Medora boys basketball coach Mark Morin said he will be looking for a lot to be answered when the Hornets open their season tonight against Shawe Memorial at home.
The girls game will start at 6 p.m., and that will be followed by the boys game.
“We don’t have much depth, and I really don’t know what to expect from this team,” he said. “Last year, I had high expectations, and we didn’t live up to it.”
The Hornets went 4-19 a season ago.
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“This year, my goal is that we just compete every night, and I think over last year’s team, this team might be a little mentally tougher,” Morin said. “Hopefully, they’ll take a challenge a little more than last year’s team did. Last year’s team would coast, and hopefully, this group doesn’t.”
Morin said this year’s team will have to be able to bounce back from its mistakes.
“The past three years, we had a real bad habit of getting our heads down,” he said. “We just can’t do that.”
Two seniors return who started in the sectional last year, Isaiah Myers, who averaged 4.4 points per game, and Jayvin Spurgeon, who averaged 2.8.
Bryce Guffey, another senior, lettered last winter.
Other seniors are Jack Combs, Caleb Sturgill and John Cobb. Gavin Fleenor is the only junior on the roster, and Mason Howard is the only sophomore. Seven freshmen fill out the roster, and Morin said he feels like some of them can contribute to the varsity team.
“We don’t have much size, so we’re going to have to spread the floor and be patient,” he said. “We’ve got three or four good ball handlers.”
Their lack of size also is going to require the Hornets to be a little more unsystematic with their approach.
“We’re going to have to be scrappy,” Morin said. “We’re not going to overpower anybody. To get to the bucket, we’re going to have to drive. Shepherd is about 6-foot-2-inches, 240 pounds. He might be able to do some stuff inside. I’ve not seen him play against varsity competition.”
Morin said the team is going to have to rely on its quickness.
“Myers and Spurgeon are two of our quicker guards,” he said. “For the most part, we’ll run a one-guard offense, and like I said, we’ll try to be patient and spread the floor and hopefully shoot a lot of layups. We’ve got three freshmen that could really help. Earl, Braxton McCory and Elijah Sturgill should step in and help us out quite a bit. That would be a key.”
Morin said the style of defense his team plays depends on the opponent.
“There will be some teams we play we feel like we can press,” he said. “We might have to use some ‘smoking mirrors’ defensively, maybe junk it up a little bit.”
Regardless of whatever his team does on defense, Morin said success is going to come down to two basic things.
“The key for us is to limit our turnovers, and we’re going to have to rebound,” he said. “We’ve spent a lot of time on blocking out.”