wilson of point guard duties.

“Tiffany has been kind of our ‘do it all person,’” Cole said. “I know she’s going to be happy to have some help with Kayla coming back.”

“I’m excited to see how she is going to do in her first game back,” Wilson said.

Since Potts has a better idea of what the coaches see each game, she already knows how she can contribute.

“I can help the team be more under control,” Potts said. “We have a few situations that we need to have that type of leadership on the court—when to do this when to do that. I’m a three-year varsity player and I kind of know how Coach Cole wants things to be done.”

Even though the Lady Panthers capped 2012 with an 8-6 overall record and 5-0 mark in the sub-region, Cole would like to see some improvements down the stretch.

“The team needs to get better,” he said. “We need to get better at what we do. We need to get an identity, which we don’t have, but we’re hoping with Kayla coming back we will get an identity of what type of team we are going to be.”

This Friday, Forest Park attempts to win its seventh straight game against Mt. Zion. On Saturday, the Lady Panthers meet Drew, which is in second place in the sub-region, for the first time.