Mehlville Senior High School’s Michelle Senf is establishing herself as one of the best girls’ basketball team players in the school’s history.

That’s a pretty lofty statement considering Senf is just a sophomore. But her statistics do nothing but solidify her place in the history of Panther hoops.

“She’s clearly my best player,” Panthers head coach Ed Feibig told the Call. “She’s aggressive and if you watch her play, she goes for the ball all of the time.”

After two seasons at the varsity level, Senf has racked up 514 points, which ranks her 10th in career points scored. She also has accumulated 488 rebounds, which puts her fourth in career rebounds for the Panthers.

“One of the strongest part of her game on the floor is her ability to be an offensive rebounder,” Feibig said. “She’s just got an instinct for it.”

Feibig and the rest of his staff had heard about how good of a player Senf was, yet, like most coaches, he was a bit skeptical. It wasn’t until he watched her on the court that he realized all the rumors were true.

“When she (Senf) came to Mehlville, I knew that she was supposed to be good,” Feibig said. “When I watched her during the summer, I knew she was really good. I didn’t have a doubt in my mind that when she walked out on the floor that she would be a starter.”

Basketball is as much a part of the Senf family’s daily life as eating a bowl of oatmeal for breakfast.

Not only did Michelle’s father, Bob, play for Bishop DuBourg High School, but her younger brother John also is a disciple of the sport.

Michelle credits her father with introducing her into the game.

“My dad’s really done a lot for me over the years,” she said. “He’s the one who got me into basketball.”

Like most coaches, however, Feibig believes that there are still some aspects of her game that she can still touch up on in order to become a more complete player.

“What I want her to work on is her ball handling, her ability to take a kid one-on-one and of course her three-point shot,” the Mehlville coach explained.

Senf not only is outstanding on the court, but also in the classroom. This past semester she carried a stout 4.0 grade-point average. It’s easy to say that Senf is one busy student-athlete.

“I really don’t have that much time between homework and basketball,” she explained.

The Panthers’ season ended at the hands of a 62-42 loss to Incarnate Word Academy in the state sectional championship game.

But Mehlville hung tight with the Red Knights and even led the game near the end of the third quarter of play.

“Seeing how we ended our season, I think we’re going to be pretty good,” she said. “I think we proved to a lot of people that we could stick with them (Incarnate Word). It measured us as a team and was a good game to play whether we won or lost.”

The 2004-2005 season is only eight months away.