Most local teams have sectional championship aspirations. A few believe they can accomplish even more. Borden 2 Charlestown 20 Christian Academy 16 Clarksville 10 Floyd Central 24 Henryville 4 Jeffersonville 6 New Albany 13 New Washington 5 Providence 9 Rock Creek 22 Silver Creek 18 BOYS Borden 3 Charlestown 21 Christian Academy 17 Clarksville 11 Floyd Central 15 Henryville 4 Jeffersonville 7 New Albany 14 New Washington 5 Providence 8 Rock Creek 22 Silver Creek 19 GIRLS
Transcript
Most local teams have sectional championship aspirations. A few believe they can accomplish even more.
Borden 2
Charlestown 20
Christian Academy 16
Clarksville 10
Floyd Central 24
Henryville 4
Jeffersonville 6
New Albany 13
New Washington 5
Providence 9
Rock Creek 22
Silver Creek 18
BOYSBorden 3
Charlestown 21
Christian Academy 17
Clarksville 11
Floyd Central 15
Henryville 4
Jeffersonville 7
New Albany 14
New Washington 5
Providence 8
Rock Creek 22
Silver Creek 19
GIRLS
2 | TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 24, 2015 | BASKETBALL
BORDEN BRAVES
2015-16 SCHEDULENov. 24 Eastern 7:30 p.m.
Nov. 28 Shoals 7:30 p.m.
Dec. 4 at Lanesville* 7:30 p.m.
Dec. 5 Southwestern 7:30 p.m.
Dec. 11 at South Central* 7:30 p.m.
Dec. 12 Crothersville* 7:30 p.m.
Dec. 18 First round+ TBA
Dec. 19 First round+ TBD
Dec. 22 at Trinity Lutheran 7:30 p.m.
Dec. 29 at Switzerland Co. 7:30 p.m.
Jan. 2 Paoli 7:30 p.m.
Jan. 8 at New Washington* 7:30 p.m.
Jan. 9 at Silver Creek 7:30 p.m.
Jan. 15 Austin 7:30 p.m.
Jan. 16 Eastern Greene 7:30 p.m.
Jan. 23 at Henryville* 7:30 p.m.
Jan. 29 Orleans 7:30 p.m.
Jan. 30 at Charlestown 7:30 p.m.
Feb. 6 at Springs Valley 12:30 p.m.
Feb. 9 West Washington 7:30 p.m.
Feb. 19 at Clarksville 7:30 p.m.
Feb. 26 Salem 7:30 p.m.
March 1-5 West Washington Sectional
* Southern Athletic Conference Game
+ Washington County Invitational
2015-16 ROSTERNo. Name Ht. Grade
3 Julien Magallanes 5-8 12
4 Chad Arnett 5-11 11
11 Reilly Gray 6-0 12
21 Nathan Bachman 5-11 11
22 Brandon Thompson 5-9 11
24 Noah Franklin 5-9 10
31 Lucas McNew 5-11 10
32 Nathaniel Knollenberg 6-0 12
33 Noah Hart 6-0 11
34 Kamden Hurst 5-7 12
35 Caleb Hart 6-0 11
2014-2015 RESULTS (13-10)Nov. 25 at Eastern L, 53-61
BORDEN — Doc Nash knows what it’s like to win a state championship.
Nash led Borden to the 2012-13 Class A state title. While he isn’t sure yet that this year’s team is capable of duplicating that feat, he wants his team to shoot for perfection.
“I want them to buy into winning,” he said. “That’s always our goal, every year. We start with three goals: go undefeated, win our sectional and win a state cham-pionship. That’s our goal every year and we’ve reached two of them. Is it likely we ever go undefeated? Probably not. But if you don’t reach for the stars, you’re never going to get there.”
Senior Nathan Bachman’s brother, Cody, helped lead the Braves to the state championship. He believes it’s his and his teammates’ turn to leave their mark on the program.
“There are a lot of expectations,” the younger Bachman said. “It makes you want to work harder to achieve something. I think this team’s capable of a lot.”
If the Braves are going to be successful this postseason, they’re going to have to take a different route. The IHSAA moved Borden from the sectional that it hosted for years to West Washington, where the host Senators, Trinity Lutheran and Orle-ans join the Braves as preseason sectional favorites.
“It’s going to be different. I’m always going to feel we have a chance,” Nash said. “I think four teams can win it. I think [West Washington] is the team to beat. They have the most talent, top to bottom.”
“[West Washington] I think is definite-ly the biggest competition,” senior Caleb Hart agreed. “I don’t think the sectional is as tough as the one we were in, but [the Senators are] definitely the biggest compe-tition in there.”
Borden has won the Southern Athletic Conference five years in a row and seven of the last nine seasons. The Braves have won 15 consecutive conference games, as well.
Winning it again won’t be easy. Stand-ing in the way could be New Washing-ton, which eliminated the Braves from last year’s postseason with a 50-47 dou-ble-overtime upset in the Borden Sectional semifinals. Borden will meet the Mustangs — Nash’s alma mater — on Jan. 8 in New Washington
Nash believes the Braves and Mus-tangs are among four teams — along with Lanesville and Henryville — that can win the 2016 title.
“It’s a goal,” he said. “I think our con-ference is as balanced as it possibly can be. New Washington has to be the favor-ite. They kicked our tail in the sectional in every asset of the game. Henryville was extremely young and Coach [Jared] Hill does a fantastic job and I think they’ll be up there.”
Bachman said it’s the first of many goals the Braves hope to accomplish.
“It’s big,” he said. “You want to keep it rolling. You don’t want to be the team that ends it. It’s always a goal at the start of the season to win conference.”
While he hopes Borden wins another league crown, Nash said, “If we win con-ference and lose in the sectional, in my opinion, it’s a bad season. We want to win in March.”
One of the expected weaknesses again in 2015-16 will be lack of size. Noah Hart — Caleb’s younger brother — is the only Brave listed at taller than 6 feet.
“We’ve got no size at all,” Nash said. “Noah Hart says he’s 6-1. That’s if he’s stepping on his tip-toes. The roster says he’s 6-1. He might be 5-8, but we’ll need him to play l like he’s 6-7.”
“We’ve got to play hard, do everything correctly and box out,” Caleb Hart said.
Borden returns three starters from last year’s 13-10 squad. Caleb Hart is the lead-ing returning scorer at 11 points per game. Bachman added 11 and Noah Hart 7.5 per game a year ago.
Nash, Braves have lofty goals heading into 2015-16
BORDEN BRAVES
SEE BRAVES, PAGE 3
Borden’s Nathan Bachman drives toward the basket during the Braves’ 58-50 win over Clarksville in Borden last season. | STAFF PHOTO BY TYLER STEWART
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BASKETBALL | TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 24, 2015 | 3
Senior Julien Magallanes, a star runner for Borden, also will help the Braves with balance and depth. The future Louisville Car-dinal finished eighth in the state in cross country last month.
“He gives us more athleti-
cism,” Nash said.Another star athlete is Lucas
McNew, who helped lead the Borden baseball team to a sec-tional championship in the spring.
“He’s been a big-time surprise for us,” Nash said of the soph-omore. “He’s been playing ex-
tremely well for us.”Senior Reilly Gray missed all
of last year and is currently out with a concussion. Seniors Kam-den Hurst and Nathaniel Knol-lenberg, juniors Chad Arnett and Brandon Thompson and soph-omore Noah Franklin will give
Nash added balance and depth.“We want balance,” Nash said.
“Opposing coaches can guard one player. We can guard one player. That’s pretty easy. I don’t care who shoots it. We just want to take high-percentage shots.”
Borden will open its season
Tuesday when it hosts Eastern. The Musketeers beat the Braves 61-53 in Pekin to begin last sea-son. Other dates of interest in-clude its SAC opener Dec. 4 at Lanesville and will make a trip to Silver Creek on Jan. 9.
BORDEN BRAVES2015-16 SCHEDULENov. 14 at Clarksville W, 61-49
BRAVES: Borden banking on balance, depth this seasonCONTINUED FROM PAGE 2
STILL OPTIMISTIC
BORDEN BRAVES
BORDEN — The 2015-16 season hasn’t begun how Borden expected or how its come to expect.
Through three games, the Braves are 1-2 with a Southern Athletic Conference defeat at the hands of Crothersville and a 49-point home defeat to rival Eastern last Friday.
Veteran coach Terry Rademacher said the losses haven’t infected his outlook for the season.
“We have good players and we’re go-ing to have a good team,” he said. “The process is just going to be a little bit slower than in years past.”
After losing three starting guards from last year’s SAC and sectional champi-onship team, senior Natalie Rueding-er and junior Taylor Streander will be called upon to shoulder much of the load. That’s particularly the case for Ruedinger, who averaged 17.4 points, 9.7 rebounds, 3.5 assists and 3.5 steals as a junior.
“She’s one of the better players in Southern Indiana,” Rademacher said of Ruedinger. “I believe in using your best player. Sure we’re going to lean on her.”
Streander, who was named All-SAC following her sophomore year when she averaged 9.4 points per game, will play a different role in 2015-16. With the three guards no longer around, she will have to be a ball-dominant player.
“She’s a good shooter and she has ex-cellent basketball savvy,” Rademacher said of Streander. “She’s a very good basketball player with a variety of skills.”
Cassy Goodridge, Kaelen Harmes and Josey Voyles are all newcomers to the Borden starting lineup. The trio had combined for one start coming into the season. Still, Rademacher believes they can contribute to a successful campaign.
“I think they can play, but it’s a differ-ent role for them,” he said.
Another development occurred in the spring when Borden was moved from Class A Sectional 62 to Sectional 61 with Orleans, Crothersville, West Wash-ington, Trinity Lutheran and Medora.
Rademacher said he doesn’t feel there’s much difference between the two sectionals. The Braves have always played Orleans, Medora, West Washing-ton and Trinity Lutheran in the past and Crothersville is an SAC opponent.
“It’s just trading one 1A sectional for another,” he said. “It wasn’t that big of a change.”
Borden will be the host in its first year in Sectional 61. Springs Valley, which moved out of the sectional, was scheduled to host it, so the IHSAA awarded it to Borden. The sectional will
rotate between Borden, West Washing-ton and Orleans.
Since Rademacher returned to Borden, the Braves have won four sectionals and three SAC titles in five seasons. Despite the new venue, he believes his team has a shot at continuing the domination.
“I think we have a decent enough team to win the sectional,” he said. “Our sec-tional, there’s going to be five teams that could win it. They could also all lose the first night because they’re going to be playing each other.”
The Braves will have to overcome an 0-1 hole to win the conference champi-onship for the third year in a row. Hen-ryville, which is 7-0 and tied Borden for the SAC crown last year, is considered the early favorite to win it again in 2016. Borden hosts the Class 2A No. 8 Hor-nets on Jan. 21.
Ruedinger said she believes her team is still in the SAC race.
“I believe we are,” she said. “We can still pull together as a team. It depends on what kind of night we’re going to have.”
Borden expecting big things this season in spite of slow start
Junior Natalie Ruedinger is expected to be Borden’s leader again in 2015-16. | STAFF PHOTOS BY GREG MENGELT
Head coach Terry Rademacher has led the Braves to four sectional titles and three
Southern Athletic Conference titles since he returned to Borden five years ago.
4 | TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 24, 2015 | BASKETBALL
HENRYVILLE HORNETS2015-16 SCHEDULENov. 24 Silver Creek 7:30 p.m.Dec. 4 Paoli 7:30 p.m.Dec. 8 Charlestown 7:30 p.m.Dec. 11 at Austin 7:30 p.m.Dec. 18 at Lanesville* 7:30 p.m.Dec. 22 First round+ TBA Dec. 22 Final round+ TBDJan. 2 Indpls. International 7:30 p.m.Jan. 8 at South Decatur 7:30 p.m.Jan. 9 Trinity Lutheran 7:30 p.m.Jan. 15 at New Washington* 7:30 p.m.Jan. 16 Medora 7:30 p.m.Jan. 22 at Providence 7:30 p.m.Jan. 23 Borden* 7:30 p.m.Jan. 29 South Central* 7:30 p.m.Feb. 4 Eastern 7:30 p.m.Feb. 13 Crawford Co. 7:30 p.m.Feb. 16 at Salem 7:30 p.m.Feb. 19 at West Washington 7:30 p.m.Feb. 20 at Crothersville* 7:30 p.m.Feb. 23 at Clarksville 7:30 p.m.Feb. 26 at Christian Academy 7:30 p.m.March 1-5 Class 2A Paoli Sectional* Southern Athletic Conference Game
+ Henryville Holiday Tournament
2015-16 ROSTERNo. Name Pos. Ht. Grade
1 Braxton Robertson F 6-4 1110 Elijah Weeks G 5-10 1214 Jacob Janek G 6-0 1220 Kade Badgers G 5-9 922 Kendal Dunn G 5-9 1024 Kasey Robertson G 6-1 1030 Nick Walker G 6-2 1032 Kevin Hollis F 6-4 1034 Thomas Green F 6-3 1042 Trevor Badger G 5-9 1050 Charlie Dieterlen F 6-0 11
2014-2015 RESULTS (9-13)Nov. 25 at Silver Creek L, 42-58Dec. 5 at Paoli W, 54-51Dec. 9 at Charlestown L, 49-56Dec. 12 Austin L, 47-49Dec. 19 Lanesville L, 50-62Dec. 20 at Southwestern W, 41-36Dec. 23 Crothersville W, 57-44Dec. 23 Madison Shawe W, 53-37Jan. 3 at Indpls. International L, 42-44Jan. 9 South Decatur W, 53-38Jan. 10 at Trinity Lutheran L, 48-58Jan. 16 New Washington W, 55-44Jan. 23 Providence W, 41-38Jan. 24 at Borden L, 25-43Jan. 30 at South Central L, 48-50Feb. 6 Crothersville W, 63-41Feb. 7 at Crawford Co. L, 48-57Feb. 12 at Eastern L, 51-69Feb. 24 Clarksville W, 55-49Feb. 25 at Jeffersonville L, 54-73Feb. 27 Christian Academy L, 35-55Mar. 3 Providence* L, 28-46* Sectional game
HENRYVILLE — A once-proud Henryville basketball program went through some lean seasons in 2012-13 and 2013-14. In those two years, the Hornets won a combined three games.
However, over the past two years, the Hornets win total has grown from zero to two to nine last year in former Hornet star Jared Hill’s first season as the head coach.
With three starters returning and plenty of talent through-out its roster, the positive trend should continue in 2015-16.
“I think the guys are used to me, I’m used to them,” Hill said. “First year wasn’t bad. I think we all learned a lot last
year. I think if we apply what we learned, it will make a big difference this year.”
“It was kind of down two years ago,” sophomore guard Nick Walker said. “We brought it back up. [The wins] keep increasing.”
“We have the experience from the years we’ve played,” senior Elijah Weeks said. “Our underclassmen are start-ing to become upperclassmen. We’ve gotten a lot more in-tense. It’s all or nothing for the seniors.”
Walker, 6-foot-4 junior Braxton Robertson and a four-year starter in Weeks return to the starting lineup. Jacob Janek, who Hill said gave the Hornets a spark every time he entered the game last year,
6-1 Casey Robertson and 6-3 Thomas Green will gave the Hornets depth.
“I think we’ll be better at scoring than we were last year,” Hill predicted. “It’s a year of maturity and guys have gotten better.”
Walker was an instant star as a freshman, averaging nine points. Hill said he expects him to bloom as a sophomore.
“Nick made some really big strides,” Hill said. “He played well last year, but he’s gotten better. He’s put on a lot of weight, as far as muscle goes.”
One of the more talent-ed players on the Henryville roster is sophomore forward Kevin Hollis. He has size at 6-foot-4 and an excellent shooting stroke.
“We’re bringing him along slowly,” Hill said. “He’s made a great deal of improvement. He might be one of the best shooters we have.”
There’s little question the Hornets should contend in the Southern Athletic Conference and the Class 2A Paoli Sec-tional. That’s quite a statement just three years removed from a winless season.
“I think we’re a contend-er for both,” Hill said. “We didn’t do as well in conference last year as we should have.”
Walker didn’t mince words. He believes his team is ready to win championships.
“We’re going to win it,” he said.
Which one?
Henryville finally feels like a contenderBY GREG MENGELT
HENRYVILLE HORNETS2015-16 SCHEDULENov. 3 at Rock Creek+ W, 65-21Nov. 5 Medora+ W, 83-17Nov. 6 Clarksville+ W, 56-17Nov. 7 Orleans+ W, 40-19Nov. 13 Crawford Co. W, 62-50 (OT)Nov. 20 New Washington* W, 66-25Nov. 21 Brownstown W, 63-60Dec. 3 at Lanesville* 7:30 p.m.Dec. 5 at Paoli 12:30 p.m.Dec. 8 Charlestown 6 p.m.Dec. 11 at Providence 7:30 p.m.Dec. 15 Silver Creek 7:30 p.m.Dec. 17 at South Central* 7:30 p.m.Dec. 29 First round# TBADec. 30 Final round# TBDJan. 5 at Crothersville* 7:30 p.m.Jan. 9 Orleans 12:30 p.m.Jan. 12 at Madison Shawe 7 p.m.Jan. 14 Southwestern 7:30 p.m.Jan. 19 at Christian Academy 7:30 p.m.Jan. 21 at Borden* 7:30 p.m.Jan. 26 at Clarksville 7:30 p.m.Jan. 28 Eastern 7:30 p.m.Feb. 2-6 Henryville Sectional* Southern Athletic Conference Game
+ Henryville Tipoff Tournament
# Washington County Invitational
2015-16 ROSTERNo. Name Pos. Ht. Grade
Class
11 Haley Huddleston G/F 5-9 1213 Reagan Hensley G 5-2 1115 Natalie LaMotte G 5-2 1221 Peyton Ottersbach F 5-7 1123 Emily Hollis G 5-7 1225 Abby Robertson F 5-9 1231 Hannah Nunn G 5-7 1133 Emma Hendricks F 5-8 1235 Darian Nipper G 5-5 1041 Becca Hunt F 5-5 1245 Hannah White C 5-10 11
2014-2015 RESULTS (18-6)Nov. 11 Irvington Prep W, 73-6Nov. 13 at Medora W, 55-28Nov. 14 at Clarksville W, 48-25Nov. 15 Providence W, 61-54Nov. 21 at New Washington W, 56-34Nov. 29 Charlestown L, 45-51Dec. 4 Lanesville W, 58-28Dec. 6 Paoli L, 39-44Dec. 12 Providence W, 43-39Dec. 16 at Silver Creek W, 46-35Dec. 18 South Central W, 65-27Dec. 27 at Eastern L, 46-63Dec. 27 Salem L, 44-50Jan. 6 Crothersville L, 51-54Jan. 10 at Orleans W, 36-24Jan. 15 at Southwestern W, 42-33Jan. 20 Christian Academy W, 77-40Jan. 22 Borden W, 72-71 (OT) Jan. 27 Clarksville W, 56-24Jan. 29 at Eastern W, 48-41Feb. 3 Madison Shawe W, 53-32Feb. 5 at Crawford Co. W, 43-41Feb. 10 Eastern* W, 54-34 Feb. 13 Crawford Co.* L, 41-58* Sectional game
HENRYVILLE — Hen-ryville faced some adversity early in the 2015-16 season.
The Hornets were coming off a disappointing sectional loss that ended last year’s suc-cessful 18-6 campaign. On top of that, a good portion of the Henryville lineup had its mind on something else in the fall, helping lead the Hornets to sectional and regional champi-onships in late October.
Despite the late arrivals of stars Emily Hollis and Haley Huddleston, the Hornets are off to their best start ever at 7-0. They’re ranked eighth in the state after Saturday’s
impressive 63-60 win over Brownstown Central.
“I’ve like our attitude,” sixth-year Henryville coach Josh Conrad said. “They’ve picked up things quickly, which they should because they’re juniors and seniors. We still have a lot of things we need to work on, but the girls are taking big steps for-ward each week and that’s what matters right now.”
In fact, Conrad said, he be-lieves the volleyball success will have a positive effect on his squad.
“Those kids have won at that level now and now they have that confidence,” he said. “They want to do the same
thing in basketball. I think it’s been good for them.”
“I think it’s motivated us to do the exact same thing,” se-nior point guard Emily Hollis added. “The feeling of going to semistate was just crazy. I’d like to do that again in basket-ball.”
Henryville was co-Southern Athletic Conference champi-ons with Borden a year ago. The Hornets beat the Braves 72-71 in overtime to claim a share of the title.
They still haven’t won a sec-tional since their lone crown in 1994. Conrad believes that this team has an opportunity to be remembered alongside those Silver Creek Sectional
champions.“With the team we have
coming back, I think the sky’s the limit with this group,” he said.
With Borden having already suffered a conference loss, Henryville looks like the pro-hibitive favorite to repeat as conference champions, but Conrad said recapturing the ti-tle won’t be easy.
“I think it’s a really good conference this year compared to years past because I don’t think there’s a weak team in it,” he said.
The ultimate goal for this team, however, is the sectional championship. The sectional,
NEW WASHINGTON – Rebuilding years are so cliché that most coaches shy away from the term altogether.
First-year head coach Kirs-ti Holloway is no exception, though she does acknowledge the fact that growth and ad-justment will play a major role in this season’s New Washington campaign.
With her young team, eager for and receptive to a new era of Mustangs basketball, Hol-loway anticipates lots of de-veloping with a few growing pains throughout the year.
“We have kids who ar-en’t used to playing signifi-cant minutes who will have to step into roles that need to be filled,” said Holloway, who took over the helm at her alma mater this season,
replacing 16-year head coach Terry White. “We have a cou-ple of freshmen who will be immediately put into those positions, but we have other underclassmen who – as the season progresses – will be able to help too.”
New Washington, which strung together quite a bit of success in recent history — with two sectional titles and eight winning seasons in the past nine years — suffered a lull last year after graduating a wealth of talent from the 2013-14 squad.
This season only two major contributors return from last year’s 6-18 campaign, so the focus for Holloway has been patience and teaching.
“We as coaches have to be patient, and the kids have to be patient with each other,” she said. “So far, they’ve all been really receptive. It’s
been exciting.”The Mustangs lost nearly all
their post presence from last season, including the gradu-ated Shelby Haymaker, who led the team in rebounds with nearly seven per game. Also lost to graduation is guard Emilee Holloway, who scored 5.6 points per game and pro-vided solid team leadership.
Returning, however, is last year’s leading scorer, junior guard Haley Tye, who aver-aged just over 14 points per outing. Gracie Krouse, anoth-er junior guard, is also back after scoring eight points and three steals per game last sea-son.
“We’ve lost a lot but we’ve gained a lot, too,” Tye said. “We’ve got a group this year that works harder than any team I’ve ever been a part of.”
Macie McCarty, a 5-foot-7 junior, and 5-5 senior Bailey
Crace are the only other re-turners who played significant varsity minutes last season.
“The rest are learning what it’s like to play at that level, and so every day we have to remind ourselves that it might take some time,” said Hollo-way. “It’s not going to happen overnight.”
The incoming freshman class does bring some size and strength to the table, with Emma Graebe and Madison Fields standing at 5-10, and Kamran Miles, Hope Griffith and Lexie Matthews – while not conspicuously tall at 5-8, 5-5 and 5-5, respectively – are gritty, tough and not afraid to get into the thick of things.
“Being a freshman and go-ing straight to the varsity lev-el is an adjustment, but it’s a goal we have,” said Hollo-way. “We would like to be
NEW WASHINGTON MUSTANGS2015-16 SCHEDULENov. 24 at Charlestown 7:30 p.m.Dec. 4 Rock Creek 7:30 p.m.Dec. 5 Christian Academy 7:30 p.m.Dec. 11 at Southwestern 7:30 p.m.Dec. 18 Rising Sun 7:30 p.m.Dec. 19 at Crothersville* 7:30 p.m.Dec. 28 First round+ TBADec. 29 Final round+ TBDJan. 2 Eastern 2:30 p.m.Jan. 8 Borden* 7:30 p.m.Jan. 9 at Clarksville 7:30 p.m.Jan. 15 Henryville* 7:30 p.m.Jan. 16 at Madison Shawe 7:30 p.m.Jan. 22 at Austin 7:30 p.m.Jan. 29 at Switzerland Co. 7:30 p.m.Feb. 4 at Medora 7:30 p.m.Feb. 6 at Trinity Lutheran 1:30 p.m.Feb. 9 at Silver Creek 7:30 p.m.Feb. 12 Lanesville* 7:30 p.m.Feb. 16 Charlestown 7:30 p.m.Feb. 19 South Central* 7:30 p.m.Feb. 26 Providence 7:30 p.m.March 1-5 Class A New Washington Sectional* Southern Athletic Conference Game
+ Northeastern Tournament
2015-16 ROSTERNo. Name Grade Ht. Pos.
5 Caleb Elison 11 5-9 G10 Brandon Gill 11 5-9 G14 Andrew House 11 6-0 G20 Brandon Horton 11 5-10 G22 Jacob Hudnall 12 6-3 C24 Hunter Lind 11 6-0 G40 Zach Moore 11 6-3 F44 Stevie Mack 11 6-7 C
2014-2015 RESULTS (10-15)Nov. 26 at Charlestown L, 39-69Nov. 29 Silver Creek L, 32-70Dec. 5 at Rock Creek L, 44-53Dec. 6 at Christian Academy L, 38-67Dec. 12 Southwestern W, 33-19Dec. 16 Crothersville W, 64-51Dec. 19 at Rising Sun W, 54-42Dec. 29 at Union Co. W, 42-30Dec. 30 Monroe Central L, 58-59 (OT) Dec. 30 Lawrenceburg W, 62-59 (2OT) Jan. 2 at Eastern L, 52-67Jan. 9 at Borden L, 52-66Jan. 10 Clarksville W, 68-65 (OT)Jan. 16 at Henryville L, 44-55Jan. 17 Madison Shawe L, 48-54Jan. 23 Austin L, 56-70Jan. 30 Switzerland Co. W, 68-60Feb. 6 at Lanesville L, 52-68Feb. 7 Trinity Lutheran L, 61-72Feb. 12 Medora W, 78-52Feb. 23 Charlestown L, 55-69Feb. 26 at South Central W, 60-47Feb. 27 at Providence L, 32-33Mar. 6 at Borden* W, 50-47 (2OT) Mar. 7 Christian Academy* L, 49-63* Sectional game
NEW WASHINGTON MUSTANGS2015-16 SCHEDULENov. 5 Silver Creek L, 45-63Nov. 13 New Albany L, 22-92Nov. 14 Christian Academy L, 54-59Nov. 17 Austin L, 49-81 Nov. 20 at Henryville* L, 25-66 Nov. 21 Madison Shawe L, 47-60 Nov. 24 at Charlestown 6 p.m.Dec. 1 at Borden* 7:30 p.m.Dec. 3 Rock Creek 7:30 p.m.Dec. 8 at Madison 7:30 p.m.Dec. 10 Southwestern 7:30 p.m.Dec. 12 Charlestown 7:30 p.m.Dec. 15 Lanesville* 7:30 p.m.Dec. 17 at Eastern 7:30 p.m.Jan. 2 at Jeffersonville 7:30 p.m.Jan. 5 at Scottsburg 7:30 p.m.Jan. 12 Providence 7:30 p.m.Jan. 14 at Trinity Lutheran 7:30 p.m.Jan. 16 at Switzerland Co. 2:30 p.m.Jan. 19 at Brownstown 7:30 p.m.Jan. 23 South Central* 7:30 p.m.Jan. 26 at Crothersville* 7:30 p.m.Feb. 2-6 Class A New Washington Sectional* Southern Athletic Conference Game
2015-16 ROSTERNo. Name Pos. Ht. Grade
10 Haley Tye G 5-4 1111 Macie McCarty G/F 5-7 1115 Bailey Crace G 5-5 1220 Samantha Crace G 5-3 1022 Gracie Krouse G 5-3 1124 Jodi Davidson F 5-4 1232 Hope Griffith G 5-5 9 33 Natalie Harrod F 5-10 11 34 Emma Graebe F 5-10 940 Madison Fields G/F 5-10 942 Kamran Miles F 5-8 944 Lexie Matthews G 5-5 9
2014-2015 RESULTS (6-18)Nov. 15 at Christian Academy W, 60-51Nov. 18 at Austin L, 24-67Nov. 21 Henryville L, 34-56Nov. 22 at Madison Shawe L, 37-52Nov. 25 at Charlestown L, 28-82Dec. 2 Borden L, 40-58Dec. 4 at Rock Creek W, 61-29Dec. 9 Madison L, 37-63Dec. 11 at Southwestern L, 51-53Dec. 13 Charlestown L, 35-75Dec. 18 Eastern L, 53-57Jan. 3 Jeffersonville L, 25-71Jan. 6 Scottsburg L, 46-69Jan. 13 at Providence L, 25-88Jan. 15 Trinity Lutheran L, 50-66Jan. 17 Switzerland Co. L, 42-66Jan. 20 Brownstown L, 52-84Jan. 22 at Silver Creek L, 25-64Jan. 24 at South Central W, 76-65Jan. 27 Crothersville W, 57-51Jan. 29 at Lanesville W, 50-45Feb. 3 at New Albany L, 35-70Feb. 10 Rock Creek* W, 50-27 Feb. 13 Christian Academy* L, 54-61 (OT)* Sectional game
NEW WASHINGTON – After a string of dismal and disappointing seasons, New Washington appears to be on the uphill swing and ready to put some marks in the win column this year thanks to a roster full of players who have talent, drive and a small taste of success from last year still lingering on their tongues.
The Mustangs had a hot-and-cold couple of months during last year’s 10-15 cam-paign, but it’s the end of the season that’s still on their minds.
“It’s kind of bittersweet, but now it’s given us motivation,” said junior guard Caleb Elli-son, who helped the Mustangs knock off reigning champion and host Borden in last year’s Class A sectional.
A day later, they took eventual champion Christian Academy to the wire in the title game.
“It was really special to be able to go to the section-al championship, and we’re eager to get back to it,” Elli-son continued. “Winning that championship is the goal. If we don’t do it, we’re under-achieving. At least that’s the way I look at it.”
That may seem like awfully big talk, especially for a team that hasn’t put a winning sea-son together in six years and has won only 24 percent of its games since 2000-01.
Add in the fact that New Washington graduated sev-en seniors, including its two leading scorers — guards James Clemons and Logan Miles — and three big post-men — Jake Zimmerman, James Seals and Matthew Wilson — and it doesn’t real-
ly look like 2015-16 year has the recipe for success.
The Mustangs are pretty confident in the group they have returning.
Joining Ellison — a quick and gritty guard who av-eraged a couple points and a couple assists playing be-hind Miles and Clemons last season — are juniors Stevie Mack, who is a strong in-side force who led the team in rebounds last year at near-ly seven per game, and Zach Moore, a versatile big man who can shift seamlessly from the post to the perimeter.
“We lost a couple guys who were extremely good teammates and worked to get some of the younger kids where they needed to be at and help them along,” May said. “We lost our best play-makers, but that’s part of it. We really feel good about the guys we have coming back
and the experience that they gained last year. We’re pretty excited about this year. We look for these guys to fill their roles quickly and continue to move forward and not take any steps backward.”
Andrew House and Bran-don Horton, who are both ju-nior guards, put in a signifi-cant amount of varsity time last season, averaging six and four points, respectively. They will be expected to play major roles this season.
Junior guards Brandon Gill, Hunter Lind and big senior forward Jacob Hudnall will also likely be contributors af-ter leading the junior varsi-ty team to Southern Athletic Conference championships the past two seasons.
“We lost a whole lot but we got a lot back,” Ellison said. “Zach and Stevie have real-ly stepped up this off-season
Mustangs expect more success after small taste last yearBY MITZI THOMPSON
JEFFERSONVILLE — Demarre Sims knows one thing about Joe Luce — his third head coach in his career at Jeffersonville.
His new boss means busi-ness.
What more would you ex-pect from a man who has a 270-112 record in his 17 years as a coach in the Hoo-sier State and is the defend-ing USA Today Indiana Coach of the Year after guid-ing Richmond to a 26-4 re-cord last season?
“He pushes us to be better. He expects a lot out of us,” Sims said of Luce.
If there is one player who knows what it is like play-ing for Joe Luce, it is his son Tommy. The Red Devil se-nior guard was the sixth man on Richmond’s Class 4A Fi-nal Four team from a year ago.
“He’s pretty intense,” the younger Luce said. “He’ll get on us in practice if we’re not going hard, and we’ve got to go hard all the time. That’s the only way we’re going to get better. His practices are pretty intense.”
Jeff players and fans hope Joe Luce can return the Red Devils to prominence after they went 20-25 the last two seasons under former head coach and ex-Jeff standout guard Matt Pait. Last year, Jeff posted an 8-14 re-cord last season, which was its first losing record since 2007-08.
However, the elder Luce thinks it is going to take a little bit of time before he can get the Devils back on track. Right now, he is evaluating the players on his roster and determine who is going to get some playing time this season.
“We’re just trying each day to keep it competitive. We’re trying each day to make sure to let them know that any guy can get those minutes,” he said. “As practice contin-ues to move forward, I think we’ll see more and more lineups change.”
Sims is expected to be one of the Red Devils’ leaders this season. The senior guard
is Jeff’s top returning scorer at 7.7 points per game. Sims also averaged four rebounds and 2.5 assists a contest in 2014-15.
Other returning players who are expected to make some contributions are senior guard Dominique Hunter, ju-nior forward Michael Min-ton, sophomore guard Bailey Falkenstein and sophomore forward Gerrin Moore.
The Red Devils also wel-come back two seniors who did not play last season in guard Brandon Coleman and forward Dechaun Lewis.
“We have a lot of seniors and I expect two or three of those guys to be a part of our starting lineup and get a lot of minutes,” Coach Luce said. “I also think we’ll get quite a bit from our sopho-mores in Gerrin Moore and Bailey Falkenstein. Dechaun Lewis gives us a different look and a different athlet-icism. He’s a project in the works, but he’s a guy that’s developing each and every day.”
Tommy Luce is the top newcomer on the squad. He averaged seven points and two assists a contest in 2014-15 at Richmond.
“He’s done a good job of being a good teammate and he’s done a good job of com-municating,” Joe Luce said of his son. “He has the capa-
bility of being a scorer and also has the capability of be-ing a good role player.”
One area where the Red Devils must improve on is on offense. Last year, Jeff av-eraged 56.2 points per game and scored 50 points or less seven times.
“I think the biggest thing with our scoring and with our ability to improve is know-ing what types of shots we can make,” Coach Luce said. “You have to establish your-self as a guy that can make certain shots and those are the shots you have to take. If you’re taking shots that are not ones you make con-sistently, then you’re going to struggle scoring. You don’t want to be a team that goes on runs. You want to be a team that’s consistent throughout. Shot selection is going to be huge.”
The Red Devils’ non-con-ference schedule is very challenging. They will start the season Wednesday with a trip to Class 4A No. 1 Southport, followed by their home opener next Tuesday at Louisville Trinity, which is ranked 10th in Kentucky. The non-conference slate al-so includes Class 4A No. 4 and defending 4A runner-up Evansville Reitz and Ken-tucky perennial power Louis-ville Ballard. In addition, Jeff will compete in the Colum-
bia City/Huntington North Tournament Dec. 29-30.
As for the Hoosier Hills Conference, archrival New Albany is the favorite to win the league this season. The Class 4A No. 2 Bulldogs have claimed the last two conference championships.
“It is definitely a competi-tive conference that New Al-bany has had a strong hold on here [recently]. There’s no doubt that they’ve been very good and coached well,” Joe Luce said.
The Devils’ first-year coach is not concerned with Jeff’s schedule. He is expect-ing his team to improve each day.
“The most important thing is worrying about us and worrying about getting bet-ter,” he said. “We do play some very good competition that hopefully will give us a chance to expose some of our weaknesses and give us a chance to improve as we get into the conference sea-son and ultimately play our best basketball at the end of the year. I’ve enjoyed getting started and working with [the Red Devils] in the short peri-od of time we’ve had to work with them. They’ve worked extremely hard and played very well. We’ll just contin-ue to improve, I think.”
New Jeffersonville head coach Joe Luce is evaluating his new players right now for the 2015-16
season. | FILE PHOTO
BASKETBALL | TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 24, 2015 | 7
JEFFERSONVILLE RED DEVILS2015-16 SCHEDULENov. 6 at North Harrison L, 48- 49Nov. 10 Austin W, 47- 36Nov. 14 Bloomington South W, 51- 41Nov. 20 at Silver Creek W, 45- 30Nov. 21 at Bedford NL* L, 27-36Nov. 24 Jennings County* 7:30 p.m.Nov. 28 Pike# 10 a.m.Nov. 28 Greenfield-Central or Providence# TBDDec. 3 at Floyd Central* 7:30 p.m.Dec. 4 at Madison* 7:30 p.m.Dec. 10 Sacred Heart (Ky.) 7:30 p.m.Dec. 12 at Columbus East* 1:30 p.m.Dec. 17 Corydon Central 7:30 p.m.Dec. 22 at Carmel 7:30 p.m.Dec. 29 Mooresville+ 6 p.m.Dec. 30 Elk. Central or Columbus North+ 10 a.m.Dec. 30 Final round+ TBDJan. 2 New Washington 7:30 p.m.Jan. 9 Castle 1:30 p.m.Jan. 16 at Jasper 1:30 p.m.Jan. 19 Seymour* 7:30 p.m.Jan. 22 at New Albany* 7:30 p.m.Jan. 26 Scottsburg 7:30 p.m.Feb. 2-6 BNL Sectional* Hoosier Hills Conference Game
# Jeffersonville Hoopsgiving
+ Columbus North Tournament
2015-16 ROSTERNo. Name Pos. Ht. Grade
3 Jaylynn Brown G 5-8 104 Tori Handley G 5-7 95 Jasmine Lilly G 5-5 912 Jacinta Gibson G 5-10 1013 Taylor Sykes G 5-5 1214 Kelsey Luce G 5-7 1115 Hailey Lacy F 5-8 1221 Jhala Henry G 5-7 1123 Jaelyn Lee F 5-9 1124 Asia Williams F 5-10 1225 Amanda McKinney F 5-9 1232 Chelsea Gibson C 6-1 9
2014-2015 RESULTS (15-11)Nov. 14 North Harrison W, 48- 43Nov. 15 at Bloomington South L, 50- 62Nov. 18 at South Central W, 54- 42Nov. 21 Silver Creek W, 48- 40Nov. 22 Bedford NL L, 24- 35Nov. 28 at Jennings Co. L, 40- 41Dec. 4 Floyd Central W, 57- 41Dec. 5 Madison L, 43- 48Dec. 11 at Sacred Heart (Ky.) W, 52- 50Dec. 13 Columbus East W, 58- 42Dec. 18 at Corydon W, 60- 21Dec. 29 Penn L, 27- 46Dec. 30 Merrillville L, 43- 51Dec. 30 Crown Point W, 42- 33Jan. 3 at New Washington W, 71- 25Jan. 8 at Charlestown L, 44- 46Jan. 10 at Castle W, 50- 39Jan. 17 Jasper W, 53- 41Jan. 20 at Seymour L, 34- 36Jan. 23 New Albany L, 28- 43Jan. 27 at Scottsburg L, 37- 45Feb. 3 Ballard (Ky.) W, 54- 53Feb. 5 at Providence W, 54- 41Feb. 10 Jennings Co.* W, 61- 50Feb. 13 Floyd Central* W, 51- 41Feb. 14 Bedford NL* L, 35- 48* Sectional game
JEFFERSONVILLE — Head coach Mike Warren has a simple, yet challeng-ing plan for his Jefferson-ville Red Devils this season.
For the majority of the regular season, the third-year boss plans on getting his team ready for the latter portion of his team’s sched-ule and the postseason.
Then once the final cou-ple of weeks of January ar-rives, he expects the Red Devils to be prepared for a run at the Hoosier Hills Conference and Class 4A Bedford North Lawrence Sectional championships.
To do that, Warren must work with a roster that has a mix of veterans and capa-ble young players.
“I expect us to hopeful-ly get better every single game we play,” he said. “We’re young, but we have seniors. We have a couple of juniors that have played in the past. Youth is not go-ing to be an excuse for us, but we do have quite a few kids that are learning how to play varsity basketball and learning how to con-tribute on the varsity level. It’s going to be a process with us, for sure.
“Of course, we want to try to win every game we play, but we’re smart enough to realize that’s not going to happen. We’re going to take some lumps along the way, but if by January we’re playing our best basketball, that’s where we want to be.”
Senior guard Taylor Sykes thinks the Red Dev-ils have a great chance of winning conference and sectional if they can grow during the regular season.
“I think this team is ca-pable of winning the sec-tional and the conference,” she said. “The teams that we’re playing against in the sectional are all talented teams. It’s going to [come down to] whoever brings it and who wants it more. For us, we’re going to have to be more physical and more mentally tough than the other teams.”
Senior forward Asia Wil-liams also has high hopes for this season.
“We want to definitely win a sectional because the seniors have been driven [to accomplish that] since we’ve been here. That’s where we want to go,” she said. “We want to make it as far as possible.”
During the first five games, Warren has been playing some of his inex-perienced players a lot. Those Jeff players have been sophomore guard Jacinta Gibson, freshman guards Jasmine Lilly and Tori Handley and freshman center Chelsea Gibson. An-other sophomore who has gotten some playing time this year is sophomore guard Jaylynn Brown.
Leading those young players is Sykes, who is considered one of the top players in Southern Indi-ana. Sykes has averaged 14.2 points per game so far this season.
“This year, I hope we all play together and we share the ball,” Sykes said. “We need to pass up good shots for great shots.”
Sykes is joined by three other seniors in Williams and forwards Aman-da McKinney and Hailey Lacy. Two juniors have already gotten some min-utes this year in guard Jhala Henry and Jaelyn Lee. Jeff also has a newcomer in ju-nior guard Kelsey Luce, the daughter of new Red Devil boys’ coach Joe Luce.
Warren thinks the HHC title chase is any team’s ballgame this season. Bed-ford has won the last four conference championships along with the previous four Class 4A sectional ti-tles.
“Our conference is wide open,” he said. “Bedford obviously has had a great run and they’re still going to have a good team, but they don’t have three In-diana All-Stars, which is
going to make a big dif-ference. I think there are probably about four or five teams in our conference that I think can legitimately win the conference. On any given night, you’ve got to bring your best effort.”
The remainder of Jeff’s non-conference schedule will be a stiff test. On Sat-urday, the Red Devils will host their first-ever Jeff Hoopsgiving tournament. The other three squads in the four-team tourney con-sist of Class 4A No. 6 In-dianapolis Pike, 4A No. 10 Greenfield-Central and 2A No. 5 Providence.
Jeff will have several non-conference challeng-es in December. The Red Devils will host perenni-al Kentucky power Sacred Heart Academy from Lou-isville on Thursday, Dec. 10. Jeff will travel to 4A No. 6 Carmel on Tuesday, Dec. 22. Then on Dec. 29-30, the Devils will play in the Columbus North Invi-tational, which features de-fending 4A state champion Columbus North, 4A No. 3 Penn and 3A No. 6 Evans-ville Memorial.
“I’ve done everything I can to get us the best
schedule we can get. Hope-fully, that will pay off in the long run,” Warren said. “I’m from the school of thought that to be the best, you’ve got to go out and play the best.”
Williams thinks the tough non-conference con-tests will get Jeff ready for the postseason.
“If we can get beat those teams, we can beat any-body in our sectional be-cause those teams are ex-tremely good,” she said.
Jeff is currently 3-2 with victories over Aus-tin, Bloomington South and Silver Creek. The Red Devils’ two losses have been by single digits. They fell to North Harrison 49-48 in the season opener Nov. 6. Last Saturday, Jeff lost its HHC opener at Bed-ford, 36-27, but it led with 90 seconds remaining.
“I’m happy to be above .500,” Warren said. “I think we kind of let one slip away that first game against North Harrison. But that’s going to happen with young kids. I think we’ve gotten better each game.”
Devils hope they are HHC, sectional contenders by January
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8 | TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 24, 2015 | BASKETBALL
PROVIDENCE PIONEERS2015-16 SCHEDULENov. 10 at Lanesville W, 56-15Nov. 17 Madison Shawe W, 62-25Nov. 20 New Albany W, 46-43Nov. 21 at Eastern L, 35-51Nov. 25 South Central 7:30 p.m.Nov. 28 Greenfield-Central* NoonNov. 28 Final round* 6 or 7:30 p.m. Dec. 4 Salem 7:30 p.m.Dec. 11 Henryville 7:30 p.m.Dec. 17 at Christian Acad. 7:30 p.m.Dec. 22 First round+ TBADec. 23 Final round+ TBD Dec. 29 First round# TBADec. 29 Second round# TBD Dec. 30 Final round# TBDJan. 8 at Clarksville 6 p.m.Jan. 12 at New Washington 7:30 p.m.Jan. 14 at Switzerland Co. 7:30 p.m.Jan. 15 at Charlestown 7:30 p.m.Jan. 20 Rock Creek 7:30 p.m.Jan. 23 Austin 2:30 p.m.Jan. 26 at Crawford Co. 7:30 p.m.Jan. 28 Floyd Central 7:30 p.m.Feb. 2-6 Henryville Sectional* Jeffersonville Hoopsgiving
+ Charlestown Holiday Tournament
# BNL Tournament
2015-16 ROSTERNo. Name Pos. Ht. Gr.
2 Mikaila Heavrin G/F 5-7 123 Brinley Prather G/F 5-8 114 Cheyenne Brooks G 5-6 115 Olivia Jenkins G 5-7 1110 Sydney Milliner G/F 5-7 1111 Brooke Hayden G 5-6 1112 Marissa Hornung F 5-9 1015 Hannah Wolford G 5-9 1023 Claire Rauck F 5-9 1124 Lexie Libs F 5-10 1130 Riley Quinn C 6-0 1133 Mia Fougerousse C 5-11 1143 Ally Tandy C 6-1 11
2014-2015 RESULTS (22-6)Nov. 11 at Crothersville W, 69-47Nov. 13 at Madison Shawe W, 61-29Nov. 14 Rock Creek W, 70-24Nov. 15 at Henryville L, 54-61Nov. 18 at Madison Shawe W, 49-35Nov. 21 at New Albany L, 44-56Nov. 22 Eastern W, 49-29Nov. 26 at South Central W, 44-42Dec. 5 at Salem W, 54-45Dec. 12 at Henryville L, 39-43Dec. 18 Christian Academy W, 46-28Dec. 22 Silver Creek L, 33-45Dec. 23 Clarksville W, 73-22Jan. 2 Switzerland Co. W, 47-34Jan. 9 Clarksville W, 84-37Jan. 13 New Washington W, 88-25Jan. 16 Charlestown W, 55-38Jan. 21 at Rock Creek W, 68-26Jan. 24 at Austin W, 54-45Jan. 27 Crawford Co. W, 51-29Jan. 29 at Floyd Central W, 59-58Feb. 3 Lanesville W, 75-36Feb. 5 Jeffersonville L, 41-54Feb. 13 at Paoli* W, 69-60 Feb. 14 Crawford Co.* W, 66-44 Feb. 23 North Knox+ W, 68-47 Feb. 24 Switzerland Co.+ W, 49-42 Feb. 28 Heritage Christian# L, 41-61* Sectional game
CLARKSVILLE — Provi-dence had its most successful season in program history last season, finishing 22-6 and ad-vancing to the Class 2A semi-state.
It’s possible that the person least surprised at that result was coach Brad Burden.
In his eight seasons at Prov-idence, Burden’s teams have never finished with a worse won-loss record than the pre-vious season. That’s going to be a tough accomplishment to match after last year’s march through the postseason.
“The group we have now is one we knew had the po-tential to do great things for a while,” he said. “Now that they’ve gotten really close. Can they get better? They can. They’re competitive enough. They like playing with each other. They’re un-selfish. I like what we see, but we play an extremely tough schedule and anything can happen. At some point, there’s going to be adversity. I like our chances.”
Providence lost one senior starter from last year, guard/
forward Michaela Hoke (five points, four rebounds per game), and a reserve Sara Gryboski. Burden’s squad re-
turns everyone else.With only one senior on
the roster — forward Mikalia Heavrin — there is an assort-ment of riches on the Pioneer roster. Forward Claire Rauck, a junior All-State candidate, is Providence’s leading re-turning scorer. The 5-foot-9 Rauck averaged almost 20 points per game last season and chipped in nearly five re-bounds.
She’s joined by sophomore point guard Hannah Wolford (14 points per game), soph-omore guard/forward Maris-sa Hornung (10 ppg) and 5-9 junior guard Lexis Libs (four points, six rebounds). Ju-nior Cheyenne Brooks, who averaged more than eight points per game last season, slides into the spot vacated by Hoke. The defensive ace played starter’s minutes last season.
“I think we’re deep. We play well together and we’re hungry for more,” Rauck said. “Last year we got a taste of what winning was re-ally like, and all of us have been working harder to try and get back there again this season.”
They also know when to step up and fill a void when necessary. Last season, as Rauck was nursing an inju-ry and was out against Hen-ryville, Wolford poured in 30 points in only her fourth varsity game as a Pioneers.
“A lot of our players are versatile and can play a lot of different positions,” Wolford said. “It’s important if one of us isn’t having a good game, or if someone’s hurt, to be able to take on their respon-sibility. That’s what makes a good team.”
Riley Quinn, a 6-0 junior center, and Mia Fougerousse,
a 5-11 junior, add size and depth, and Olivia Jenkins, an-other junior, adds another ex-perienced skilled player at the guard position.
Hornung, Libs and Foug-erousse were integral parts of the Pioneers’ volleyball squad that recently won its third consecutive state cham-pionship, so there may be a little bit of early-season as-similation that will need to take place.
“We’re ready,” said Hor-nung, who is also the squad’s returning leading rebounder at eight per game. “There’s a little bit of a transition from volleyball to basketball, but I know as soon as our volley-ball season was over, we took a little bit of a break and we were ready to get started.”
There’s already been a little bit of blip in the road during early season play. The Pio-neers, who were ranked No. 1 in Class 2A, were knocked off their perch Saturday — decisively in fact — by pos-sible sectional-rival Eastern. Add 7-0 Henryville into the sectional mix and it’s not go-ing to be an easy road for the Pioneers.
Burden feels that chances are good his squad will live up to the hype.
“As long as they keep work-ing hard and playing togeth-er, the sky is the limit for this team,” he said. “We’ve got size, experience, competitive spirit ... all the ingredients are there for a special team. We just have to keep getting better and approaching each game as a must-win.”
Pioneers want more success following regional championship
Providence forward Claire Rauck is embraced by teammates on the bench after leaving the game in
the fourth quarter of the Pioneers’ 66-44 triumph over Crawford County in last year’s Class 2A Paoli Sectional final for the Pioneers’ first sectional championship in school history. | STAFF PHOTO BY TYLER STEWART
Providence’s Cheyenne Brooks drives to the basket during last season’s Clarksville City Championship game. The Pioneers de-
feated crosstown-rival Clarksville, 84-37. | PHOTO BY JOE ULLRICH
BASKETBALL | TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 24, 2015 | 9
PROVIDENCE PIONEERS2015-16 SCHEDULENov. 27 Indpls. Metropolitan 7:30 p.m.Dec. 4 at Austin 7:30 p.m.Dec. 5 at Madison 7:30 p.m.Dec. 8 at Meade Co. (Ky.) 7:30 p.m.Dec. 12 Scottsburg 7:30 p.m.Dec. 18 Floyd Central 7:30 p.m.Dec. 19 Charlestown 7:30 p.m.Dec. 29 First round+ TBADec. 30 Final round+ TBA Jan. 8 at Clarksville 7:30 p.m. Jan. 9 at Madison Shawe 7:30 p.m.Jan. 16 at Jeffersonville 7:30 p.m.Jan. 19 Crawford Co. 7:30 p.m.Jan. 22 Henryville 7:30 p.m.Jan. 26 Silver Creek 7:30 p.m.Jan. 29 at Christian Academy 7:30 p.m.Feb. 4 at South Central 7:30 p.m.Feb. 12 New Albany 7:30 p.m.Feb. 16 at Rock Creek 7:30 p.m.Feb. 19 North Harrison 7:30 p.m.Feb. 20 at Brownstown 7:30 p.m.Feb. 26 at New Washington 7:30 p.m.March 1-5 Class 2A Paoli Sectional
* Silver Creek Holiday Tournament
2015-16 ROSTERNo. Name Pos. Ht. Grade
3 Juston Betz G 6-2 115 Max Leist G 5-10 1210 Eli Coker G 6-1 1111 Sam Conrad G 6-0 1112 Cullen Ebert G 5-8 1021 Sean Morris F 6-1 1123 Landon Sprigler G 5-8 924 Alex Judd F 6-2 1131 Hunter Byerley C 6-3 1235 Griffin Libs F 6-6 1253 Dawson Mitchell C 6-5 11
2014-2015 RESULTS (9-12)Nov. 28 Indpls. Metropolitan L, 55-64Dec. 5 Austin W, 46-40Dec. 6 Madison L, 47-50Dec. 13 at Scottsburg L, 55-68Dec. 19 at Floyd Central L, 45-48Dec. 20 at Charlestown W, 43-37Dec. 29 at Silver Creek L, 32-55Dec. 30 Clarksville W, 49-47Jan. 9 Clarksville W, 49-36Jan. 10 Madison Shawe W, 56-49Jan. 17 Jeffersonville L, 33-34Jan. 20 at Crawford Co. W, 58-49Jan. 23 at Henryville L, 38-41Jan. 27 at Silver Creek L, 36-53Jan. 30 Christian Academy L, 46-52Feb. 6 at New Albany L, 36-61Feb. 12 South Central W, 54-28Feb. 20 at North Harrison L, 56-69Feb. 27 New Washington W, 33-32Mar. 3 Henryville* W, 46-28 Mar. 6 at Crawford Co.* L, 37-42* Sectional game
CLARKSVILLE — It was just two years ago when Juston Betz en-tered the Providence High School basketball program as a 5-foot-9 freshman who may have been 120 pounds dripping wet.
Two years later, it’s al-most startling to recall Betz from the 2013-14 season. Now a junior, he’s 6-2 and has gained 40-50 pounds that have translated into muscle.
“It’s important to put the work in on the court but in the weight room, too,” said Betz, who averaged 10 points a game for the Pioneers last season and is their second-leading re-turning scorer. “When you play a schedule like ours, and you’re taking on 3A and 4A schools, you’ve got to be ready to take the pounding.”
The team’s leading scorer, Griffin Libs, also gained an inch over the offseason and stands 6-6. Despite adding 20-30 more pounds, he hasn’t sacri-ficed his leaping ability, throwing down alley-oops and reverse slams during the team’s recent public exhibition at the Larkin Center.
“As a team, I think we’re a lot more explosive and another year has made us stronger and better,” said Libs, who averaged 11 points and six rebounds last season. “Another year together with us and Coach [Andrew Grantz] has made us more confi-dent and we’re ready to get the season started.”
Grantz, a Providence graduate and former assis-tant coach at Indiana Uni-versity Southeast and for the Team Southern Indiana AAU program, is in his second year at the helm at the school.
Grantz is also the found-er of the Attack And Re-act offense, a series of sets that have gained the coach a lot of attention in coach-ing circles.
The Pioneers were 9-12 last season in Grantz’s first year after taking over from Lou Lefevre, but it was obvious to most observers that the team improved quite a bit throughout the season.
There’s an opportunity for the Pioneers to make some noise this season. While their schedule in-cludes local powers Jef-fersonville, New Albany, Floyd Central and Silver Creek, the Class 2A sec-tional at Paoli appears to be winnable this year and the Pioneers seem as ready as anyone to take the crown.
Grantz challenged his squad to take 15,000 shots over the course of the sum-mer, wherever they could — at the gym, at a park, at their home.
“People will notice our size, but I think what peo-ple will notice this season is our confidence,” he said. “I asked them to take that many shots, and at that point when you see the ball go through the bas-ket that many times, your confidence can’t help but grow.”
Joining Betz and Libs in the starting lineup will be junior forward Alex Judd, a hard-nosed, 6-2 player who averaged six points and almost seven rebounds last season. Junior guard Sam Conrad, who aver-aged four points per game, is also back.
One gaping spot that needs to be filled is the void of 6-5 junior center Dawson Mitchell, a tight end for the football team who suffered a knee injury during sectional play and is out for the season.
Two players Grantz be-lieves can help fill the void is 6-3 senior Hunter Byer-ley and 6-1 junior forward Sean Morris. Morris missed 17 games with a broken hand last season, and Byer-ly dealt with a nagging hip injury last year.
“Talk about kids who have been tested and put through the ringer,” Grantz said. “It’s great to have them back.”
Joining Betz and Conrad in the backcourt will be se-niors Max Leist, who also saw his playing time lim-ited due to the injury bug last season, sophomore Cullen Ebert and junior Eli Coker.
Coker didn’t get a lot of playing time last year, but he “has grown, matured and really gotten better,” Grantz said.
So the Pioneers appear to
have a lot of pieces ready to make an impact, which is how Grantz wants it.
“We don’t have anything set in stone, and what we want is these guys to take
personal responsibility for their own playing time,” he said. “The way these kids have been working in practice, it’s tough to fig-ure out a top 5.”
Pioneers appear ready to challenge for championships again
Clarksville senior Cody Leonhardt moves the ball across the court during the
Generals’ game at Floyd Central last season. | STAFF PHOTO BY CHRISTOPHER FRYER
Clarksville
went 3-20
in the first
season for
Brian McE-
wen as the
Generals’ head
coach. His
team is
expect-
ed to be
improved
in 2015-16.
| PHOTO BY JOE ULLRICH
GO GENERALS
1351 Veterans Parkway, Clarksville, IN 471291-800-232-2642 | www.centra.org
BASKETBALL | TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 24, 2015 | 11
CLARKSVILLE GENERALS2015-16 SCHEDULENov. 3 Medora+ W 76-17Nov. 5 at Rock Creek+ W 55-42Nov. 6 at Henryville+ L, 17-56Nov. 7 Crothersville+ L, 45-63Nov. 13 at Corydon* L, 30-40Nov. 14 Borden L, 49-61Nov. 17 at Rock Creek W, 62-43 Nov. 21 Christian Academy L, 45-58Dec. 2 Silver Creek* 7:30 p.m.Dec. 5 Crawford Co. 7:30 p.m.Dec. 8 at Shoals 7:30 p.m.Dec. 12 Eastern* 6 p.m.Dec. 15 at Brownstown* 7:30 p.m.Dec. 17 Austin* 7:30 p.m.Dec. 22 First round# TBADec. 23 Final round# TBD Jan. 8 Providence 6 p.m.Jan. 12 at Salem* 7:30 p.m.Jan. 16 North Harrison* 2:30 p.m.Jan. 21 at Lanesville 7:30 p.m.Jan. 26 Henryville 7:30 p.m.Jan. 28 at Charlestown* 7:30 p.m.Feb. 2-6 Class 2A Henryville Sectional* Mid-Southern Conference Game
+ Henryville Tipoff Tournament
# Charlestown Holiday Tournament
2015-16 ROSTERNo. Name Pos. Ht. Grade
3 Courtney Holmes F 5-10 124 Aly Weber G 5-0 1011 Amber Grier G 5-0 1213 Morgan Eversole F 5-6 1220 Eliana Maglione F 5-7 1121 Makayla Dare G 5-1 1223 Ciara Early F 5-3 1224 Bailey Sharp G 5-5 1232 Kaelyn Gibson F/C 5-5 1133 Destiny Givings F 5-7 1134 Brittney Andres F 5-4 1140 Dee Baker C 5-8 12
2014-2015 RESULTS (4-21)Nov. 11 at Medora W, 41-36Nov. 13 Irvington Prep W, 70-20Nov. 14 Henryville L, 25-48Nov. 15 Crothersville L, 28-47Nov. 18 Rock Creek W, 56-19Nov. 22 at Christian Academy L, 39-49Dec. 3 at Silver Creek L, 14-53Dec. 6 at Crawford Co. L, 27-54Dec. 9 Shoals W, 57-37Dec. 13 at Eastern L, 29-59Dec. 16 Brownstown L, 16-89Dec. 18 at Austin L, 16-69Dec. 22 at Charlestown L, 28-72Dec. 23 Providence L, 22-73Jan. 8 Scottsburg L, 18-60Jan. 9 at Providence L, 37-84Jan. 13 Salem L, 29-57Jan. 17 at North Harrison L, 10-60Jan. 22 Lanesville L, 29-43Jan. 27 at Henryville L, 24-56Jan. 29 Charlestown L, 20-68Feb. 3 at Borden L, 25-66Feb. 5 Corydon L, 47-64Feb. 7 Crothersville L, 34-62Feb. 10 at Paoli * L, 31-76* Sectional game
Conveniently located in Jeffersonville on the river and on Charlestown Road in New Albany.
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12 | TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 24, 2015 | BASKETBALL
and put in some work. As for me, I feel like my job is to get them shots. As long as they’re scoring points, we’re going to win games.”
The Mustangs also look for-ward to doing something this year that they’ve not ever been a part of — getting to host the sec-
tional. Borden, which previously hosted the Class A sectional ev-ery year due to its large-capacity gymnasium, moved to the West Washington Sectional this sea-son. New Washington’s James Matthews Gymnasium is now the largest in the six-team tour-nament with a capacity of nearly 2,000.
“We’re excited for that,” El-lison said. “It’ll be special to be able to play in our own gym and on our own floor.”
Even with the loss of Borden from the tournament, the field is still talented and will provide a challenge. Christian Academy, Lanesville, Rock Creek and sec-tional rookie Madison Shawe
will likely be contenders.“There are several teams that
could win it,” said May, who doesn’t count his team out of the running either. “I feel like, just getting that taste of the sectional championship and experiencing the atmosphere of that, they want to be there. They’re really mo-tivated. I can see a difference in
them this year. Hopefully that experience will be able to benefit us.”
The Mustangs open their regu-lar season with a trip to Class 3A Charlestown on Tuesday, then host back-to-back games against potential sectional opponents Rock Creek and Christian Acad-emy on Dec. 4 and 5.
which will be played at Hen-ryville, is one of the toughest 2A sectionals in Indiana. It features three ranked teams and the Wolf-pack squad that eliminated the Hornets last year and pushed them into overtime on Nov. 13.
“They’re going to throw the ball up and you have to go play,” Con-rad said. “I think we can control what happens this year and that’s always a good thing.”
“If we work hard, we’ll be fine,” Huddleston said.
Senior Haley Huddleston, who is leading the Hornets at 13.7 points per game through seven contests, said last year’s loss in the sectional refocused the team on its ultimate goal.
“We’ve matured a lot,” Hud-dleston said. “The Crawford loss really put things into perspective.
A lot more people are stepping up and becoming leaders.”
Last week, Providence earned the No. 1 ranking in Class 2A. Eastern then toppled the Pioneers and is up to No. 9 in the poll, one spot behind Henryville.
“I think it’s too early in the season to tell anything,” Hollis said. “The rankings are basically from last season. You don’t worry about that. You just have to go out and play.”
Hollis, who is averaging 13.5 points, 4.1 assists and 2.7 steals early in the season, said there’s no doubt in her mind Henryville will have a successful 2015-16 cam-paign. This season, though, will mostly be measured on how the Hornets play in February.
“We have seven seniors, so win-ning a sectional I think would be huge,” she said.
HENRYVILLE: Seniors Huddleston, Hollis off to fast startsCONTINUED FROM PAGE 4
Henryville’s Haley Huddleston drives to the basket during the Hor-nets’ loss against Crawford County at the Class 2A Paoli Sectional last February. | STAFF PHOTO BY CHRISTOPHER FRYER
MUSTANGS: New Wash opens its season Tuesday at CharlestownCONTINUED FROM PAGE 5
able to rotate in and out and not lose anything on the floor. We’re going to try to get them as much experience as we can through the season so that by the end of the year we’ll have an established group of 10 to 12 players that we hesitate to in the game. That’s what we’re working toward.”
At 5-10, junior Natalie Harrod will be called up-on to grab some rebounds this year after playing in only four varsity games last season. Sam Crace, a quick sophomore guard, and senior Jodi Davidson round out the early-season varsity roster.
Holloway, while uncer-tain of the number of wins and losses this year’s team will put in the book in her first year, is sure of one thing: Her Mustangs are focused, and they’re buy-ing in.
“We’re teaching a lot of things that, in terms of of-fensive and defensive sys-tems that they’re not used to, and that requires pa-tience, but it also that kind of puts the returning play-ers on an even keel with the others because it’s new for them as well,” said Hollo-way, who is implementing a read-and-react, cut-and-drive game. “But it’s a good thing because we’re
all starting and moving for-ward at the same time.”
“I love basketball and I know basketball,” Tye said, “but I’m learning a lot this year already. [Coach Holloway] moti-vates us every day to want to do our best and give 100 percent.”
New Wash opened its season 0-6, including a 92-22 home-court thumping by big, athletic 4A New Albany, but the Mustangs have never shied away from a tough schedule. In fact, of their 22 regular-season games, eight are against schools class 3A or higher.
“We may take licks,” Holloway said, “but we play a tough schedule for a reason. Once the tour-nament rolls around, we’ll have played teams that’ll have us prepared for what-ever situation we may come across. We want to be challenged, and some seasons that may translate to an ‘L’ on the score-board, but we’ve been a part of seasons around here where we’ve given those 3A and 4A teams a run for their money. We’ll be back there again. It takes buy-in and we all have to believe it, but I’d like to think that we’ll be back to having years like that again very soon.”
The Mustangs are also looking forward to hosting
Sectional 62 this season, which looks a little differ-ent with the loss of last-year’s champion Borden to Sectional 61 and the ad-dition of Shawe Memorial.
“It’s a comfort, to me, to be able to play at home, and not having to travel is priceless, especially if you have to travel two or three times in the same week,” Holloway said.
As for the Southern Ath-letic Conference crown, which was shared last year by Henryville and Borden, Holloway foresees another competitive year.
“Borden and Henryville both have a good core player who can really take over a basketball game if you let them. Crothersville also has some athleticism and can do damage, and I don’t ever count out South Central and coach (Ran-dall] Schoen. The confer-ence will be competitive,” she said. “For us, it’s hav-ing the mindset that inex-perience doesn’t matter when you walk out on the floor if you’re ready to compete and make your opponent play to their weaknesses.”
So while the players may have their own goals for victories, titles and bringing hardware back to New Washington, Hollo-way has her sights set on growth – both on and off
the hardwood.“What we want to do
more than anything is to train good habits and train them to think for them-selves on the court. When you’re training a habit, it may not happen right away. It may not happen
by the end November. It may be December, or it may be January before things fall into place,” she said. “But I hope that what people see when they watch us is a team that truly and genuinely loves being on the floor
playing together, having that excitement to just get to lace up and go out and play basketball. I hope people see our energy and see us picking each other up when we do encounter those bumps that will in-evitably come along.”
NEW WASH: Mustangs have gotten off to rough start this seasonCONTINUED FROM PAGE 5
“Both,” he said. “We’re going to win both. We have the talent this year to do it.”
Eastern is the defending sec-tional champion but is dealing with an injury to star Grant Newcomb. Providence and Clarksville each return the nu-cleuses of their teams, and Paoli and Crawford County are al-ways contenders.
“I think the sectional, it’s wide open,” Hill said. “A lot of teams lost some components. Us and Providence and Clarksville didn’t lose a ton. It should be a really fun sectional this year.”
The Hornets will open the sea-son Tuesday at home against ri-val Silver Creek.
“They lost a lot of kids from last year,” Hill said. “I know their [junior varsity] was suc-cessful and Brandon [Hoff-man] is one of the best coaches around. I know he’ll have them ready to go.”
The Dragons have beaten Henryville 13 straight times.
“It really gets our guys ready,” Hill said. “There’s always a lit-tle added incentive. It’s a fun time.”
HORNETS: Walker believes Henryville can win SAC, sectionalCONTINUED FROM PAGE 4
Henryville guard Braxton Robertson goes up for a shot during the Hornets’ home game against Eastern last season. | STAFF PHOTO BY CHRISTOPHER FRYER
500 Quartermaster Ct. Room 205, Jeffersonville
812-285-6440 • www.jeffparks.org
GOOD LUCK to Coach Luce
and the Red Devil Basketball Team
during the 2015-2016 Season!
From the Jeffersonville Parks and Recreation Team
BASKETBALL | TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 24, 2015 | 13
NEW ALBANY BULLDOGS2015-16 SCHEDULENov. 28 at Bloomington South 7:30 p.m.
Dec. 5 Ev. Harrison 8 p.m.
Dec. 11 at Floyd Central* 7:30 p.m.
Dec. 12 Pike+ 5 p.m.
Dec. 18 Seymour* 7:30 p.m.
Dec. 19 at Carmel 7:30 p.m.
Dec. 29 at Ev. Bosse 7:30 p.m.
Dec. 30 Ev. Reitz 8 p.m.
Jan. 8 Jeffersonville* 7:30 p.m.
Jan. 9 Lexington Dunbar# 6 p.m.
Jan. 15 at Madison* 7:30 p.m.
Jan. 16 Scottsburg 7:30 p.m.
Jan. 19 Charlestown 7:30 p.m.
Jan. 22 at Silver Creek 7:30 p.m.
Jan. 29 Ev. North 8 p.m.
Jan. 30 Jasper 7:30 p.m.
Feb. 4 at Jennings Co.* 7:30 p.m.
Feb. 6 Columbus East* 2 p.m.
Feb. 12 at Providence 7:30 p.m.
Feb. 13 at Ev. Central 8 p.m.
Feb. 19 Bedford NL* 7:30 p.m.
Feb. 26 at Bloomington North 7:30 p.m.
March 1-5 Class 4A Seymour Sectional
* Hoosier Hills Conference Game
+ At Southport
# At Frankfort, Ky.
2015-16 ROSTERNo. Name Pos. Ht. Grade
1 Romeo Langford G/F 6-4 10
3 Adrian Pratt-Thomas G 5-11 12
5 Sean East G 5-10 10
11 Peyton Martin G 5-11 11
13 Rondale Moore G 5-9 10
22 Isaac Hibbard G 6-0 11
23 Michael Maxwell F/C 6-3 12
25 Josh Jefferson G 6-1 12
33 Kameron Guess F 6-2 10
35 Blake Murphy F 6-4 10
40 Seth Short F/C 6-5 11
2014-2015 RESULTS (23-3)Nov. 29 Bloomington South W, 73-56
NEW ALBANY — When a program loses four se-niors that helped win 20-plus games, a conference cham-pionship and a sectional ti-tle in the previous season, the expectations within the team and outside it are usually lower for the upcoming cam-paign.
It is the exact opposite at New Albany this season.
The Bulldogs have their sights set on matching last year’s accomplishments, which included a 23-3 record, a second consecutive outright Hoosier Hills Conference championship and a second straight Class 4A Seymour Sectional title — and perhaps doing a little bit more.
The statewide media thinks New Albany has a good shot of achieving more this season, as the Bulldogs rank second in The Associated Press Class 4A preseason poll.
“We’re ranked No. 2 right now, so that’s a pretty good
ranking,” New Albany senior guard Josh Jefferson said. “We’re just going to go out and play and show that we deserve to be up there and work our way to No. 1. We’re going to take it one game at a time right now.”
Sophomore forward and reigning News and Tribune Player of the Year Romeo Langford thinks the goal is simple for the Bulldogs in 2015-16.
“It’s the same as it is every year — try to win state,” he said. “Every night we’ve got to come out and play hard and play as a team. We have to play defense because defense wins games.”
Junior guard Isaac Hibbard agrees with his teammate on the goal of a state title.
“The team’s expectations this year are a state champi-onship — nothing less,” he said. “We came up short the past couple of years, but this year we’re feeling better than we ever have at the start of the season. This should be
a great year for us. We just have to play our best bas-ketball when the tournament starts. Everything has got to click.”
Head coach Jim Shannon, who is in his 18th season at New Albany with a 304-96 record, is unsure if he thinks his team can make a deep run in this year’s state tour-nament. He does say that he likes coaching this version of the Bulldogs.
“I think we’ll know more by Christmas. But it’s so ear-ly,” he said of the potential of how good this team can be. “I know we’re ranked re-ally high — No. 2 or what-ever. I know that’s a good ranking, but to me, rankings don’t mean a thing. We need to play first and then I can let people know what I think. I don’t know right now, I re-ally don’t. I think we can be as good as this team wants to be. They’re a lot of fun to coach. They’re coachable. They play well together. They play hard and their basket-
ball IQ is pretty high. When you have those attributes, you don’t ever want them to grad-uate. You want them to stay.”
When you think New Al-bany in 2015-16, you auto-matically think of Langford. Last season as a freshman, he averaged 17.6 points, 6.1 re-bounds, three blocked shots and two steals per game. Langford has received schol-arship offers from five NCAA Division I schools: Indiana, IUPUI, Purdue, UCLA and Vanderbilt. He also is being recruited by Butler, Louisville and Ohio State.
Shannon is looking for his star to step up his leadership role on the team this season.
“We expect him to be more of a vocal leader,” Shannon said. “The thing about him is he led us in five [statistical] categories, so I don’t really expect any more out of him than [producing] in those five categories. He’s improved. I think he’ll be even more dif-ficult for teams to stop. I think
Bulldogs hope to make deep tournament runBY KEVIN HARRIS
NEW ALBANY BULLDOGS2015-16 SCHEDULENov. 7 at Ev. Bosse W, 72- 35Nov. 10 Columbus North L, 32- 39Nov. 13 at New Washington W, 92- 22Nov. 14 Silver Creek W, 79- 28Nov. 20 at Providence L, 43-46Nov. 21 at Corydon W, 68-47Nov. 25 Eastern 7:30 p.m.Dec. 3 North Harrison 7:30 p.m.Dec. 5 Bedford NL* 1:30 p.m.Dec. 10 Scottsburg 7:30 p.m.Dec. 12 at Jennings Co.* 1:30 p.m.Dec. 17 at Switzerland Co. 7:30 p.m.Dec. 19 Castle 1:30 p.m.Dec. 29 First round# TBADec. 30 Final round# TBDJan. 2 at Ev. Harrison 2:30 p.m.Jan. 7 Madison* 7:30 p.m.Jan. 9 at Floyd Central* 7:30 p.m.Jan. 16 at Columbus East* 1:30 p.m.Jan. 19 at Charlestown 7:30 p.m.Jan. 22 Jeffersonville* 7:30 p.m.Jan. 28 Seymour* 7:30 p.m.Feb. 2-6 Class 4A BNL Sectional* Hoosier Hills Conference Game
# North Central Tournament
2015-16 ROSTERNo. Name Pos. Ht. Gr.
3 Alayasia Douglas G 5-6 910 Megan Thevenow G 5-6 1215 Jenna Shine G 6-0 1220 Chyna Anthony F 6-1 1121 Sadie Meyer G 5-8 1123 Marissa Jones G 5-5 1124 Aaliyah Bell G 5-8 1225 Ashley Lyninger F 5-10 1232 Earlean Davis G 5-6 1134 Savanna Pinkston F 5-9 1035/33 Marrisia Ray G 5-6 1142 Julyen Condra G 5-11 1044 Kelsy Taylor F 6-0 10
2014-2015 RESULTS (14-9)Nov. 15 at Silver Creek W, 56-49Nov. 21 Providence W, 56-44Nov. 22 Corydon W, 59-39Nov. 26 at Eastern W, 40-29Dec. 4 at North Harrison L, 42-46Dec. 9 Bedford NL L, 26-57Dec. 11 at Scottsburg W, 64-46Dec. 13 Jennings Co. W, 67-64Dec. 18 Switzerland Co. W, 53-45Dec. 20 at Castle W, 56-42Dec. 29 at North Central L, 45-59Dec. 30 Hamilton SE L, 33-39Jan. 2 Ev. Harrison W, 58-45Jan. 8 at Madison L, 47-57Jan. 10 Floyd Central W, 49-42Jan. 13 at S. Oldham (Ky.) W, 55-54Jan. 17 Columbus East W, 64-51Jan. 20 Charlestown L, 55-60 (OT)Jan. 23 at Jeffersonville W, 43-28Jan. 29 at Seymour L, 37-58Jan. 31 Ev. Bosse L, 53-58Feb. 3 New Washington W, 70-35Feb. 10 Bedford NL* L, 29-50* Sectional game
NEW ALBANY — New Albany wants to play one style during the 2015-16 sea-son — up-tempo.
Just ask the Bulldogs’ Ashley Lyninger.
“I’ve always wanted to play a fast tempo, but this is finally the time where we can actually mentally handle it and physically excel at it,” she said.
So far, the Bulldogs’ fast-paced system has helped them start the season with a 4-2 record. They are aver-aging 64.3 points per game, ranking 29th in the state. In its four victories, New Al-bany has scored 77.8 points per contest. The Bulldogs also have used their overall quickness in making their defense more stifling, as they allowed 36.2 points a game.
“There isn’t a team in In-diana that can keep up with us for four quarters with our transition,” Bulldog point guard Marissa Jones said. “It’s a great feeling to know we’re putting as many points as we are.”
New Albany’s solid start has it thinking about mak-ing a run at both the Hoosier Hills Conference and Class 4A Bedford North Lawrence Sectional championships.
“I see us going a lot fur-ther than sectional, just be-cause there are very few teams right now that can keep up with us for four quarters. I truly believe that,” Jones said. “We’re so family oriented. We don’t want to lose this [rapport]. We want it to go as far as it can. Sectional is what we want and conference.”
Bulldogs’ head coach Tammy Geron says her players definitely have their sights set on capturing the program’s first sectional title since 2002.
“I think our sectional is wide open. I think we can all compete with each other on any given night. I think sectional is a goal for this group and beyond,” Geron said. “We’ve got some pret-ty high goals for ourselves, but we want to look to im-prove every day and every game. We want to keep a high level of energy. That’s a big focus for us and some-thing we feel like that is hard to compete with. I think this team has the ability to put together a very good year in the win-and-loss column just because of their competitive nature.”
The Bulldogs have four seniors who are expected to play key roles in a potential winning campaign. Three of those four are guards in Jen-na Shine, Aaliyah Bell and
Megan Thevenow. The other senior is Lyninger, who is a 5-foot-10 forward.
Three juniors currently in New Albany’s rotation are Jones, 5-6 guard Earlean Da-vis and 6-1 forward Chyna Anthony. Sophomores July-en Condra and Kelsy Tay-lor and freshman Alayasia Douglas could see some playing time.
“Our team is more than our starting five. We’ve got a solid bench,” Lyninger said.
Geron says Seymour is the favorite to win the HHC. But she thinks the conference race is wide open, as she ex-pects Jeffersonville, Colum-bus East, Jennings County and Bedford to be very com-petitive.
“Seymour I think is the favorite right now. You’ve got Seymour, you’ve got Columbus East, you’ve got Jeff and you’ve got us. Jen-nings is always hard-nosed. They’re guard-dominant this year,” Geron said. “Night-in and night-out, it’s just going to be a battle between con-ference teams. I think that it’s going to be very import-ant for teams to come out and be ready to play.”
The Bulldogs have already lost to two tough non-con-ference opponents in defend-ing Class 4A state champi-on Columbus North (39-32) and archrival Providence (46-43), which was ranked No. 1 in the Indiana Coaches of Girls Sports Association Class 2A poll last week.
Other challenging foes in New Albany’s non-confer-ence slate are on the horizon in Eastern and North Harri-son. The Bulldogs also will play in the North Central tournament in Indianapolis Dec. 29-30, featuring the host Panthers and Hamilton Southeastern.
“We have a pretty tough out-of-conference sched-ule. We’ve got some big schools here and there throughout the schedule,” Geron said. “We go up to North Central, and North
Cent ra l and Hamil ton Southeastern are both in that tournament. They are both powerhouses. It gives us an opportunity to see how we compare to other big schools in the state.”
Athletic New Albany averaging 64.3 points so far in 2015-16
New Albany junior Marissa Jones tries to evade the pressure during the Bulldogs’ 39-32 loss to Columbus North earlier this season. | STAFF PHOTOS BY CHRISTOPHER FRYER
New Albany senior Ashley Lyninger drives to the basket during
the Bulldogs’ 39-32 loss to Columbus North at the Doghouse.
Good Luck
Teams!
BASKETBALL | TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 24, 2015 | 15
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FLOYDS KNOBS — Floyd Central comes into the 2015-16 season look-ing for its first winning campaign since 2012.
The Highlanders lost six of their nine games that were decided by sin-gle-digits last year and will look to five seniors and a host of talented under-classman to reverse that trend.
“This team has good unity,” fifth-year head coach Kirk Hamsley said. “They are close, especially our five seniors. We have more depth this season than in any of my previous four years. We just need to take care of the ball better and learn how to win those close ones this year.”
Gone is Madison Kaiser who led Floyd in scoring and rebounding last sea-son. Despite Kaiser being one of the best players in the area last year, the Highlanders still had their troubles at the offensive end. That is again a con-cern of Hamsley.
“Our scoring could cer-tainly be better than it is right now,” Hamsley said. “We should have more bal-ance this year but we need to find more scoring. Mad-ison did so much for us last year, and now this year, we have girls that need to fig-ure out they need to look to score more.”
Floyd’s always tough schedule begins even hard-er than normal this season with five of its first six games on the road.
“We’ll see how tough we are here early and I’m sure what we don’t do well will be exposed,” Hams-ley said. “We played well against Columbus East [in the season opener], did some things really well, but we just didn’t close things out. It was tied with 2:05 left and then we had two empty possessions and that hurt us.”
Thirteen of Floyd’s 26 losses over the last two seasons have been by nine points or less. Senior guard Maddie Probus has been around for all of those and
she didn’t beat around the bush when talking about her team’s struggles in the final minutes of close games.
“There is no doubt that we need to execute much better at the end of games,” Probus said. “We lost a lot of games last sea-son by single digits. They were all winnable but we just didn’t execute what and when we needed to.”
With the obvious void on the floor with no Mad-ison Kaiser this season, Floyd spent a lot of time on its offense in the offsea-son. However, the defen-sive end has always been Hamsley’s top priority while on the Highlander sidelines and this year will be no different.
“The summer was good and the kids worked hard,” he said. “We worked on shooting a lot, so that should be improved this season. But the girls have to buy in defensively to be able to compete for a sec-tional title. The team has to get on board with the con-
cept we’re trying to put in defensively. We’re taking a step in the right direc-tion, but there still needs to be some sacrifices by cer-tain players.”
Floyd will have formi-dable frontcourt this sea-son, led by Brianna Roth and newcomer Gracie Hale. The mention of the Highlanders presence in the paint brought a smile to the face of senior guard Morgan Wagner.
“It’s comforting to me as a shooter to have our big post players in there” Wagner said. “I know if I’m having an off night
shooting, they’re going to rebound.”
The Hoosier Hills Con-ference and sectional will again be ultra-competitive, but Probus was quick to point out what the team goal is and that she feels it’s very attainable this season.
“Our team goal this year is to win sectional,” she said. “I think now that the Div. I players aren’t at Bedford anymore, the playing field has definitely been leveled. We have five experienced players who have played a lot together, so I think we can do it.”
Floyd hopes talent, depth overcomes lack of scoringBY CHRIS STONER
Floyd Central senior Maddie Probus is one of several returning Highlanders with experi-
ence in 2015-16. | STAFF PHOTO BY CHRISTOPHER FRYER
16 | TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 24, 2015 | BASKETBALL
CHRISTIAN ACADEMY WARRIORS2015-16 SCHEDULENov. 24 Floyd Central 7:30 p.m.Nov. 28 Scottsburg 7:30 p.m.Dec. 4 Switzerland Co. 7:30 p.m.Dec. 5 at New Washington 7:30 p.m.Dec. 11 at Rock Creek 7:30 p.m.Dec. 12 Paoli 7:30 p.m.Dec. 18 South Central 7:30 p.m.Dec. 23 Indpls. Lighthouse+ NoonDec. 29 First round* TBADec. 30 Final round* TBDJan. 2 at Covenant Christian 7:30 p.m.Jan. 8 at CAL 7:30 p.m.Jan. 9 West Washington 7:30 p.m.Jan. 15 Lanesville 7:30 p.m.Jan. 16 at Charlestown 7:30 p.m.Jan. 28 at Louisville Manual 7:30 p.m.Jan. 29 Providence 7:30 p.m.Feb. 4 at Madison Shawe 7:30 p.m.Feb. 4 Trinity Lutheran 7:30 p.m.Feb. 19 at Southwestern 7:30 p.m.Feb. 26 Henryville 7:30 p.m.March 1-5 Class A New Wash Sectional+ At Indianapolis Manual
* South Ripley Tournament
2015-16 ROSTERNo. Name Pos. Ht. Grade
0 Stephen Cook G 6-2 101 Noah Williams G 5-9 105 Nathan Paris F 6-2 1010 Bradley Gay G 6-1 1111 Matt Hamby G 5-11 1120 Patrick Fitzgibbon C 6-6 1130 Riley Linnehan F 6-2 1132 Nic Reed G/F 6-5 1245 Braden Renfro F 6-1 12
2014-2015 RESULTS (21-5)Nov. 24 at Floyd Central L, 56-59Nov. 29 at Scottsburg L, 67-68 (OT)Dec. 5 at Switzerland Co. W, 63-47Dec. 6 New Washington W, 67-38Dec. 9 Salem W, 65-45Dec. 12 Rock Creek W, 61-57Dec. 13 at Paoli W, 57-47Dec. 19 at South Central W, 52-19Dec. 27 Jeffersonville W, 60-33Dec. 29 South Dearborn W, 70-43Dec. 29 Knightstown W, 53-48Dec. 30 Bloomington North L, 50-52 (OT)Jan. 3 Covenant Christian W, 59-46Jan. 9 Christian Academy (Ky.) W, 45-33Jan. 10 at West Washington W, 47-45Jan. 16 at Lanesville W, 59-38Jan. 17 Charlestown L, 28-68Jan. 23 Borden W, 51-22Jan. 30 at Providence W, 52-46Feb. 6 at Trinity Lutheran W, 67-53Feb. 12 Madison Shawe W, 66-36Feb. 20 Southwestern W, 49-28Feb. 27 at Henryville W, 55-35Mar. 6 Lanesville* W, 64-49 Mar. 7 New Washington* W, 63-49 Mar. 14 Barr-Reeve+ L, 33-49* Sectional game
NEW ALBANY — Af-ter winning its first section-al championship since 1999, Christian Academy begins this season ranked fourth in Class A.
The Warriors return two regulars from a team that won 21 games a year ago.
“Losing three starters from last year will make us adjust some things, but we have a re-ally good player in Nic Reed back and we have some real-ly good young talent around him,” fifth-year head coach Steve Kerberg said. “Those guys have worked hard this summer and I think if they play within themselves and play their roles, then having a player like Nic on the floor can make them all better.”
Although a 49-33 loss to eventual state champion Barr-Reeve at regional was disappointing, Kerberg said the sectional crown was a springboard into a productive offseason for his Warriors.
“I thought we had a good summer,” he said. “We got to play a lot of really good bas-ketball teams from Louisville and from all over Indiana. I think playing good competi-tion over the summer the last couple of years has really helped us. That has given us a good idea of where we’re at and what we need to work on.”
CAI’s schedule has gotten stronger each year since Ker-berg’s arrival in 2011. The Warriors have 11 opponents Class 2A or bigger on the slate this season, not includ-ing what should be a very competitive holiday tourna-ment at South Ripley.
“Our goal with a younger team like this is to get bet-ter every day throughout the season,” Kerberg said. “Our ultimate goal is to win an-other sectional. We feel like we’re in the mix again to win it. Playing good competi-tion will help us achieve our goals at the end of the sea-son. We’ve added Louisville Manual to the schedule and we’re playing in a showcase in Indianapolis. Our sched-ule gets tougher every year, that’s good for our program and our kids, and it pays off during the tournament.”
Despite a relatively young team, Kerberg remained op-timistic that a good blend of experience from last season’s success with the youth of this year will pay dividends for Christian Academy in March.
“We’ve got some good young guards that we think are going to contribute and get better during the season,” Kerberg said. “Riley Linne-han improved a lot over the summer. Patrick Fitzgibbons, our big guy, has gotten a lot stronger and we need him to have a big year for us.”
With two-thirds of its start-ing front court and a four-
year starting point guard gone, CAI has some holes to fill. Kerberg isn’t sure if the number four preseason ranking is deserved, but likes what he has seen so far from his squad.
“We have a lot of young
guys that haven’t been through some of the battles yet at the varsity level,” he said. “However, if we take care of the basketball this season and can find rebound-ing from new spots, I think we can play with anybody
on our schedule. I feel like we have enough talent to cut down nets again this year, but I think this group will be one that develops significant-ly throughout the season and gets tougher by the end of the season.”
CAI looks to repeat as sectional champions, advance further in 2016
Christian Academy forward Nic Reed is the top returning player from the Warriors’ sectional cham-
pionship team in 2015. | STAFF PHOTO BY TYLER STEWART
Steve Kerberg helped lead Christian Academy to its first sectional championship in 16 years when
the Warriors won the Borden Sectional in 2015. | FILE PHOTO
BASKETBALL | TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 24, 2015 | 17
CHRISTIAN ACADEMY WARRIORS
2015-16 SCHEDULENov. 14 at New Washington W, 59-54Nov. 17 at West Washington L, 54-63 Nov. 19 at Lanesville W, 57-30 Nov. 20 South Ripley L, 31-67 Nov. 21 at Clarksville W, 58-45Nov. 23 at Orleans 7:30 p.m.Nov. 28 Borden 12:30 p.m.Nov. 30 at Scottsburg 7:30 p.m.Dec. 5 Switzerland Co. 7:30 p.m.Dec. 15 Rock Creek 7:30 p.m.Dec. 17 Providence 7:30 p.m.Dec. 18 South Central 6 p.m.Jan. 5 at Trinity Lutheran 7:30 p.m.Jan. 7 Crothersville 7:30 p.m.Jan. 12 at Southwestern 7:30 p.m.Jan. 16 Eastern 1:30 p.m.Jan. 19 Henryville 7:30 p.m.Jan. 21 at Springs Valley 7:30 p.m.Jan. 23 at Charlestown 7:30 p.m.Jan. 25 at Medora 6 p.m.Feb. 2-6 New Washington Sectional
2015-16 ROSTERNo. Name Pos. Grade1 Danielle Summitt G 113 Alli Stumler F 1011 Hannah Beckley G 1012 Brittany Moffett C 1215 Lizzie Hilburn F 1220 Kye Jenkins C 1121 Audrey Graham F 1122 Cortney Baird F 1223 Kendra Mahan F 1224 Hailey Jones G 1130 Avery Furnish G 1240 Clara Koch G 12
2014-2015 RESULTS (8-16)Nov. 15 New Washington L, 51-60Nov. 18 West Washington W, 54-52Nov. 20 Lanesville L, 43-48Nov. 21 at South Ripley L, 42-64Nov. 22 Clarksville W, 49-39Nov. 24 Orleans W, 46-44Nov. 29 at Borden L, 34-71Dec. 6 at Switzerland Co. L, 21-64Dec. 9 at Louisville Collegiate L, 40-68Dec. 16 at Rock Creek W, 53-22Dec. 18 at Providence L, 28-46Dec. 19 at South Central L, 31-41Dec. 23 Scottsburg L, 38-57Jan. 6 Trinity Lutheran L, 36-53Jan. 8 at Crothersville W, 40-36Jan. 9 CAL L, 37-77Jan. 13 Southwestern L, 34-49Jan. 17 at Eastern L, 33-56Jan. 20 at Henryville L, 40-77Jan. 22 Springs Valley L, 35-53Jan. 26 Medora W, 66-39Feb. 2 South Dearborn W, 48-42Feb. 13 New Washington* W, 61-54 (OT) Feb. 14 Borden* L, 36-78* Sectional game
PAST 10 YEARSCoach: Mike Baird• 2014-15: 8-16• 2013-14: 5-15• 2012-13: 5-14Coach: Emy Lorigan• 2011-12: 8-13Coach: Tim Coomer • 2010-11: 6-17 • 2009-10: 13-9 • 2008-09: 8-15• 2007-08: 7-15Coach: Alan Strickland• 2006-07: 5-15Coach: Jo Bachman• 2005-06: 1-20
Last season, Christian Academy notched its first sectional win since 2003.
The Warriors aim to build on that milestone in 2015-16.
“This team’s positioned to continue our upward trend,” fourth-year head coach Mike Baird said. “I’ll be disap-pointed if we don’t hit dou-ble-digit wins this season. I’m thinking 12 or 13 wins is very doable. This team has it in them and they showed it in the opener [at New Wash-ington].”
CAI had lost 14 straight to traditional Class A-power New Washington before its sectional win over the Mus-tangs last season. The War-riors then opened this season with a 59-54 win at New Wash on Nov. 14th, marking the first time in program his-tory to have beaten the Mus-tangs in consecutive games.
“New Washington has had a lot of success, and for us to now have beaten them two straight, says a lot about where our program is head-ed,” said Baird, who is look-ing to guide CAI to its first winning season since 2009. “When we play teams that have continually beaten us like they had been doing, it does something to you men-tally. Our first game this sea-son, winning at their place, was another big mental obsta-cle that our girls overcame.”
The Warriors have four players that were members of the Class A volleyball state champions. Baird can already see the intensity and winning drive those athletes have brought to the basket-ball court.
“Those girls simply hate to lose,” he said. “They can’t stand losing. I think they have everyone bringing a dif-ferent swagger to the court.”
One of the CAI volley-ball standouts that is new to the basketball program is 6-foot-1 Alli Stumler. The sophomore set a state cham-pionship record with 34 kills and brings things a special skill set to the basketball court, according to Baird.
“Aly is 6-1 and maybe the fastest player on the team,” Baird said. “That’s stuff you can’t teach.”
Offense was a focus and concern coming into the sea-son after last year’s bunch had 11 games in which it scored less than 40 points. However, senior Cortney Baird doesn’t see putting the ball in the hoop as a problem.
“Offense is definitely one of our strengths this year,” the coach’s optimistic daugh-ter said. “Personally, I think
our defense is pretty good too, but over the summer we did a lot of shooting and ball handling stuff.”
Every coach will tell you that a good offense starts on the inside and works its way outside. Senior Brittany Mof-fett likes what she sees of her team’s interior players.
“Our post play is definite-ly our biggest strength right now,” she said. “We have a bunch of tall girls this year, and in past years, we haven’t really had that. That should help us with one of our main goals, which is com-ing to compete in every sin-gle game that we play this year. Last year, there were a few games where we didn’t show up to play and we got creamed. So this year, we want to compete every night, and of course, we want to win the sectional champion-ship.”
The Warriors return four starters from last season and will rely on that experience to weather a brutal first part of their schedule. CAI has six of its first eight games on the road. The Warriors again have a challenging sched-ule that includes traditional powers Borden, Providence, Scottsburg, and Charlestown.
“We are going to find out a lot about where we are ear-ly,” Baird said. “We have two solid leaders in Brittany Moffett and Cortney Baird. They pushed the team in the summer workouts and con-tinue to do that now that the season has started.”
SELLERSBURG — There is good news and bad news for Silver Creek en-tering the 2015-16 season.
The bad news for the Dragons is they graduat-ed seven seniors from last year’s 23-3 team that won the outright Mid-Southern Conference championship and its second consecutive Class 3A sectional title.
The good news is Sil-ver Creek welcomes back NTSPY Player of the Year finalist center Christian Reed and has several tal-ented players on its roster from last season’s 21-1 ju-nior varsity team.
“I think our culture is the same. It’s just differ-ent players,” sixth-year head coach Brandon Hoff-man said. “We lost a ton of guys from last year ob-viously. We lost a lot of leadership, but the guys are working hard and the guys have been in our sys-tem for a while. I really think we can surprise a lot of people.”
Reed will be looked up-on as the Dragons’ lead-er this season as he enters his fourth year as a varsity player. The 6-foot-6 senior led Silver Creek last sea-son in scoring (14.6 points per game) and rebounding (8.9). Reed shot 57 percent from the field in 2014-15. He will play college basketball next season at Lawrence Technolog-ical University, an NA-IA school in Southfield, Mich., near Detroit.
“He’s the only one com-ing back that has major varsity minutes,” Hoffman said. “He’s led us in scor-ing and rebounding the last two years, so he knows how important he is. But he’s even more important now. Now, he’s got to be a leader by example and be a vocal leader. There hasn’t been anything he hasn’t been through as a varsity player.”
Leadership skills have been a point of emphasis for Reed during the pre-season.
“It’s been different hav-ing to build relationships with these guys,” he said. “I think it’s been a matu-rity lesson for me because I’ve had to show some of these guys even my age and younger the ropes the first couple times around. They’re doing a great job of picking up on it. It’s a great challenge that I’ve enjoyed so far.”
Another player Hoffman expects big contributions from is Ryan Baker. The senior guard came off the bench some for the Drag-ons last season.
Last year’s JV players who Hoffman expects pro-
ductive seasons from are junior guard Cameron Ste-phens and senior forwards Alex Long and Zach Dens-ford. Two other seniors from last season’s JV team who should get some play-ing time are Noah Eckert and TJ Tharp.
“A lot of those guys we had playing JV last year were varsity-level play-ers. I really think our JV could’ve won a lot of var-sity games last year and those kids feel that way, too, so they kind of have a chip on their shoul-der,” Hoffman said. “All of them can score. We’re a better shooting team than what we were last year, and I think that’s going to play well in our hands where it may open things up for Christian. If it doesn’t, then we have players who can knock down shots.”
Reed thinks the 2014-15 JV players can make a smooth transition to varsi-ty this year.
“When you’re 21-1, you have to have some talent. They’re used to winning,” Reed said. “The guys are starting to find their spots and their jobs. I think once we figure out these last couple of steps, our record should be great for our last year.”
Along with his team, Hoffman thinks there are four other contenders for the MSC title in Class 3A No. 9 Brownstown Cen-tral, Charlestown, North Harrison and Salem. Those teams also will play in Sil-ver Creek’s 3A sectional, which will take place this season at Charlestown.
“I don’t think there is any doubt that Brown-stown is the favorite. They have three All-Conference players from last year coming back, so it proba-bly starts with them,” said Hoffman, whose team is ranked sixth in The Asso-ciated Press Class 3A pre-season poll. “Other than us, North Harrison is go-ing to be good. Salem has all of their players coming back, so I think they’re go-ing to be better. Charles-town has Jamal Long and he’s going to be a really
good player.”The Dragons’ non-con-
ference schedule includes seven Hoosier Hills Con-ference teams. Highlight-ing that group is Class 4A No. 2 New Albany. The other HHC squads on Silver Creek’s slate are Bedford North Lawrence, Columbus East, Jeffer-sonville, Jennings Coun-ty, Madison and Seymour. Hoffman also expects tough games from non-conference foes Henryville and Providence.
Hoffman believes by tournament time, his pro-gram can make a run at an-other sectional title.
“That’s the goal,” he said. “We’re not there yet. But I think our guys with the way they continue to improve in practice and their pride and work ethic, I really do think we have the pieces to win sectional.”
Despite losing seven seniors, Dragons think they can have solid year
Silver Creek’s Christian Reed takes the ball over the Providence defense during the Dragons’ 53-36 win over the Pioneers in Sellersburg last season. | STAFF PHOTO BY TYLER STEWART
GO DRAGONS
7812 State Rd 60, Sellersburg, IN 471721-800-232-2642 | www.centra.org
GO DRAGONS!
Maple Manor Christian Home
643 W. Utica St,Sellersburg, IN(812)246-4866
BASKETBALL | TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 24, 2015 | 19
SILVER CREEK DRAGONS2015-16 SCHEDULENov. 5 at New Washington W, 63-45Nov. 7 Jennings Co. L, 58-69Nov. 13 Seymour L, 41-69Nov. 14 at New Albany L, 28-79Nov. 18 Charlestown* W, 43-36 Nov. 20 Jeffersonville L, 30-45Nov. 25 at North Harrison* 7:30 p.m.Nov. 28 Ev. Memorial 2:30 p.m.Dec. 2 at Clarksville* 7:30 p.m.Dec. 5 Corydon* 1:30 p.m.Dec. 9 at Columbus East 7:30 p.m.Dec. 12 Scottsburg* 1:30 p.m.Dec. 15 at Henryville 7:30 p.m.Dec. 19 at Brownstown* 1:30 p.m.Dec. 22 First round+ TBADec. 23 Final round+ TBDJan. 9 Salem* 1:30 p.m.Jan. 12 Madison 7:30 p.m.Jan. 16 at Austin* 2:30 p.m.Jan. 23 Eastern* 7:30 p.m.Jan. 27 at South Central 7:30 p.m.Feb. 2-6 Class 3A North Harrison Sectional* Mid-Southern Conference Game+ Charlestown Holiday Tournament
2015-16 ROSTERNo. Name Pos. Ht. Gr.4 Haley Baxter G 5-6 115 Lauren Hall G 5-6 1011 Abby May G 5-5 1114 Kylie Wilkinson G 5-9 1015 Hannah Merriweather G 5-6 1220 Jordan Balz G 5-4 922 Whitny Booher F/C 6-0 1223 Hailey Ramey F/C 6-1 1230 Alyssa Wright G 5-6 931 Lauren Polston G 5-6 1133 Emily Steele F 5-9 950 Savannah O’Neil F/C 5-8 11
2014-2015 RESULTS (9-15)Nov. 14 at Seymour L, 49-63Nov. 15 New Albany L, 49-56Nov. 21 at Jeffersonville L, 40-48Nov. 26 North Harrison L, 48-50Nov. 29 at Ev. Memorial L, 40-71Dec. 3 Clarksville W, 53-14Dec. 6 at Corydon W, 44-43Dec. 11 at Charlestown L, 34-55Dec. 16 Henryville L, 35-46Dec. 18 Brownstown L, 36-51Dec. 22 Providence W, 45-33Dec. 23 at Charlestown L, 39-48Jan. 8 Borden W, 59-42Jan. 10 at Salem L, 51-61Jan. 13 at Madison L, 40-65Jan. 17 Austin W, 60-58Jan. 20 at Jennings Co. L, 42-67Jan. 22 New Washington W, 64-25Jan. 24 at Eastern L, 42-49Jan. 28 South Central W, 47-35Jan. 31 at Scottsburg W, 66-48Feb. 5 Columbus East L, 35-67Feb. 11 Corydon* W, 51-41 Feb. 13 North Harrison* L, 43-45* Sectional game
PAST 10 YEARSCoach: Scott Schoen• 2014-15: 9-15• 2013-14: 7-16• 2012-13: 16-7• 2011-12: 16-5• 2010-11: 17-7 (Sectional Champions)Coach: Ryan Apple• 2009-10: 8-13• 2008-09: 7-15• 2007-08: 4-17• 2006-07: 3-18Coach: Dave Chanley • 2005-06: 15-7
Silver Creek junior Abby May drives by Seymour’s Morgan Ritz in the Dragons’ 69-41 loss to the Owls in Sellersburg on Nov. 14. | STAFF PHOTOS BY CHRISTOPHER FRYER
Silver Creek’s Hailey Ramey puts up a shot during the Dragons’ 45-30 loss to visiting Jefferson-ville last Friday. | PHOTO BY JOE ULLRICH
20 | TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 24, 2015 | BASKETBALL
CHARLESTOWN PIRATES2015-16 SCHEDULENov. 24 New Washington 7:30 p.m.Dec. 1 at Silver Creek* 7:30 p.m.Dec. 4 Scottsburg* 7:30 p.m.Dec. 8 at Henryville 7:30 p.m.Dec. 11 Clarksville* 7:30 p.m.Dec. 19 at Providence 7:30 p.m.Dec. 29 First round+ TBADec. 30 Final round+ TBA Jan. 5 Rock Creek 7:30 p.m.Jan. 8 Seymour 7:30 p.m.Jan. 9 at Madison 7:30 p.m.Jan. 16 Christian Academy 7:30 p.m.Jan. 19 at New Albany 7:30 p.m.Jan. 22 at Eastern* 7:30 p.m.Jan. 23 at Corydon* 7:30 p.m.Jan. 29 Brownstown* 7:30 p.m.Jan. 30 Borden 7:30 p.m.Feb. 4 North Harrison* 7:30 p.m.Feb. 9 Austin* 7:30 p.m.Feb. 16 at New Washington 7:30 p.m.Feb. 19 at Salem* 7:30 p.m.Feb. 23 at Jeffersonville 7:30 p.m.March 1-5 Class 3A Charlestown Sectional* Mid-Southern Conference Game
+ Silver Creek Holiday Tournament
2015-16 ROSTERNo. Name Ht. Grade
3 Shaun Mansfield 5-8 114 Miles Matthews 5-8 1110 Korey Harris 5-9 1212 Jordan Knoebel 5-11 1114 Jamal Long 6-4 1220 Trey Schafer 6-0 1124 Tanner Wesp 6-3 1232 Trey Woodward 6-2 1140 Matt Fellows 6-2 1044 Austin Smith 6-6 12
2014-2015 RESULTS (10-13)Nov. 26 New Washington W, 69-39Dec. 2 Silver Creek L, 39-57Dec. 5 at Scottsburg L, 48-59Dec. 9 Henryville W, 56-49Dec. 12 at Clarksville W, 54-40Dec. 20 Providence L, 37-43Dec. 29 Clarksville W, 64-47Dec. 30 at Silver Creek L, 40-58Jan. 6 at Floyd Central L, 39-60Jan. 9 at Seymour L, 49-52Jan. 13 at Rock Creek L, 46-58Jan. 17 at Christian Academy W, 68-28Jan. 20 New Albany L, 46-95Jan. 23 Eastern L, 57-70Jan. 30 at Brownstown L, 55-74Jan. 31 at Borden W, 46-42Feb. 5 at Austin W, 69-63Feb. 7 Corydon L, 54-60Feb. 12 at North Harrison W, 75-57Feb. 23 at New Washington W, 69-55Feb. 24 Jeffersonville L, 44-63Feb. 28 Salem W, 79-71 (2OT)Mar. 6 at Corydon* L, 48-51* Sectional game
CHARLESTOWN – Charlestown’s roster is big, strong, fast, skilled and well-coached. It’s a combination that very like-ly could give the Pirates their first bout of real suc-cess in several years.
Despite having lost a lot of heft from last season’s 10-13 team, Charlestown emerges this year with plenty of height and an ample amount of first-rate guard play to go with it.
Graduated from last year are football-bodied bruisers Hunter Crace, Eli Daniel and Tristan Ches-ter, who combined to score about 16 points and grab around seven rebounds per game. The Pirates also lost a few guards from last season, but with what they have coming back, they ar-en’t really feeling the pain.
“I think our biggest weakness last year was that we never could get any set rotation,” said second-year head coach Jason Connell, who was hired late in the offseason in 2014 but spent a qual-ity and competitive sum-mer with the team this year. “But now we’re able to have that set rotation. We have a really versatile group that plays as a cohe-sive unit.”
Leading the group of returning players is All-Mid-Southern Conference member Jamal Long, who averaged 14 points and six boards per game last year. The 6-foot-4 senior bulked up in the off-sea-son, played football for the Pirates and has been work-ing on getting back into basketball shape the past couple months.
“He’s a kid who’s go-ing to get a lot of attention from other teams,” Connell said. “He’s going to play a huge role in our offense this year. We’re gonna want him to at least touch the ball every trip down the floor. We’ll be looking for a lot from him, so hopeful-ly he can stay healthy and we can get him in shape and ready to go.”
Joining Long in the frontcourt are 6-3 senior Tanner Wesp, who scored about four points an out-ing last year, as well as 6-5 senior Austin Smith, who is new to the varsity this season.
“We’ve got some good size and this year we have some really good guard play to complement that size,” Connell said. “We’ve got some guys who can really handle and shoot the ball well.”
Senior Korey Harris and juniors Jordan Knoebel and Shaun Mansfield will likely lead the Pirates’ backcourt.
“Korey had a really good summer, and we’re going to expect a lot from him,” Connell said. “We’ll look to him for a lot of lead-ership. He’s really been shooting the ball well so far and he’s grown a lot more confident in his play.”
Knoebel , who only played in 13 varsity games last year but had a strong year on the 12-6 junior varsity team “is ready,” ac-cording to the coach. Man-sfield, who has no varsi-ty experience, will bring quick, hard-nosed defense to the team.
“We also have [junior guard] Miles Matthews, who is a good shooter as well, so we have a lot of good variety on the team this year,” Connell said. “The nice thing about this team is that they can play so many different ways. Once our bigs get into a little bit better shape, we’ll be able to play fast or we’ll be able to slow it down. We’re excited about that, because last year we pretty much just played slow and pounded the ball inside. This year, we have those guards to help speed things up a little bit.”
The Pirates, who open their regular season in a girls-boys doublehead-er with New Washington on Nov. 24 at home, have confidence but have set their goals one at a time. Goal No. 1 is the Silver Creek Holiday Tourna-ment on Dec. 29 and 30, which they haven’t won since the 2006-07 season. Last season, they were edged in the championship game by the host Dragons, who are ranked sixth in the state in the 3A preseason poll.
“We want to bring that trophy back to Charles-town,” said Long, who scored 13 to lead the Pi-rates in the title game last year. “After that, we’ll move on from there. One
thing at a time though.”That’s not to say that
the team hasn’t at least thought about the confer-ence or sectional titles this season.
Defending MSC champi-on Silver Creek will be the early favorite, but Brown-stown Central, ranked fifth, and No. 10-ranked Coryd-on will present challenges as well. The Pirates aren’t discounting their chances either.
“We have one of the toughest conferences in the area, so know we have a tough schedule and play some tough opponents,” said Long. “But when we play as a team, we’ll be hard to beat.”
Connell agreed.“With our conference,
anybody could be beaten on any given night, so you just have to show up ready to play each time you hit the floor,” he said.
As for sectional, which features many of the same teams as in the MSC in-cluding Silver Creek, Co-rydon and Brownstown, Charlestown is looking forward to playing host this season and will battle to win its first crown since the 2007-08 season.
“It’s hard to predict, because for us, it’ll all depend on how well we shoot the ball,” Connell said. “But every coach can say that. If our guard play continues to improve throughout the season, I think we could be right in the mix.”
Guard play could be key to Charlestown’s success this season
Charlestown senior Korey Harris drives toward the basket during the Pirates’ game at Floyd Central last season. | STAFF PHOTOS BY CHRISTOPHER FRYER
Charlestown senior Jamal Long fights for a rebound during
the Pirates’ game at Floyd Central last season.
Charlestown head coach Jason Connell yells from the sideline during the Pirates’ 51-48 loss to host Corydon Central in the first round of the Class 3A Corydon Sectional last season. | STAFF PHOTO BY TYLER STEWART
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Highway 62, 11106 Dean St., Charlestown, IN 47111
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BASKETBALL | TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 24, 2015 | 21
CHARLESTOWN PIRATES2015-16 SCHEDULENov. 7 at Madison L, 45-53Nov. 14 North Harrison* L, 29-46Nov. 18 at Silver Creek* L, 36-43 Nov. 20 Corydon* L, 38-44 Nov. 21 at South Central W, 57-47 Nov. 24 New Washington 6 p.m.Dec. 2 Austin* 7:30 p.m.Dec. 4 Scottsburg* 6 p.m.Dec. 8 at Henryville 6 p.m.Dec. 12 at New Washington 7:30 p.m.Dec. 16 Floyd Central 7:30 p.m.Dec. 19 at Mitchell 1:30 p.m.Dec. 22 First round TBADec. 23 Final round TBDJan. 5 Rock Creek 6 p.m.Jan. 9 at Brownstown* 1:30 p.m.Jan. 12 at Eastern* 7:30 p.m.Jan. 15 Providence 7:30 p.m.Jan. 19 New Albany 7:30 p.m.Jan. 21 at Salem* 7:30 p.m.Jan. 23 Christian Academy 7:30 p.m.Jan. 28 Clarksville* 7:30 p.m.Feb. 2-6 Class 3A North Harrison Sectional* Mid-Southern Conference Game
2014-2015 RESULTS (19-5)Nov. 21 at Corydon W, 58-38Nov. 22 South Central W, 50-42Nov. 25 New Washington W, 82-28Nov. 29 at Henryville W, 51-45Dec. 3 at Austin W, 53-48Dec. 6 at Scottsburg W, 58-55Dec. 11 Silver Creek W, 55-34Dec. 13 at New Washington W, 75-35Dec. 17 at Floyd Central L, 53-58 (OT)Dec. 20 Mitchell W, 47-33Dec. 22 Clarksville W, 72-28Dec. 23 Silver Creek W, 48-39Jan. 6 Rock Creek W, 108-21Jan. 8 Jeffersonville W, 46-44Jan. 10 Brownstown L, 52-57Jan. 13 Eastern W, 49-36Jan. 16 at Providence L, 38-55Jan. 20 at New Albany W, 60- 55 (OT)Jan. 22 Salem W, 52-44Jan. 29 at Clarksville W, 68-20Feb. 3 at North Harrison W, 49-35Feb. 6 Madison L, 36-41Feb. 10 Madison W, 41-40* Feb. 13 Salem* L, 27-28 (OT)* Sectional game
PAST 10 YEARSCoach: Michael Prichard
• 2014-15: 19-5• 2013-14: 15-8• 2012-13: 10-11Coach: Sam Terrell
CHARLESTOWN – Lack of size and lack of experience will likely be the thorns in the side of Charlestown this year. The 2015-16 Pirates are girls who spent most of their time in the shadows of standouts from seasons past who are now thrust into starring roles.
Still, the term “rebuilding” doesn’t enter the vocabulary of third-year head coach Michael Prichard, who says expectations remain the same despite circumstances.
“I expect them to compete in ev-ery single ballgame,” said Prichard. “Even though I have a freshman, two sophomores and two seniors who will be playing a lot of our minutes – you look at that on paper and think ‘Wow, that’s a young team,’ but the grade they’re in doesn’t enter my mind. If you’re a varsity player, you’re expected to perform. I try not to let them have the mindset that suc-cess will come in time. The learning curve has to happen now.”
The Pirates, who don’t have a player taller than 5-foot-10 in their regular rotation, will rely on speed, grittiness and skillful ballhandling by their plethora of guards.
“We don’t have much height this year, but we’re a lot faster,” said Lexi Logsdon, who – along with Bethany Hall – is one of two seniors on the team. “I feel like we have a lot more quickness than we had last year. We lost a lot of good leader-ship, but I feel like Bethany and I are stepping into that role and filling it the best we can.”
Logsdon and Hall played in every varsity game last year — averaging six and four points, respectively — but most of their minutes were spent in support of the talented group of then-seniors that led the team to a 19-5 season and a second-place fin-ish in the competitive Mid-Southern Conference.
Two of those graduates are now playing basketball at the college lev-el. Kaitlynn Henning, who averaged 19 points, 4.4 rebounds, 3.7 steals and 2.5 assists per game and finished her career with 1,528 points for sec-ond-best in Charlestown history, is currently scoring nine points a game for Wabash Valley College in Illinois. Justice Burdin, who averaged 13.1 points and led the team in rebounding last year with seven per game, is at Lincoln Trail College in Illinois.
Also gone from last year’s team is guard Shelby Goedeker, who provid-ed 8.2 points per game and a ton of sound, vocal leadership before a sea-son-ending injury sidelined her with three games left in the regular season.
Despite what Charlestown lacks this year, the team leaders maintain a positive outlook.
“We lost a lot, definitely a lot of height,” said Hall, referring to Bur-din’s 5-11 frame that seemed much larger when crashing the boards. “And shooting-wise Kaitlynn was one of the best, but this year we have a freshman, Sam Matthews, who’s
already starting to take over that role as a strong shooter. We feel good about what we’ve seen her doing al-ready. She’s really going to help us out this year.”
Matthews, a 5-6 guard, is already averaging nine points an outing in Charlestown’s first three games this season, and big things are expected of her. Bri Harvey, the tallest play-er on the team at a smallish 5-10, saw quite a few varsity minutes as a freshman last season and is showing lots of promise early this year with a 10-point, seven-rebound effort in a 43-36 loss to Silver Creek and a 13-point performance against North Harrison.
The sophomore class of Gabi Gag-non, Shirlee Hayes and Erin Kim-brell — all small guards — rounds out the Pirates’ main rotation so far this year, but Prichard hopes to have a larger, more established group as the season progresses.
“The biggest problems for us will be rebounding and depth,” he said. “The style that we play takes a lot of energy, so we’re looking to get our bench developed so that when we sub we don’t lose anything.
“With the girls who will be playing a lot of minutes for us, we are prob-ably the shortest team maybe in the history of this school. Maybe in all of southern Indiana. Maybe in all of In-diana period,” Prichard said. “We do have some quickness and we kind of have a system in place that we play defensively that — when we follow it — we do okay. We’re just going to try to play to our strengths. Our girls are good at handling the basketball, they’re quick and they’re gritty.”
And they’re goal-oriented.First order of business: the four-
team Charlestown Holiday Tour-nament, which includes the Pirates, Silver Creek, Providence and Clarks-
ville. The hosts won it last season and they have their sights on a repeat performance.
“That’s our first goal,” said Hall, “but of course, we want to win the conference and then sectional, too.”
North Harrison is the likely fa-vorite to win both the 10-team Mid-Southern Conference and the sectional title, but, according to Prichard, any team can win on any given night.
“I think, when it gets down to it, every team has something to prove,” he said, recalling his team’s 17-point loss to the Cats on November 14. “For about 27 or 28 minutes when we played them the other day I don’t think any spectator watching the game could have told you which was the better team. But then, for a span of about four or five minutes, it was very obvious which team had more experience. North Harrison.”
In fact, the Pirates trailed by just two at the half and kept it close through most of the third quarter but wound up losing 46-29.
“Most people will only see the fi-nal score but what I saw was that we hung right with them for the better part of the game,” Prichard said
And come tournament time, youth or experience, size or lack thereof, all teams are on an even playing field.
“At the beginning of the season, you might take some losses but you use those to learn and hopefully to get better,” Hall said. “You can look at what you struggled with and look at your weaknesses, then take those weaknesses and get stronger so when it’s time for the sectional, you’re play-ing at your fullest potential.”
Quickness could help Pirates overcome lack of size, experience
Head coach Michael Prichard helped lead Charlestown to a 19-win season in 2014-15. | STAFF PHOTO BY TYLER STEWART
Charlestown senior Lexi Logsdon looks to pass during the Pirates’ 41-40 win over Madison at the Class 3A Scottsburg Sectional last season. | PHOTO BY JOE ULLRICH
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22 | TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 24, 2015 | BASKETBALL
ROCK CREEK ACADEMY LIONS2015-16 SCHEDULENov. 24 Clarksville 7:30 p.m.Nov. 28 South Spencer+ 12:30 p.m.Nov. 28 Loogootee or Irvington Prep+ 6 or 8 p.m.Dec. 4 at New Washington 7:30 p.m.Dec. 5 Crothersville 7:30 p.m.Dec. 11 Christian Academy 7:30 p.m.Dec. 12 at Jennings Co. 7:30 p.m.Dec. 19 Crawford Co. 7:30 p.m.Dec. 23 Scecina* 3 p.m.Dec. 29 First round# TBADec. 29 Final round# TBD Jan. 5 at Charlestown 7:30 p.m.Jan. 9 at South Central 7:30 p.m.Jan. 16 First round≠ TBA Jan. 16 Final round≠ TBD Jan. 23 Medora 7:30 p.m.Jan. 29 at Louisville Iroquois 7:30 p.m.Jan. 30 at South Ripley 7:30 p.m.Feb. 13 at Lanesville 7:30 p.m.Feb. 16 Providence 7:30 p.m.Feb. 19 Madison Shawe 7:30 p.m.Feb. 26 Cannelton 7:30 p.m.March 1-5 Class A New Washington Sectional* At Indianapolis Manual+ Loogootee Classic# Tecumseh Classic≠ Pikeville (Ky.) Shootout
2015-16 ROSTERNo. Name Pos. Ht. Grade2 Elijah Toole G 5-2 124 Trae Davis G 6-1 1212 James Dunlap G 5-9 1214 Devin Hughes F 6-3 1122 Malcom Graves F 6-1 1124 Tye Blankenbaker G 5-11 1230 Josiah Kelsey G 5-9 1232 Daon Alexander G 5-10 1134 Noah Allen F 6-1 1142 Max Vogen G 6-2 1144 Taj Oliver C 6-3 1250 Alex Eddy C 6-5 12
2014-2015 RESULTS (18-6)Nov. 25 at Clarksville W, 61-52Nov. 29 South Spencer W, 91-69Nov. 29 at Loogootee W, 75-62Dec. 5 New Washington W, 53-44Dec. 6 at Crothersville W, 76-51Dec. 9 at North Harrison W, 75-48Dec. 12 at Christian Academy L, 57-61Dec. 13 at Jennings Co. L, 47-48Dec. 20 at Crawford Co. W, 59-55Dec. 23 Pike Central W, 64-57Dec. 26 Brownstown L, 47-59Dec. 27 Barr-Reeve L, 41-60Jan. 10 South Central W, 72-46Jan. 13 Charlestown W, 58-46Jan. 17 Washington Catholic W, 53-23Jan. 24 at Medora W, 66-43Jan. 30 Louisville Iroquois W, 56-32Jan. 31 South Ripley W, 55-51Feb. 7 Borden W, 61-49Feb. 12 Lanesville W, 63-45Feb. 20 at Madison Shawe W, 52-31Feb. 24 at Greensburg L, 59-68Feb. 27 at Cannelton W, 82-32Mar. 3 at Borden* L, 42-45 (OT)* Sectional game
ROCK CREEK ACADEMY LIONS2015-16 SCHEDULENov. 3 Henryville+ L, 21-65Nov. 5 Clarksville+ L, 42-55Nov. 6 at Medora+ W, 49-37Nov. 7 Madison Shawe+ L, 28-46*Nov. 14 at Cannelton W, 53-21Nov. 17 Clarksville L, 45-62 Nov. 21 at Springs Valley L, 21-85 Dec. 1 Crawford Co. 7:30 p.m.Dec. 3 at New Washington 7:30 p.m.Dec. 10 at Medora 7:30 p.m.Dec. 12 Crothersville 12:30 p.m.Dec. 15 at Christian Academy 7:30 p.m.Dec. 19 Cannelton TournamentDec. 28 Whitefield (Ky.) TournamentDec. 29 Whitefield (Ky.) TournamentJan. 5 at Charlestown 6 p.m.Jan. 7 at Madison Shawe 7 p.m.Jan. 11 West Washington 7:30 p.m.Jan. 14 at Lanesville 7:30 p.m.Jan. 20 at Providence 7:30 p.m.Jan. 26 Perry Central 8 p.m.Jan. 28 South Central 7:30 p.m.Jan. 30 Washington Catholic NoonFeb. 2-6 Class A New Washington Sectional* Won by forfeit+ Henryville Tipoff Tournament
2015-16 ROSTERNo. Name Pos. Grade4 Emaleigh Jones F 1010 Breanna Rottet F 1212 Katie Thompson G 1014 Benedicte Nzombi-Fenner C 1120 Bri Ragland G 922 Payton Blackburn G 1224 Noemi Tolentino F 1230 Abby Guidrey G 932 Olivia Rottet G 1034 Renayah Bailey F 1040 Hannah Hart G 1044 Catie Troncin F 1150 Ireland Dozal C 10
2014-2015 RESULTS (5-20)Nov. 11 at Madison Shawe L, 25-69Nov. 13 Crothersville L, 33-62Nov. 14 at Providence L, 24-70Nov. 15 Irvington Prep W, 69-27Nov. 18 at Clarksville L, 19-56Nov. 22 Springs Valley L, 29-61Dec. 2 at Crawford Co. L, 28-66Dec. 4 New Washington L, 29-61Dec. 6 Union Dugger W, 58-36Dec. 11 Medora L, 27-49Dec. 13 Columbus Christian L, 35-56Dec. 16 Christian Academy L, 22-53Dec. 19 Cannelton W, 66-44Dec. 22 Columbus Christian L, 33-62Dec. 22 at Cannelton W, 45-40Jan. 6 at Charlestown L, 21-108Jan. 8 Madison Shawe L, 8-66Jan. 15 at Lanesville L, 28-59Jan. 19 at West Washington L, 37-65Jan. 21 Providence L, 26-68Jan. 27 at Perry Central L, 14-70Jan. 29 at South Central L, 15-67Jan. 31 at Washington Catholic W, 54-47Feb. 2 at Crothersville L, 36-69Feb. 10 New Washington* L, 27-50* Sectional game
PAST 10 YEARSCoach: Bill Paro• 2014-15: 5-20• 2013-14: 0-20Coach: Will Eubank• 2012-13: 0-20Coach: Brandon Yates• 2011-12: 1-20• 2010-11: 0-21Coach: Bill Paro• 2009-10: 0-20• 2008-09: 1-20• 2007-08: 3-18• 2006-07: 3-20• 2005-06: 7-19
SELLERSBURG — Re-covering quickly from the loss of eight seniors is never easy.
It would seem to be nearly impossible for a Rock Creek program that lost one of its most valuable classes in pro-gram history.
Will Brown left as the Li-ons’ all-time leading scor-er. Gedeon Nzombi, Ronald Karenzi and Emony Malum-bu made up about 20 feet of talent. T.J. Hayes and Tanner Gerth gave the Lions unlimit-ed scoring during their senior seasons.
Ninety-five percent of the scoring and rebounding was
lost to graduation, but Rock Creek isn’t about to whine about the losses. Instead, the Lions feel like they’re reload-ing.
“The [junior varsity] went 15-4 and competed [with the varsity] in practice,” veter-an Rock Creek coach Chris Brown said. “They’re scrap-py. I think these guys learned they have to show up and play every day. Every day they had to compete against that team.”
Brown admits that 2015-16 really is a rebuilding year at Rock Creek. However, he likes his group.
“They play hard. They just haven’t had varsity competi-tion,” he said. “They’re go-ing to step right into the fire.
They’re going to have to learn quick.”’
“We play as a family,” said 5-foot-2 guard Elijah Toole. “We play as a team.”
Several Lions did see some varsity action last year, led by Toole and 5-11 guard Tye Blankenbaker.
“Elijah is a great hustler, just scraps everywhere,” Brown said. “There’s not a kid who plays harder than him. Tye Blankenbaker is a good shooter for us. Both of these guys will key.”
Brown has high expec-tations for 6-2 junior guard Max Vogen.
“He’s a high IQ basketball player,” Brown said.
Six-foot-3 Taj Oliver gives the Lions six players who saw
varsity action last season.“We’re quick and scrappy
and work hard,” Blankenbak-er said.
Joining that core six is a pair of transfers. James Dun-lap moved to Rock Creek from Louisville. Brown said Dunlap is a “very high IQ player and quick as light-ning.”
The other transfer came from Jeffersonville. Devin Hughes is a 6-3 junior. Junior Malcom Graves will be eligi-ble in the second semester.
“We got some kids who came in and they’re good, too,” Blankenbaker assessed.
Rock Creek enters Tues-day’s opener against Clarks-ville ranked No. 8 in The
Despite personnel losses, Lions feel they’ll be competitive in 2014-15
SELLERSBURG — Rock Creek Academy is off to its best start in program history at 3-4.
It may not sound like much, but for these Lions, it is.
In the first few weeks of the season, the Lions earned their first winning record in over a decade, had a three-game win-ning streak — its longest since 2006 — and to up their record 3-2 and equaled their win total from 2008 to 2014. Since win streak, they have dropped two games in a row to Clarksville and Springs Valley.
“It’s immeasurable,” Rock Creek coach Bill Paro said.
“You can talk all you want about winning, but when you actually do it, it gets easier. We’ve gone year-after-year when we had very few wins or no wins at all. When they got a couple of wins, they know what it feels like now. Even when they go against the bet-ter teams, they’re playing bet-ter. They see the light at the end of the tunnel.”
“We’ve improved a lot,” senior point guard Peyton Blackburn said. “I think we’ve impressed a lot of people.”
Paro said the victories have made his team a more atten-tive audience. The former Marine has had an easier time getting his point across fol-lowing the recent success.
“It made it a lot easier on the coaches because it showed them where they want to go,” Paro said.
At 3-4, the Lions aren’t sat-isfied. They see several more wins on their schedule and ex-pect to beat last year’s five-win total, which was Rock Creek’s most in nine years.
“We still have a lot of things to work on, but they’re so much more into what we’re doing,” Paro said. “We play some tough teams. But hav-ing the wins under their belts, I think it will make us more competitive.”
Paro said one of his biggest goals is to be more compet-itive with the Charlestowns, Henryvilles and Providences
of the Lions’ schedule. Last year, the Pirates beat Rock Creek 108-12.
“I try to tell them, let’s go one quarter at a time and mea-sure our success by that,” he said. “A victory might be win-ning a quarter or winning a half. Then when we start play-ing against teams our size, it makes [wins seem] more at-tainable.”
Blackburn says now the Li-ons expect to compete with the better teams on their schedule.
“We’re capable of a lot,” she said. “More than all the years before. This team is probably the best we’ve had at Rock Creek.”
they’ll definitely be keying on.”Jefferson and senior center Michael
Maxwell are expected to get their chanc-es to be in the Bulldogs’ starting lineup after coming off the bench last season. Jefferson scored a game-high 20 points and earned team MVP and led Indiana to a 64-63 victory over Kentucky in the 18th-annual Battle of the Bridges in Au-gust in Louisville. He averaged eight points a game last season.
Shannon liked how Jefferson and Maxwell performed over the summer.
“Mike has done a great job on the boards for us. He’s playing his role re-ally well, and he’s scoring around the basket,” Shannon said. “Josh has just exploded into a phenomenal offensive player. He really makes it difficult for defenses because he and Romeo sort of give us a 1-2 punch. They’re not the only two [Bulldogs who can score], but they’re the two that draw a lot of atten-tion. He’s very capable of putting up numbers quickly.”
Hibbard is expected to make contri-butions, as well. This season will be his third year on the New Albany varsity squad. Last season, he scored nine points per contest and shot 45 percent from 3-point range.
“He’s really steady. He’s improved a tremendous amount,” Shannon said. “He’s taking the ball to the basket. He has gotten way better at that. His mid-range jumper is heads and shoulders above where it was last year. His defense
has improved. He’ll be taking on a big-ger role.”
Other Bulldogs who are in the running to get some playing time are senior Adri-an Pratt-Thomas, juniors Payton Martin and Seth Short and sophomores Rondale Moore, Sean East, Kameron Guess and Blake Murphy.
New Albany is the favorite to win a third HHC championship in a row. Shannon says he has not studied the oth-er conference teams much yet, but he knows one thing — the Bulldogs have a target on their backs.
“Everybody will be shooting and gun-ning for us,” he said. “I fully expect peo-ple to come after us. I think everybody is a threat.”
New Albany’s non-conference sched-ule is formidable. The Bulldogs will face Class 4A No. 10 Pike in the Forum Tipoff Classic on Dec. 12 at Southport. On Saturday, Jan. 9, they will travel to Frankfort, Ky., to face Lexington (Ky.) Dunbar, which is ranked third in Ken-tucky, in the Indiana/Kentucky Chal-lenge Cup Classic.
New Albany’s non-conference slate also includes Class 4A No. 3 Carmel, 4A No. 4 Evansville Reitz and 4A No. 11 Bloomington South.
“We’re playing a lot of talented teams,” Jefferson said. “We’re all work-ing hard because we don’t want to go out there and be embarrassed by them. We want to show them that we belong. [The tough schedule] is definitely going to help us.”
BULLDOGS: Face tough non-conference slateCONTINUED FROM PAGE 13
New Albany junior Isaac Hibbard drives to the basket during the Bulldogs’ home game against Bloomington North last season. | STAFF PHOTO BY CHRISTOPHER FRYER
Blackburn is one of four re-turning starters for Rock Creek. She’s joined by sophomore guard Katie Thompson, junior forward Catie Troncin and ju-nior center Benedicte Nzom-bi-Fenner.
“We have a little experience back, which we haven’t had in a while,” Paro said. “It’s show-ing already. We still have a lot of room to grow, but they’re working hard.”
Paro said Thompson is the key. The sophomore is one of the best players at Rock Creek in years.
“She’s our shooter,” Paro said. “She’s only a sophomore, but I had her in junior high and she knows how I run things. She’s got a good head on her shoulders and she has more confidence in herself than some of the older ones.”
ROCK CREEK: SG
Thompson is go-to scorerCONTINUED FROM PAGE 22
Johnson Arena’s new Jeffersonville “J” logo at center court. LEFT, Jeffersonville High School has added a new radio studio for the WJHI radio station inside Johnson Arena.
NEW-LOOK JOHNSON ARENA
Associated Press Class A pre-season poll. It’s a ranking that’s hard to take too seriously with all the Lions’ losses, but it does show that Creek has gained some statewide respect.
“It’s appealing. But we know it’s based off of last year’s mer-it, there’s no doubt about it,”
Brown said. “It just goes to show that the program’s been put on the map.”
Brown called defending sec-tional champion Christian Acad-emy the obvious favorites to re-peat, New Washington is “up there,” and Lanesville is solid, but he wouldn’t count his squad out.
“I think this group will com-
pete,” he said. “It’s our goal to be playing our best basketball in February and March. I would not count Rock Creek out.”
“We’ll definitely surprise some people,” Blankenbaker said. “I think we have all the tools to be a sectional champion, for sure.”
LIONS: Players believe they can win sectionalCONTINUED FROM PAGE 22
Payton Blackburn is the Rock Creek Lions’ senior leader and point guard. | PHOTO BY JOE ULLRICHChris Brown instructs his Rock Creek Lions during a practice last week. | STAFF PHOTO BY GREG MENGELT
24 | TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 24, 2015 | BASKETBALL
FLOYD CENTRAL HIGHLANDERS2015-16 SCHEDULENov. 24 at Christian Academy 7:30 p.m.Dec. 1 at Clarksville 7:30 p.m.Dec. 5 Bloomington South 7:30 p.m.Dec. 11 New Albany* 7:30 p.m.Dec. 18 at Providence 7:30 p.m.Dec. 23 First round+ TBADec. 23 Final round+ TBDJan. 8 Corydon 7:30 p.m.Jan. 9 at Castle 8 p.m.Jan. 15 Jeffersonville* 7:30 p.m.Jan. 16 at North Harrison 7:30 p.m.Jan. 22 Jennings Co.* 7:30 p.m.Jan. 23 at Madison* 7:30 p.m.Jan. 29 Seymour* 7:30 p.m.Jan. 30 Ev. Reitz 7:30 p.m.Feb. 4 at Bedford NL* 7:30 p.m.Feb. 6 at Scottsburg 1:30 p.m.Feb. 13 at Ev. Harrison 7:30 p.m.Feb. 16 Brownstown 7:30 p.m.Feb. 19 at Jasper 7:30 p.m.Feb. 20 Bloomington North 7:30 p.m.Feb. 26 Columbus East* 7:30 p.m.March 1-5 Class 4A Seymour Sectional* Hoosier Hills Conference Game
FLOYDS KNOBS — Last year, a senior-laden group propelled Floyd Central to its first winning season since 2011.
Now a young team with new faces will try to make it back-to-back win-ning campaigns for the first time in 15 years.
“We have a completely different team this season,” second-year head coach Todd Sturgeon said. “We lost several seniors, five of our top six scor-ers, so we’re putting together a differ-ent team that should be fun to watch.”
The Highlanders experienced a marked improvement at the defensive end under Sturgeon’s guidance. That is a trend that needs to continue for Floyd to compete in the rugged Hoosier Hills Conference.
“We haven’t shown many positives defensively yet in practice so far,” Sturgeon quipped. “That’s something we’re just going to have to work at. Last year we had a lot of size, quick-ness, and strength. That’s a good com-bination to have for defense. We had the physical tools to guard last year. This year we won’t quite be as physi-cally gifted of a team as a year ago, but hopefully we have a basketball IQ that will make up for some things.”
With so many new players that will see significant varsity minutes this sea-son, Floyd was able to get a lot of guys some much needed experience over the summer.
“We had a good summer,” Sturgeon said. “We had some guys missing and I’m sure other teams did also, but I still thought we got a lot accomplished and some of our young guys showed they can come to the varsity level and com-pete. There are six or seven guys who I think have made marked improve-ments. Right now, I’m looking at nine guys who could start. I hope that means we’ll have some depth this year.”
Sturgeon said he hasn’t had a formal talk with his team about season goals, but senior Garrett Mehling got straight to the point when asked about team goals.
“We talk about competing to win ev-ery game and then win a sectional,” he said. “We’re a smart team. We move the ball well and play as a team.”
Many coaches have to battle a selfish player or two that can destroy chemis-
try. Sturgeon said that is the last thing he will have to worry about with this year’s Highlanders.
“We have a lot of good passers on this team and that can be contagious,” he said. “Guys are sharing the basket-ball so far in practice. We also have a high basketball IQ as a team and have a lot of guys who have played basketball their whole lives. We think we have a chance to have a really good season.”
Senior Connor Sturgeon is the team’s returning leading scorer and rebounder. The coach’s son will be expected to step into a leadership role this season.
“I feel like I can be that leader both on and off the court for this team,” the younger Sturgeon said. “We have a bunch of young guys this year. We have a lot of smart guys who know what they’re doing but I just try to talk out there and remind guys of where they need to be. We have a bunch of
high character guys so I don’t have to say too much about off the court stuff, but just to make sure we’re going the right thing and staying together as a team.”
Coach Sturgeon didn’t shy away from the red and black elephant in the room: second-ranked and defend-ing sectional champion New Albany. Floyd’s road to the top of the Hoosier Hills Conference and a sectional cham-pionship must go through its archrival.
“New Albany certainly has the most pieces returning and they won it last year,” he said. “They are in our back yard, in our conference and in our sec-tional, so obviously they’re a focal point on what we’re trying to do. We had a winning season last year, which hasn’t happened here in a few years, so now we need to build on that and keep growing our program.”
Inexperienced Highlanders on quest for back-to-back winning seasons
