JOHNSTOWN — Heading into the new season, the Johnstown boys’ basketball team has its sights set on a more successful campaign than it had in the 2021-22 season.
The Sir Bills went 1-19 overall and 1-17 in Foothills Council play last season.
Johnstown is looking to turn things around this season.
“We’re off to a pretty good start,” Johnstown coach Phil Satterlee said. “This is the best start to the first week or so of practice we’ve had in a few years.”
The Sir Bills lost Kyle Everest, Bryce Mureness, Jared Stewart and Steven VanNostrand to graduation, while two other players opted not to return.
“We lost four players to graduation, but not all of our possible returning players came back,” Satterlee said. “I felt a little but like a college coach recruiting players to come out for the team. Everyone that is on the team at least played junior varsity last year.”
Johnstown returns seniors Jordan Fox, Braden Jones and Elijah Jones, as well as juniors Ryan Hoyt and Matthew Wheelis.
“The goal is to win all of our games. They give us 20 to play, and we want to win them all,” Satterlee said. “Hopefully, we can go to sectionals this year. It’s something we have to earn though.”
New to the team this year are juniors Antonio DeMarco, Christian Gibson, Alex Insogna, Andrew Lake, Skyler Lundquist, Maddox Pedrick, Marcus Wilson and P.J. Yetto.
“We’re running new stuff,” Satterlee said. “We have some of the same concepts, but it’s a little bit easier to build on them rather than to install them from scratch.”
Johnstown is scheduled to open its season Sunday against Galway at 10 a.m. in the Western Athletic Conference Coaches vs. Cancer Tip-Off Classic at Fulton-Montgomery Community College.
“We’ve been working to get better every day since the first day of practice,” Satterlee said. “Hopefully, come February will be playing our best basketball.”
Categories: High School Sports
