sports@southwesttimes.com
RADFORD – After winning the school’s second ever state championship in boy’s basketball and the first one since 1949 last season, the Radford Bobcat boy’s basketball team is now officially in rebuilding mode.
The team lost eight seniors from last year’s squad, including Cory Collins, Allen Dickerson, Jake Giesen, Scotty Hendricks, Marcus Martin, Tyler Matusevich, DeAndre Thompson, and Jon Thompson.
“Last year was a special year obviously,” said Radford coach Rick Cormany. “We had a lot of accomplishments along the way. We had eight great seniors on that team. We graduated a bunch of guys who are doing great things. A couple of them are playing college, a couple of them are going to college, and one of them is playing college football. It was a great group of guys. It left us kind of bare except for three guys who are back from last year’s team.”
There are only three returning players for the Bobcats – Jerome Alexander, Josh Smith, and Dontae Carter, who hit the game-winning shot against James River in the State Semi-finals at the Siegel Center in Richmond. Radford coach Rick Cormany sees these players and how they have taken the leadership role this season.
“I think they are working harder than anyone else,” Cormany said. “That is a great start. It’s too early for us to see yet what kind of leaders they are going to be. We are after them a little bit. We had a discussion during last night’s game that those guys have to be the first ones that want to take a charge, not the last ones, if they want to expect anyone else to take a charge in the game. I think they are going to be really good leaders and work so hard.”
“With the seniors we had last year, they showed me good leadership rules,” said guard Dontae Carter. “I followed them and listened to every piece of advice they gave me. It carried on to this year for me to help me become a better leader than what I was last year. Being the quarterback on the football team also helped me become a better leader too.”
“It’s all about trying to push our teammates as hard as well because we know we’ve experienced this for three years now, third year being on varsity,” said center Jerome Alexander. “Having great leaders to begin with like Jon Thompson, Allen Dickerson, DeAndre Thompson, Jake Giesen, and all the seniors last year helped paved the way to help us know how to respond to all these younger guys coming up. We have to lead by example basically.”
Joining them on the team this year are three freshmen – Josh Little, William Minter, and Paul Parcell – along with senior Dillon McCoy, a transfer student from Indiana. Cormany expects a lot of production from all of his new additions to the squad, especially his three freshman.
“They are all three playing,” Cormany said. “We’ve had four games and they’ve all played significant minutes in all four games, not to mention we have four sophomores that are also playing significant minutes. When you throw Dontae [Carter], Jerome [Alexander], and Josh Smith in there, you are talking about three juniors that are playing. Right now, we really only have one senior who is playing and that is a kid who transferred to us from Indiana, Dillon McCoy. He’s a great kid. Right now, we are just playing youth. They are going to have to grow up fast.”
Something that may hinder the team’s progress is the lengthy football playoff appearance that saw the Bobcats advance to the state championship game. Six of the Bobcats 13 players were on the team that played against Essex in the state championship game on December 12. Cormany sees some of the positives from it though.
“I think the only advantage probably is the fact that they have a winning attitude,” Cormany said. “They’ve got used to winning. Of the football guys, Dontae is the only one who has been with me for quite some time. The rest of them are new. You don’t get those four weeks back that they lost. It’s not like you can find those four weeks of practice somewhere. They are gone. So it’s kind of a win-lose situation I think. Any other year, probably if it had happened last year, we would have been ok.”
Carter has had some time adjusting from playing quarterback position on the football team to the guard position in basketball.
“It’s been difficult because I haven’t been able to get my jump shot back,” Carter said. “I’m not in the condition that I want to be because football and basketball have two different conditions. It was a little harder transition to get ready for me for basketball.”
The football team’s success delayed try outs and crucial practice time, so the team hasn’t spent that much time together. Despite all this, Cormany has expectations for a team he thinks will have a lot of depth.
“We are just trying to get this group caught up and the fact they are young and the fact that they are starting four weeks behind has really made a difficult transition,” Cormany said. “I think we are going to be ok as the season goes along. We are deep. We could get to the point where we play 12 players. It could really be that kind of a team.”
“We are inexperienced and guys are coming up for the first time on the varsity level, not knowing what to expect,” Alexander said. “Still, we’ve been working hard in practice and we’ve got to work on bonding better as a team. We’ll be alright as soon as we get a little more in-depth in season.”
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