Boys start practice

The Thermopolis Boys Basketball team has hit the court to begin practices and are looking forward to the upcoming season.

Coach Kevin Gerber stated, "I am very blessed to be having my assistant coach joining me again this year in Ryan Shaffer. He has been a huge help with off season workouts and camps and planning for the upcoming year. I would not be even close to where I am today preparing for the season if he was not helping me out. We had a lot of boys participating in off season workouts either with myself and Coach Shaffer or some did the workouts at the HS with the football coaches. We were able to open the gym off and on throughout the summer to let the players get some time on the court as well. Sterling Gerber and Oran Coyne did an amazing job of recruiting his teammates to meet him at the rec center whenever they could."

Gerber also noted the program has been strengthened by the two coaches at the middle school - head coach Shane Corpening and assistant coach Mitch Baker -"that have helped with opening the gym and weight room. They also helped with team camps as well. I am very blessed to have them in the program."

Gerber stated the summer camps were very enjoyable "and proved a lot for our program moving forward. We went to a team camp at Black Hills State University in Spearfish early in June and were able to play about six games. We saw some success at that camp and also some places that we needed to improve. This was our second year going to this camp and our first time to enter in the Varsity bracket play. Our team was mostly made up of our younger players and they showed a lot of improvement as the camp went on.

"Early in July, we then were able to go to a team camp in Bridgeport, Neb., at their local high school. We were easily the team that had travelled the furthest with a five-hour drive, but it proved to be a very enjoyable camp as well. It was a two-day camp and we played four games each day along with a section set aside for situational games. Each team was able to pick a possible end game situation and then run it through. It was a very exciting part to the camp and the reason I chose to go to that camp. The rest of the time the boys spent time either on their own or in a gym doing our workouts or a workout of their choice."

The boys' first practice was 6:15 p.m. Monday, and Gerber said, at that time, it looks like the team will have four seniors, two juniors, seven sophomores and two freshmen.

"I am so very excited for the team that I have coming out and cannot wait to get them going for this season," he stated. "It should also be noted that I did cancel our first tournament that was going to be in Wright due to the fact that we were going to have some that were not going to be able to make it. Because of this the coaching staff believed the extra week of practice will be extremely beneficial."

The Bobcats varsity and junior varsity teams are scheduled to hit the road Friday, Dec. 15 for the East-West Classic at Douglas. The freshman are scheduled to attend the Lovell Invite on Friday, Dec. 8.