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Core group gives Triton hoops high hopes

Friday, December, 14 By John Shimer
Staff writer

For seven years, the Triton basketball program has struggled with misfortune and untimely injuries, missing out on the state tournament since the 2000-01 season. But, to take a line from Bob Dylan, the times they are a-changin', because the Vikings return most of the talent from last year's team.

Three years ago, a talented freshmen team at Triton achieved great things, going on to finish the season 17-3. From that group, nine have dedicated themselves to sticking with the basketball program: Joe Katin, Jim Dure, Kyle Devenish, Derek Clark, Devin Culverwell, Will Joy, Will Short, Tom Ladd, and Caleb Noble. And seven of those guys played on the varsity last year.

"Right now, this group has kept us competitive; we have seven kids returning off last year's team," said Triton coach Tim Connell. "That allows our program to keep kids at the appropriate stage of development they should be at freshmen, JV, or varsity instead of coming up to a higher level too soon.

"What I love about this particular group also is that they know their roles," Connell emphasized. "Guys like Caleb Noble and Tom Ladd have waited their turns to get to the varsity level, and although they probably won't play a whole lot, they never complain and commit to work hard."

Clearly there have been hard times in recent years. The past two seasons, the Vikings combined record is 8-32, but by winning three of their final four games last season, the signs were evident that Triton was making significant progress.

"I think we have a bit of a chip on our shoulder now because we know we belong now after knocking some teams out of the state tournament last year," said Vikings center Dure. "People will have to respect us now, and I think we are really coming together as a program."

Between Devenish, Clark, Katin, Joy, and Short, Connell has five players who can matchup with most opponents any position, something he has not been able to say in his tenure as Vikings coach.

"I have never had this many players that I could say to each individual, 'OK, go guard the point guard,' and then turn around and say to the same kid, 'OK, now we need you to guard the 4-spot," said Connell of his team's versatility. "For the first time in my career, I think we have enough athletes to go out and play full-court pressure defense for a full 32 minutes."

The seniors wiping off the rust at the offensive end after not playing any significant playing time together in the offseason may be the biggest obstacle impeding any run for the Vikes to state tournament this season.

"I think we need to play like robots on offense to do the little things before we can play more freely," acknowledged Katin, who dropped a game-high 18 points against Newburyport in the first game of the season. "Despite having experience off last year's team, it's almost like we are still inexperienced because we don't play in the offseason."

Nonetheless, Katin is ready to make some bold predictions. "A lot of teams lost a lot of seniors last season, and now we are all big seniors, so I think we should be able to dominate some of those teams," Katin said confidently. "I think we are capable of doing what we did our freshmen year, we just need to continue working hard."

Trotting out Katin, Dure and Devenish to score points with Culverwell and Clark to dish the ball to them, Connell has a solid nucleus to build around.

"We just need to stay disciplined in our sets to keep good spacing. We don't have the basketball IQ to be able to freelance yet," the coach said. "But Katin can go inside or outside, Dure has changed his body so that he logs big minutes now, and Devenish just does all the little things right. These kids all play hard and do it the right way."