By Chris Parker
Greenfield boys basketball returns just one starter from last season’s team that finished 13-12, but he is a good one in senior Daute Stafford. Stafford averaged 15.6 points and 4.3 rebounds per game last year.
“Daunte is going to be the kid that every coach has scouted when they have us on their schedule. Every kid in our program looks up to Daunte,” second-year Greenfield head coach Matt McCarthy said.
Fellow seniors Quin Morrow and Levi Matthews also return to the varsity lineup.
Matthews averaged 3.8 ppg last year.
“Levi started a few games last year for us but will definitely see a ton of more minutes this season. Levi has the ability to play both the guard and forward position. His ability to do multiple things will put him in many different opportunities to succeed,” McCarthy said.
Morrow averaged 2.9 points and 1.5 rebounds per game last year.
“Quin is going to be in a very different role this year. Last year he was a kid that came off the bench and gave us some quality minutes. This year he is going to step up and become one of our primary ball handlers and leaders of this team. Quin is always found doing the right thing and is often leading by example,” McCarthy said.
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Senior Caden Sims will be back in the varsity lineup this year. He missed his junior season due to a torn ACL.
“This season will be Caden’s first season playing varsity basketball for Greenfield and he will help us tremendously. He is a big body that has some great guard skill. He can either be a post player or could even gain some ball handling responsibility as this season continues,” McCarthy said.
Junior Jacob Feezell saw some varsity time last year averaging 2 ppg. Sophomore Connor Lewandowski will step up to the varsity level this year.
Jasper Meyers, Arron Matthews, Isaac Vaughn, Tyler Howard, Keyton Ipock, Aidan Taylor, Nathan Pickett, and Kyle Watson are all candidates to fill out the varsity roster.
“Our strength is going to be the fact that we like to compete. Greenfield varsity basketball has not had a losing season since any of these kids have been in high school. The fact that they have been taught how to win will hopefully help them compete once again this year,” McCarthy said.
Greenfield will have to get new varsity players used to their new roles to keep up that run of winning records.
“Our team is going to have to improve on playing together and their decision-making this year. Daunte is the only one with a lot of varsity playing time and as we get people into different roles we are going to learn how to play well with one another,” McCarthy said. “We have a lot of players that do not have much experience. There may be a learning curve at the beginning but as the season progresses I believe that we can limit our turnovers in order to find success.”
The Wildcats will look to mesh throughout the year with the goal of peaking for the postseason.
“I expect this year’s team to go out and compete on a nightly basis. There is a lot of playing time to still be earned and a lot of growing to still do. My goal is to have these kids compete every night and then to be playing our best basketball at the most important time of the year. I can see us being in a lot of tight contests this year,” McCarthy said.
Greenfield opens the season on Nov. 25 at Everton.
