Hagerstown Head Coach Bobby Jones talks to his players during a pre-season practice.
HAGERSTOWN, Ind. – Hard work has been a trademark of the Hagerstown boys basketball team during the tenure of head coach Bobby Jones.
“These kids come to practice every day and work their tails off,” said Jones, who is entering his 10th season. “They do everything we ask them to do.”
“We’re really looking forward to the season,” Jones continued. “We’ve got a lot of good kids in the sophomore class that had some success at the JV level. This is might be one of the quickest teams I’ve had. It’s just a matter of putting all of the pieces of the puzzle together.”
Perhaps the biggest pieces of that puzzle are seniors Jalen Oliver, Trent Weiss and Drew Pyle, who are back from last year’s 17-8 squad that was second in the Tri-Eastern Conference with a 5-2 mark.
“Those guys are going to be playing major minutes and they are doing a really good job of being an extension of the coaches out on the floor,” Jones said.
Oliver was an All-TEC performer a year ago after averaging 14.2 points and team-highs of 8.6 rebounds and 2.1 assists per contest. However, Jones has a question that needs to be answered as he discusses Oliver.
“Who is going to step up and score when teams are keying on Jalen?” he asked. “I told him, if you lead us in assists we are going to be alright.”
“We’ve got some really good shooters,” Jones added. “This group really knows how to take care of the basketball. We’ve worked a lot on the fundamentals and really tried to brush up on that as we could going into the season.”
The juniors on the team are Noah Dale, Zack Sherrow and Cody Swimm, while Brady McMillan, Silas Parsons, Branton Payne, Camden Rhoades and Collin Romack are sophomores. Michael Howard is a freshman.
“Our youung guys expect to win,” Jones said. “If we come out on the short end of the stick, we’re not going to use our youth as an excuse.”
The Tigers start the season at Jay County on Tuesday. Hagerstown’s TEC opener is at Union County on Friday, Dec. 8.