Local teams looking ahead to new season

High school basketball season has arrived, and with that, the promise that this season will be the one each team breaks through and has a terrific campaign. Will any of the local teams be able to match what Oak Mountain’s boys did last year, when the Eagles captured their first state championship in program history?

Spain Park’s boys and Chelsea’s girls made it to the state final four in their respective classes last year, but both teams have plenty of challenges ahead if they hope to get back to that stage.

Both Briarwood and Chelsea teams have the unenviable task of navigating a challenging Area 9 in Class 6A, while Oak Mountain and Spain Park have their hands full with Areas 5 and 6 in 7A.

The season began the first week of November and the regular season runs through the beginning of February, so there will be plenty of ups and downs for each time throughout.

Lions leaning into strengths

The Briarwood Christian School boys basketball team plans to get everyone involved this year. That’s because head coach Bobby Kerley feels he has plenty of players capable of contributing in a major way.

The Lions are shifting to the Princeton offense this season, an offensive system that generates several passes per possession and causes teams to play at a more deliberate pace. It will allow the Lions to capitalize on areas they will have an advantage most nights: shooting and the ability to read situations.

“These kids are so smart,” Kerley said. “I’m really excited about how we’ll play as a team. We’re going to be really hard to scout and defend.”

The Lions will have two seniors this year in Baylor Gann and Miller Stubblefield. Gann plays the point guard spot and Stubblefield plays center. Briarwood is heavy on juniors, with Miles Gilbert expected to take on a big role.

William Lloyd is a solid guard, while Grant Mears is a knockdown 3-point shooter. Matthias Leib, a soccer player as well, will play forward and bring defensive intensity to the floor. Christopher Vizzina, the Lions’ standout quarterback, is expected to play as well. Sawyer Russell and Zach Lamey are two other juniors.

Josh Thompson, Luke Schultz and Caleb Keller are three sophomores who will have a role as well.

“I would expect us to really play great team basketball and I expect it to be a really selfless group,” Kerley said. “If we can commit and buy into it, it really is the most fun way to play basketball, where you don’t care who gets the credit or who’s scoring the basket.”

Hornets see plenty of room to grow

The Chelsea High School boys basketball team doesn’t return a wealth of experience, but the Hornets do have one of the best players in the area back in Paul Lanzi.

Lanzi, now a junior, led the Hornets in scoring last year and has continued to improve, continuing a family legacy of great players to roll through the Chelsea program.

“He’s shot the ball really well,” Chelsea head coach Nick Baumbaugh said. “He’s a vocal leader on top of everything else. He’s really going to be our best player. We’re going to look at him to do a lot of things offensively.”

Baumbaugh believes his team has a high ceiling this season, though, because several of the players with no varsity experience to speak of have the ability to grow into big roles.

“This team has a ton of upside,” Baumbaugh said.

Cooper Griffin and Carson Camper are the Hornets’ two seniors this season. Both got some playing time last season and will have more extensive roles in their final year. Juniors Alex Redd and Caden Cook also played some last year.

Also in that junior class are Dylan Brown, MJ Conrad, Walker Gailey and EJ Hudnall. Chelsea should also get major contributions from some of the underclassmen, as sophomores Avery Futch and Carter Abrams and freshman Aiden Owens will help out a great deal.

Chelsea has failed to make the playoffs the past few years and this group is eager to stop that trend.

“These kids expect to win,” Baumbaugh said. “They want to do what it takes. This group has a different mindset.”

Eagles looking forward after state title

The Oak Mountain High School basketball team capped off a special season last year with the program’s first Class 7A state championship.

After the graduation of Noah Young and the early departure of Will Shaver, the University of North Carolina signee who is getting a head start on his college career, some have said the Eagles have no chance at repeating.

But don’t tell Evan Smith, Wilder Evers and the rest of the Eagles.

“We all have a huge chip on our shoulder,” Oak Mountain head coach Chris Love said. “We just want to go out and prove them wrong.”

With that being said, having a chance at another state title is not Oak Mountain’s sole objective. Love has far too much respect for the process and journey of each season to boil down a season’s success to that.

“Our kids have really taken on the challenge of getting better,” Love said. “At the end of every summer, we sit down with our kids and talk to them about where they can improve. To a player, they have come back and improved on what we felt like they needed to improve.”

Smith concluded his remarkable high school football career in the fall and will put a bow on his hardwood career this winter. Love calls him one of the most competitive kids he’s ever coached.

Evers, a junior, had a big role last year and will take on an even bigger one this season and is working on becoming a more consistent player in order to do that. Ryan Giegel is a potential breakout player for the Eagles this season, as is Brady Dunn.

Matthew Heiberger is a 6-foot-4 left-handed shooter and Love said there are days he plays as the best player on the team. Ean Gove, Gavin Nelson, Jah’Ki Mullens, Cam Whitaker and Cam Atkinson all had solid summers and gives Oak Mountain nine seniors.

Devan Moss and Tre Thomas lead a group of juniors who will help the Eagles throughout the year as well.

“We’re not trying to win anything or prove anything,” Love said. “We’re just trying to prove that we’re a quality team.”

New-look Jags seek to improve each day

The Spain Park High School boys basketball program put together one of its best seasons in program history last year, reaching the state final four and coming just shy of an appearance in the state championship game.

If the Jaguars have intentions of replicating that kind of success once again this season, they will have to do so in a slightly different fashion after losing eight seniors to graduation.

“We’ve got a lot of young guys that are going to have to fill roles and figure it out, but there’s a lot of opportunities for guys to grab spots,” Spain Park head coach Chris Laatsch said.

Two players who aren’t young, though, are Colin Turner and Josh Harrington, who will be third-year starters and were key components to the Jags’ success each of the last two seasons. Laatsch is leaning heavily on both of them for a high level of on-court production and off-court guidance.

Zach Gray and Pierson Cole are the only two other players returning that played a good bit for the varsity team a year ago. Laatsch is counting on Gray to have a great season, citing his talent handling the ball and his improvement on the defensive end.

Sam Wright and Chase James are two others with an opportunity to take hold of a significant role for the Jags.

Ben Corley, Chantz Pickett, Solomon Robinson, Hunter Davis and Andrew Nails give the Jags eight seniors in the program. Chad Pickett, Evan Houser and Hunter Herritt are juniors. Korbin Long, Alex Williams and Braylon Bernard are sophomores.

One of the reasons Spain Park was so successful last year was the team’s unity and collective hatred for losing. Laatsch believes this team can accomplish great things if it can establish those traits again.

“This group’s got some talented kids, but we’ve got to develop the oneness and the competitiveness and those things. We’re going to have to learn and grow into it. This team can be good enough to make some type of run,” Laatsch said.

Lady Lions seniors fostering positive culture

The Briarwood Christian School girls basketball team lost nine seniors from last season. A statement like that is typically followed by the idea that a team has to replace virtually all of its production.

But the Lady Lions do have some key players returning from last year’s team, led by sophomore point guard Mary Beth Dicen and senior forward Kate Saunders.

Dicen started as a freshman last year and possesses electric quickness. Saunders has been a major contributor on the varsity team for three years now.

Saunders is one of three seniors for Briarwood this year and head coach Lorie Kerley has been impressed with how Saunders, Claire Lehane and Ella Coons have led the way so far. Another senior, Ashby Mixon, suffered her third significant knee injury in the summer, and will be out for the season.

Those seniors have had the task of blending a team with a wide variety of ages. There are three juniors, two sophomores, a freshman and two eighth graders on the team this year.

Sigourney Bell, Piper Eighmy and Taylor Smith are the team’s juniors. Colleen Lehane is a sophomore, Taylor Leib is a freshman and the Lady Lions have brought up eighth graders Ann Tatum Baker and Emma Kerley to the team.

Briarwood hopes to pick up the pace on offense even more this year — after playing at a fast pace last season to begin with — and aims to notch some wins in Class 6A, Area 9.

Lady Hornets finding new ways to win

The Chelsea High School girls basketball team had a dream season a year ago, making a run to the Class 6A semifinals and the state final four.

From that team, a couple of key seniors, Mackenzie Titus and Ellen Fleming, graduated. They were already going to be tough to replace. But the Lady Hornets were dealt a significant blow in the summer, as junior Sophia Brown went down with an injury.

There’s no covering up the fact those losses will hurt the Lady Hornets. But they still have the makings of a solid team this winter.

“We have really good pieces coming up from a solid junior varsity team,” Chelsea head coach Jason Harlow said. “We were pretty deep last year. We had some kids come off the bench last year that will have big roles.”

This year’s team will be led by senior point guard Sydney Schwallie, who recently signed with the University of West Alabama. She has been a key part of the team since her freshman season.

Mary Cartee and Nia Cummings are two players who thrived in a complementary role last year. Now, they will be relied upon on both ends of the floor on a nightly basis. Ashley Washington has some varsity experience as well and will take on a big role for this year’s team.

Harlow mentioned that Lexi Redd and freshman Haley Trotter could have breakout years.

The Lady Hornets have five seniors this season, Sydney Bridgeman, Cartee, Cummings, Schwallie and Washington. Nora Breedlove, Hardy Erwin, Madison Moore and Redd are juniors. Madeline Epperson is a sophomore and Trotter and Sadie Schwallie are freshmen.

“We’re going to defend, we’ve just got to find our offensive identity in the first month,” Harlow said. “Hopefully that translates to success around Christmas and January.”

Lady Eagles determined to take next step

The Oak Mountain High School girls basketball team has been right on the edge of breaking through the last two years.

The Lady Eagles have advanced to the Class 7A regional tournament each of the last two seasons, a great accomplishment for the program on its own. But in the regional semifinals each season, they felt like they let an opportunity to advance to the next round slip away.

“We felt like we should’ve gone further and they think that now,” Oak Mountain head coach Beth Parmer said. “They feel they can, so they've got a little bit of a chip on their shoulder, they’ve got something to prove which is good.”

Tamia Threatt, Charity Shaw and Abby Gordon are the team’s three seniors and will be tasked with helping get the Lady Eagles where they want to go. Threatt and Gordon combine in the backcourt to take care of the ball handling duties. Shaw can play any position on the floor and Parmer calls her an “all-purpose” player.

Parmer said she wants her team to be more aggressive this year on both ends of the floor.

“We want to be a pressuring defense and want to be an attacking offense,” she said.

Oak Mountain is determined to end this season on a better note than the last two.

“We like to push each other and have fun together,” Gordon said. “We all want to go to the elite eight, so we work together.”

Lady Jags fueled by low expectations

Mike Chase doesn’t mind the underdog role.

In fact, he embraces it.

After several years being at or near the top of the totem pole in Class 7A, not much is expected from the Spain Park High School girls basketball team this year from the outside. However, the Lady Jaguars want to exceed those expectations.

Spain Park has dealt with more roster attrition than normal. In addition to the normal graduating seniors, the Lady Jags have also lost a few players who transferred schools and a few others who excel in other sports and chose to exclusively focus on them.

With that being said, the Lady Jags will move forward with what they have, which is a team full of players willing to compete each and every game.

“I’ve got kids that will listen to everything I tell them to do,” said Chase, the Spain Park head coach. “They’ll run through a brick wall. We’re going to be competitive.”

One thing Chase believes will make a difference this season is his four seniors. Those seniors have been in the program for several years and know exactly what Chase expects from his teams.

Camille Chase, Kerri Barnes, Paxton Gillipsie and Alex Baskin will lead this year’s team on and off the court. Camille has been a contributor for a few years and will need to have a strong year on both ends of the floor to give the Lady Jags a chance, but the other three will have their chance to make a significant impact as well.

“Everybody thinks we’re going to be down, but I just like that situation and I think our kids like that situation,” Chase said.