Courtney Callas isn’t afraid to take a few risks.

The 2004 Freeport graduate went to work as a financial planner for her father’s new independent contracting company.

She also dived back into coaching, taking over the reigns of the Franklin Regional girls basketball program this summer.

Was it scary?

“Of course it was,” Callas said. “It’s like starting with a blank slate. It’s all new everything.”

That, too, applies to her coaching job with the Panthers.

The program is stocked with freshmen and sophomores who are seeing significant minutes.

Callas took over in late June for longtime coach Rick Klimchock.

Callas, 29, who now lives in Monroeville, said she couldn’t pass up opportunities to both work for her family and get back into coaching.

Callas spent four years as an assistant women’s basketball coach at Seton Hill before stepping down two years ago.

“It was one of those things that you either make the jump, or you don’t,” Callas said. “This gave me a chance to do this again where my other career did not.”

Callas received her MBA from Seton Hill.

Her late start with Franklin Regional has been challenging.

“You can’t slight the learning process,” Callas said. “You can’t skip ahead. Say the season ends in February, I didn’t have February through July with them. I had July through October with them.”

The Panthers are 6-12 following an overtime loss to Butler Thursday.

Callas is disappointed with the record.

“Of course I thought we’d do better this year than we’ve done,” Callas said.

But Callas isn’t discouraged. She has a track record of reaching a program and helping it win.

She did it at Juniata College, where she played for four years and helped the Eagles make their first NCAA Tournament appearance in 2008.

At Seton Hill, she was on the staff when the Griffins reached the NCAA Tournament for the first time in 2010 and advanced to the regional semifinals.

“I never went to a program and just won,” Callas said. “To go through the trenches at first is nothing that is foreign to me. You never walk into a program and all that glitters is gold.”

Callas has a plan to make Franklin Regional glitter again.

It was one of the reasons why she wanted to coach at the high school level.

“It’s a lot different than college,” Callas said. “There’s not enough people in this day and age who want to work on fundamentals and want to work with kids. The plan is in the next couple of years to have the groundwork of fundamentals at the fifth- and sixth-grade level. That’s what’s it’s going to take.”