BLUFFTON — Establishing a winning culture can be dirty, painstaking work.
There almost always are bumps in the road and the job is never completed overnight.
Ashland coach Renee Holt knows there is still plenty of work to be done, but her Arrows are pointed in the right direction.
Ashland’s historic season came to an unceremonious halt Wednesday inside Bluffton University’s Sommer Center. The Arrows encountered one of those obstacles in the form of Toledo Notre Dame, a program with eight Final Four appearances and two state runner-up finishes on its résumé — all since 2012.
The seventh-ranked Eagles cruised to a 63-27 win and, as unpleasant as it was for the Arrows, the experience was a necessary one in Holt’s rebuild. Ashland was making its first appearance in the Sweet 16 since 1979.
“This team has never seen anything like this,” said Holt, who starred at Crestview and Ashland University before taking over a moribund AHS program in 2020. “Nobody expected us to be here … so we proved a lot of people wrong.”
To appreciate just how far Ashland has come in Holt’s five seasons, one only need look at the state of the program before her arrival.
“I came into a program that won one game the year before,” said Holt, who won a Division II national championship at AU. “My first year I think we won four games.”
Ashland finished sixth in the Ohio Cardinal Conference standings in Holt’s first season. The Arrows won their first OCC crown and first conference championship in 30 years this winter.
Ashland won nine games last season. The Arrows finished the 2024-25 campaign with a 20-6 record. Holt matched her victories total in one season after going a combined 20-66 through her first four years.
Ashland had a combined total of 10 tournament victories in the previous 31 seasons. The Arrows won two tournament games this year and were credited with a third after Mansfield Senior had to forfeit the sectional semifinal because of illness.
What’s more, the Arrows are beginning to believe.
“They’re starting to not only believe in the coaching staff, but believe in each other,” Holt said. “It takes all five out there and everyone on the bench. It takes a whole team.”
The Arrows will lose seniors Lauren Green, Laney McNamara and Brylyn Mottayaw to graduation. Holt will welcome back a talented nucleus that includes OCC Player of the Year Kennedy Lacy as well as first-teamers Madison Hoffman and Camryn Cox.
“They are a program on the rise,” said veteran Notre Dame coach Travis Galloway, whose 324-104 record in 17 seasons speaks for itself. “They are talented and well-coached.”
The lessons learned in Wednesday’s loss to Notre Dame should serve the Arrows well.
“The cool thing is we grew a lot today,” Holt said. “We’re going to miss those three seniors, but we have a strong core coming back and we want to be right back on this court next year.”