Last season Westside coach Shawn Jenkins was hoping his veteran team full of seniors would make it back to Charleston.
The Renegades fell short, losing in the regional co-final.
The good news is he’ll still field a strong team with aspirations of traveling to Charleston.
“Evan Colucci, he’s starting for us,” Jenkins said. “He’ll be back and the returning starter I have coming back. Shandell Adkins, he’s a senior this year but he got a lot of experience as a sophomore and a junior. Dale Bledsoe is back and last year he came off the bench for us and in some games he got some big minutes. And then we’ve got to insert some newcomers.”
Jenkins already has an idea as to who some of those newcomers will be.
“We’ve got a boy named Hunter Lester and he’ll be a junior,” Jenkins said. “He did get some playing time last year, just not enough to really get that experience under his belt but he’ll get plenty this year. He’s about 6-foot and he’ll probably play our three guard. He plays great defense and he’s a scrapper. He stays on the floor quite a bit. We’ve got a boy named Ryan Anderson, he was just behind the group that just graduated and he’s going to get some time. He runs real good and is athletic. And then we’re probably going to have a freshman and a sophomore. The sophomore’s name is Ashton Reed and he’s probably going to play the five for us because Shandell is actually hurt. The freshman is named Bryson Blankenship and he’ll see some quality time as well. Another guard I have is Austin Cline and he’ll see some time as well. He actually got some playing time last year in spurts.”
For Jenkins there’s been an adjustment period. Four years ago he had a team that shot the ball well from 3-point range. His last three teams have been more athletic but haven’t shot the ball quite as well. It’s forced him to change some of the things he wants to do.
“What you do one year doesn’t mean you can do it another year,” Jenkins said. “We have a different group of kids. We had an early scrimmage and I wanted that to do some observations. I usually only do one but I wanted an extra one. I think we got what we wanted out of it and figured out we’ll probably take an eight or nine-man rotation. We played better which kind of surprised me. I’ve got to make some adjustments, but I’m going to scrap some offense and keep some offenses. Defensive-wise as well we got a better idea of what direction we need to go to.”
While younger and more inexperienced there are positives with this group.
“They’re a hardworking bunch of kids and they listen and they’re coachable,” Jenkins said. “That makes my job a lot easier and they work together pretty good as team. If we’re going to do anything it’s going to be a collective team effort. They’re not scared and they scrap pretty good. If we get things set up in the direction we need to go, we’ll be alright.”
Though it was a short offseason, Jenkins has noticed improvement from his players. It’s actually impressed him.
“My point guard, which is going to be Dale Bledsoe, he impressed me,” Jenkins said. “He was able to get us into an offense, not turn it over and make good decisions. He impressed me a lot. He’s a different point guard, a pass-first kind of person. I tell him all the time I need him to score some points to keep them honest. I think he’s going to stop up as the leader of our team when it comes to running the offense. Evan Colucci has another year, so we’ve got one senior back and everybody is going to lean on him.”
Despite the youth, the goal remains the same for the Renegades – advance to the state tournament.
“Again, every year when you start you goal is to get to Charleston,” Jenkins said. “That’s the main goal. To get down there and play and be in the mix of everything. If your goals are that high you have to win at least a regional game and those are goals we talk about and have. I don’t know how you can be a competitor and not think like that. I try to instill that within our program. It’s their turn to step up. It’s their turn to accomplish that, get to a regional game and fight for it.”
