Sachse senior forward Arianna Gregory (34) scored the 1,000th point of her high school career on Jan. 23. Photo by Elijah Kloepping / C&S Media
By David Wolman
Before Sachse’s Jan. 16 home game against District 9-6A rival Wylie, senior forward Arianna Gregory was thinking about what kind of shot she wanted to make to achieve 1,000 career points.
Gregory was stuck on 999 points, one away from becoming the latest Lady Mustangs player to join the 1,000-point club.
Once the game tipped off, Gregory was focused more on what the team needed than her individual statistics. But if an opportunity presented itself for her to shoot the ball, Gregory wouldn’t think twice.
With just over a minute left in the first quarter, Gregory pulled up for a 3-point attempt. This time, the shot fell through the basket, giving Gregory her 1,000th and 1,001st career points. Students sitting behind Sachse’s team bench raised “1,000” signs in the air, and the reserves for the Lady Mustangs jumped up in the air to celebrate Gregory’s milestone.
“I turned around for a second and saw a lot of people in the crowd with signs,” she said. “A lot of people in the crowd sent me video of the shot. It was really cool.”
What made Gregory feel the proudest about that moment was how much her 3-point shooting has improved since her freshman year.
Growing up, Gregory was always the tallest player on the court. But that changed when she entered high school. With some players standing at least four or five inches taller than her, Gregory, who is 5-feet, 10-inches, knew that she had to refine her game.
The first thing Gregory worked on was getting in better shape.
“Everyone that I played against was so much smarter and taller than me,” she said. “I just had to get more in shape so that I could beat the bigger girls off the dribble. My shooting has gotten really better, and it has helped my confidence.”
Gregory is a gym rat and puts up anywhere from 300 to 500 shots a day during team practice.
“She spends a lot of time in the gym shooting,” head coach Donna McCullough said. “She’s developed into an inside-out player that can score at all levels. She can hit the jump shot, 3-pointer, post up. She does that on her own outside of practice.”
Gregory worked hard on becoming a dominant all-around player well before she stepped onto the court for her first high school game. She has worked with a few private coaches outside of Sachse High School. “Coach Derek” was one of the first coaches she worked with. Unfortunately, he passed away in 2018. While in middle school, Gregory played for Coach Jeff on the AAU team Lady Ballerz.
“Coach Derek always believed in me,” Gregory said. “I miss him. I was crying when my mom told me that he died.
“Coach Jeff was my favorite coach. He worked with me on all of the fundamentals. He definitely prepared me for high school.”
After playing on Sachse’s junior varsity team as a freshman, Gregory was a bench player for the Lady Mustangs varsity team during her sophomore season before becoming a starter later in the year.
One player who helped Gregory prepare for the fast pace of the varsity game was Class of 2025 Sachse graduate Charish Thompson, two-time District 9-6A MVP and forward for the Cal Poly women’s basketball team.
“She would text me some of the plays or send me messages to motivate me,” Gregory said. “Our whole team was so close. One time, I was on the court, and she said that there was a shot that I should have taken. She said to me, ‘Why didn’t you take that shot? That’s your shot.’ I didn’t realize how good I was at the time.”
All of that hard work has paved the way for a breakout senior season for Gregory, who is averaging a career-best 15.6 points per game this season, up from 10.8 as a junior and 7.7 as a sophomore.
During a Jan. 6 game against Naaman Forest, Gregory broke the school record for most points scored in a game with 36.
“We were blowing out that team, but I still needed to get another basket to break the record,” she said. “We went back to the locker room after the game, and the coaches announced it. I was so happy, and it was cool to see everyone happy for me.”
With the playoffs set to begin next week, Gregory will look to help the Lady Mustangs build on last season’s run to the area round of the Class 6A Division I playoffs.
“I feel that we can go far as long as we keep working hard in practice and not letting up,” she said.
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