KiaLynne Bland

With basketball season underway, the Lady Black Knights basketball team is lead by the help of senior, Desirae Cooper, a four-year member and lifelong player. While the beginning of the season didn’t go exactly how she planned, she has big expectations for how her team will finish the season. “We definitely planned to have a lot more wins by now, but I think we’re about to take a turn because we have a lot of games coming up that we’re supposed to win, so hopefully we’ll win those,” says Cooper.

In addition to participating in basketball, Cooper is a four-year member of F.F.A., a thrower in track and field, and is active in God’s Knights which she is very passionate about. As far as her after school activities go, Cooper attends church with her friend, Lauren. “That’s a thing I’m really passionate about is my relationship with God,” explains Cooper. She also enjoys shopping and hanging out with her friends.

Cooper works at the Daily Queen in North Baltimore during the summer. Though she likes her job, she is considering finding a different job elsewhere. “I’ll probably go back next summer too, but I think I’m going to look for a more steady job,” continues Cooper. “I like to work with clothes, like in retail, so maybe somewhere in the mall or something for this summer to get ready for college and save up some more money.” Along with her interest in fashion, Cooper plans on attending Wright State University with a major in business management in hopes of achieving her goal of opening a fashion boutique.

What's your favorite memory of basketball? That’s a really hard one because there’s honestly been a lot. I’ve been with the team for four years now, and we’ve made so many memories. One specifically I can think of is recently, probably a week or two ago, our team missed a practice so Coach made us have a three hour practice, so I told Lauren (Wise), "During practice, we’re going to play 20 questions." So that made practice go by a lot faster, so I thought that was a really funny one.

Favorite basketball game so far this season? Probably the Elmwood or Riverdale one. We played really good at Riverdale as a team. Elmwood, we didn’t really know what the outcome was going to be, but we played really well and it felt really good. The crowd was going wild and we were at home, so that was a great game too.

Weirdest dream? I had a dream the other night I was pregnant...it felt really real and it scared me. In my dream, I asked my mom what she thought about it and my mom was really happy about it, so it was really weird. And I was happy when I woke up.

Favorite place to shop? Probably Gabe’s. They just have really good deals. I like other stores like Forever21. There’s some stores in the mall like T.J. Maxx or The Buckle.

Who is your favorite artist/band? That’s a hard one. I really like Christian music. There’s a rapper named LeCrae, and I like the worship music from Hillsong. But I also like some music that’s not Christian like Becky G, and Cher Lloyd, and Meghan Trainor, like the girl, pop songs.