Northern Region Boys Basketball Preview - Liberty District

In advance of the 2010-11 boys baskeball season, we have put together a comprehensive preview for the Northern Reigon. Below, you will find previews for all eight Liberty District teams, beginning with your Jefferson Colonials. Please click on the approporiate link for the Patriot, Concorde and National districts.

Editor's note: Madison preview written by Woodrow Bellamy III. Additional reporting on South Lakes by Brian Belefski. Additional reporting on Marshall by Allen Abrams.

Jefferson Colonials

After going 10-30 the last two seasons, a change was necessary for Jefferson basketball. That was easy to see. The way it was brought on was the odd part.

A group of Jefferson players got together and respectfully asked former Coach Ed Grimm to step aside. Grimm had won just 19 percent of his games at Jefferson, and even in the Liberty District, which roundly gets overlooked within the Northern Region for the Patriot and the Concorde, a winning percentage that paltry isn't going to get it done.

In his stead comes former Jefferson player Mark Gray-Mendes, who had been an assistant on Grimm's staff.

For his part, Gray-Mendes is looking to the future.

"I think we have a chance to be very competitive," Gray-Mendes said. "I'm very excited about what were going to do this year. We're going in a different direction, we're going a little more up-tempo. We've got kids that can match up in terms of athleticism and basketball ability with anyone were going to play."

While the Colonials lost some guys who were in leadership roles last season, they return their top four scorers, led by Daniel Barnes, a 6'5 swingman, who excels both on the wing and in the post.

"Daniel is a strong rebounder, a lot of toughness, good basketball IQ and great athleticism," his coach gushed.

Another player Jefferson will look to is guard Richard Kuzma. Gray-Mednes called Kuzma Barnes' running mate, and said he brings great offensive awareness to the table, with the ability to set up his teammates and knock down open shots himself.

"Those two are going to be the standard bearers," Gray-Mendes said.

It may come as no surprise at a science and technology magnet school that sends a high percentage of its graduates to Ivy League schools, but it bears mentioning that Gray-Mendes believes his team's strength, not just one of Barnes', is its basketball IQ.

Both the players and the coach want to get out and run, a departure from the way things were done in the past. Gray-Mendes said his team's natural athleticism, combined with its experience in running a traditional half-court offense, gives them a unique one-two punch.

"We'll certainly be patient if the occasion calls for it, but we believe the best time to attack a defense is before it gets set," Gray-Mendes said. "We can step back and move the ball, we're steeped in the patience game, but we believe in the opportunities we get early in our offense."

Gray-Mendes knows it won't be easy turning around a Jefferson team competing against Langley, who has won three straight Liberty District titles, the top-notch athleticism at South Lakes and the size, discipline and depth of Fairfax, but he's a man who sounds ready for the challenge.

"I think we have guys who will be able to do a lot of things," Gray-Mendes said. "Each team has an identity, and it's up to us to do the best we can to keep them from doing what they want. It's no more complicated than that."

Langley Saxons

After winning three straight Liberty District titles, the last thing anyone expected the Langley Saxons to do was to change the way they play. But that's exactly what Coach Travis Hess did this offseason, implementing a new spread offense to capitalize on a strong group of guards, led by point guard Austin Vasiliadis.

"We're cautiously optimistic so far with how it has looked," Hess said. "Our kids are getting it slowly and buying into it. I think they all like it."

Langley is more guard-oriented than usual, and Hess indicated they could start a five-guard lineup with Braden Anderson, who starred as the Saxons' quarterback this year, as the de-facto center. Vasiliadis and Anderson will start, along with David Adams, with the other two spots rotating for the time being.

"We're going to look to get up and down the floor, spread people out, play tough defense, press and be a little bit of a different look than we were last year," Hess said.

Something else to watch with Langley is the return of Zach Sekel, who had surgery over the summer.

"His rehab has been a little slow, he's not quite ready yet," Hess said of Sekel. "I don't expect it to be something that keeps him out a long time. Hopefully he'll be back in the next couple of weeks. For the time being, it hurts our depth, and he's a very capable ball-handler and a very good shooter."

Langley is also looking to get contributions from a handful of kids making the leap to the varsity level from JV. Hess pegged Joey Robinson, Tristan Evans and Daniel Dixon as juniors who will have to pitch in if the Saxons are to win the district for the fourth straight year.

"These kids have had a lot of success at the JV level," Hess said. "They have confidence and they expect to win, so they've carried that to the varsity level. They've just never done it before.

"We're apprehensive because we don't know if they can do it at the varsity level. We think that they can."

In fact, outside of Vasiliadis and Adams, no one on Langley has logged significant minutes at the varsity level.

"We do have some question marks in terms of experience," Hess said. "We don't have a lot of guys who have played in the fourth quarter of a hotly contested district game at McLean or had to go to Stone Bridge on a Tuesday night, and those are tough things to do for high school basketball players.

"We'll see how mature we get and how quickly we get there."

McLean Highlanders

Youth will be served on the McLean basketball team this season.

The Highlanders have just three seniors, and while Coach Kevin Roller is confident in their leadership abilities, he's unsure as to what they'll provide from a basketball standpoint, as one is new to the team and the others did not log a lot of minutes as juniors.

"The vast majority of minutes are going to be played by underclassmen," said Coach Kevin Roller. "It's going to be fun to watch them because we'll be a significantly different team at the end of the season."

McLean will look to juniors Gordon Rogo, Sango Amolo, Thomas Van Wazer and Kevin Lastova to carry the scoring load. Rogo was McLean's second-leading scorer last season, while Amolo and Van Wazer grew into starting roles as the season progressed.

After going 10-11 last season, McLean is certainly ready for a change. Langley and South Lakes look like the class of the Liberty District, but after that it's wide open.

The Highlanders are also probably one of the shortest teams in the entire region. With just one player listed taller than 6'2 (6'4 sophomore center John Pascoe), they'll have to use a blend of speed, athleticism and strong guard play to remain competitive.

"We will press and run as hard as we can while making good decisions," Roller said. "We'll be athletic enough to get up and down the floor, we'll be in shape. It's not a matter of skill, it's a matter of, do they make good decisions at tempo and do they make good decisions when they get tired?

"If we do both of those, we will look to press and run."

Roller knows his team will have trouble defending big players, and they'll struggle with teams that have a strong post presence. He said they may have the antidote for that, however.

"One of the best ways to avoid mismatches in the half court is to try and play in the full court."

South Lakes Seahawks

South Lakes first-year Coach Andrew Duggan understands what it means to run one of the most prestigious programs in all of Northern Virginia.

"I'd say I'm blessed to be quite honest," Duggan said. "Got a lot of great history here with this gym, with the players that have come through here and Coach [Wendell] Byrd, l feel honored and a little lucky to be part of South Lakes basketball."

Duggan does have some large shoes to fill, as Byrd led the Seahawks to 12 distirct championships, six region titles and two appearances in the state championship game.

The Seahawks enter the season as the favorites, along with Langley, for the Liberty District title. South Lakes returns three key players, including first team All-District player Joe Daye. He, along with J.D. Wallace and Darius Smith, will be charged with leading the team.

"Joe is going to have a nice impact on our team, and hopefully the league, as well," Duggan said.

Smith is coming off an impressive football season for South Lakes, in which he helped lead the team to the semifinals of the Division 5 Norhtern Region, where they lost to the eventual region champion, Stone Bridge. Duggan is looking to Smith to bring a certain level of toughness with him from the gridiron to the court.

"Darius came out for the first time [this season], and brought a spark to these guys, which is nice."

As the point guard, Wallace will be asked to captain the offense.

"Wallace has shown a lot of promise this offseason, and is developing into a pretty good leader," Duggan said.

While it may be an honor to follow a coaching legend like Byrd, he never took that final step at South Lakes. If Duggan can do that, he will create a legacy all his own.

Fairfax Rebels

This year, the Fairfax Rebel football team made it to the playoffs in the Division 6 Northern Region with a team whose whole was greater than the sum of its parts.

With three of the basketball team's four leaders coming over from the gridiron, perhaps it's no surprise they too plan to employ those tenets of unselfishness and teamwork.

"I wouldn't say we have one superstar, but collectively if we do certain things, I think we can be very competitive," said Fairfax Coach P.J. Kelly. "We're going to have to share the ball, there's no doubt about that. We're going to have to take pride in our defense. It's one thing to talk about it and another thing to do it."

Even though Kelly points to Spencer MacLeod, Joey Boyle, Matt Frank and Jazz Holly as guys who will carry the team, he said everyone will have to contribute.

"We have no idea who our starting five is," Kelly said. "We're going in thinking these are our top guys probably, but that's good because you want competition. It just depends on who's playing well, who's hot, who's rebounding."

Fairfax returns most of the team that went 7-11 a year ago. Last year's record is a bit deceiving, as the Rebels had four games canceled due to snowstorms. They beat three of those teams in matchups earlier in the year, and lost a close game to Stone Bridge, the one team they did not beat.

"We lost Jordan Kuchel, who was second team All-District, but I feel like we're going to be okay," Kelly said. "Any time you can play 10 guys and feel good about it, that's good. I've been in situations where you look down your bench and see that you're in trouble. That won't be the case for us."

Joining those holdovers from last year are three sophomores from a team that went 12-1 as freshmen. Kelly said his team will keep it offensively, trying to run a transition game as often as possible before falling into its secondary break.

"We have probably about six or seven options off our transition," Kelly said. "What I like is that I think we can go inside and we have some shooters, so it's a nice balance. We have a bunch of guys who can average eight or 10 points a game, and that should be enough."

Even in a district that has a three-time defending champion in Langley, Kelly said it's wide open.

"We feel pretty good, we have some depth, we've got a solid backcourt and size inside," he said. "If this team does what we're trying to preach here, we should be in the mix at the end."

Stone Bridge Bulldogs

Stone Bridge basketball will look a whole lot different than it did a year ago.

In addition to losing four players to graduation, Nik Brown and Jimmy Paige transferred to Middleburg Academy.

The loss of Brown particularly stings, as the 6'3 guard averaged 22.2 points per game as a junior.

Still, Coach Sonny Green remains confident that his Bulldogs can compete in the Liberty District.

"I'm very optimistic about the team this year," Green said. "We're pretty new as far as playing time and experience. It's going to be interesting, but I think this is the type of group that will be able to jell."

Stone Bridge featured two guys who scored at least 20 points per game last year, so they're going to have to spread the scoring load without those players this season. Point guard Ryan Lowdermilk, entering his third year as a starter, will be asked to shoulder some of that responsibility.

"I expect him to really be the one person coming in who gives us valuable playing time," Green said of Lowdermilk.

Shooting guard Danny Elezer joins Lowdermilk in what should be a strong starting backcourt, but what Green is really excited about is a greater post presence than Stone Bridge has had in the past with the 6'5 Marcus Matthews, and the highly skilled Jack Wohlfert.

"He plays tough in the post, and it's something I'm hoping we can exploit," Green said when talking about Matthews. "I expect us to be able to utilize the post more than we have in the past. We've been more guard-oriented, more dribble-drive. With Marcus and Jack, we can throw it into the post more.

"We're running offense through our post."

Green said that Matthews is the more physical of the two, while he likened Wohlfert to a Kevin McHale-style of player. With those two teaming with Lowedermilk and Elezer, as well as a strong wing player in Michael Hamrick, Green likes his team's balance.

"It's nice to have that mix of inside-out basketball," he said. "I really like our backcourt. We have good shooters, a couple nice post players and we're going be a lot more well-rounded this year."

Marshall Statesmen

Marshall had a respectable 12-10 season last year, but all five starters were seniors, leaving a major void from the top of the roster all the way to the end of the bench.

"For us it's a work in progress," Coach Dan Hale said. "We don't have any starters back. It's a new system."

Most notably, Marshall said goodbye to center Will Simonton, who is now a freshman at DePaul. Simonton's running mate in the post, Daniel McClain, is now at Division-III Bridgewater (Va.) College.

Simply put, it's a challenge for anyone to replace that sort of scoring punch.

The good news for the Statesmen is the Liberty District is wide open behind Langley and South Lakes. With uncertainty at Jefferson, McLean and Madison, Marshall may be able to rebuild on the fly and still experience a measure of success.

Guard Shelton Hardy figures to be a leader for Marshall, along with fellow guards Kent Blackstone and Ryan Medric, and forward Tim Richards.

Madison Warhawks

After a 1-19 finish and an exit from the first round of the Liberty District tournament last season, the Madison Warhawks are looking to redeem themselves this year. They are return seven seniors and have a head coach, Chris Kuhblank, entering his seventh year at the helm.

"It was the first year in my whole career that we didn't make it out of districts," Kuhblank said.  "I didn't like that feeling."

As usual, the Liberty District is very competitive this year.

"I think Langley is the best, I think they're loaded every year," Kuhblank said. "I think our district is going to be pretty balanced this year. Besides Langley, I think everyone is going to be fighting for second place this."

Junior post player Jason Man is the most natural scorer for the Warhawks, and he brings a strong defensive presence, as well. Senior captain Ian Dyle is the seasoned veteran for Madison, entering his third season of varsity basketball.

The offseason was very long and a painful reminder for the many returning players who experienced only one victory last season. Their lack of offensive ability outside of Man and Dyle will force them to focus on defense and limiting their opponents' number of possessions with steady passing and good offensive decision-making.

"We're going to protect the box and we're going to play good half-court defense. We won't deviate from that too much," said Kuhblank as his team went through warm-up drills in preparation for practice.

Last season is the past, and it's a new a year and another opportunity for the Warhawks to start rebuilding and get back to the level of competitiveness that they had in 2006 when they won the state championship.