In a normal year, West Virginia High School basketball teams would be making their final push to reach the Charleston Civic Center.
This year, as has been repeated ad nauseum to the point of exhaustion, has been anything but normal. Later tonight, the first games of the winter high school basketball season tip off across the Mountain State.
Normally, this is where most hoopers are playing their final games of the season, and turning in their basketball shoes for cleats or track spikes.
Other states started their seasons on time or had shorter delays. Ohio, for instance, is currently in the regional round for the girls’ tournament, districts for boys.
But West Virginia, out of an abundance of caution that many may believe was unnecessary, is finally getting rolling tonight.
It’s going to be dash to the finish line—the start of the sectional tournament. The girls’ postseason begins on Saturday, April 10, less than 40 days away. The boys’ sectional tournament begins seven days later on the 17th.
Tonight is the first day West Virginia girls’ team could officially play a game. The boys can start on Friday.
Two games pitting featuring four OVAC teams line the card tonight, while the rest of the area teams will get rolling between Thursday and Monday.
On the boys’ side, John Marshall is making the season-debut trip to Weirton to take on the Red Riders while Brooke and new head coach Adam Shinsky are off to New Manchester for a meeting with Oak Glen.
Wheeling Park is off to Wood County on Saturday night for a meeting with regional rival Parkersburg South in the bi-annual battle of the Patriots. Incidentally, the WPHS girls’ team is taking on a fellow Wood County team in cross-town South rival Parkersburg High on Saturday afternoon.
First Out the Gate
Opening tonight is Wheeling Central and first-year head coach Roberta Olejasz traveling to Hancock County to take on the Weir High Red Riders.
The Maroon Knights are debuting life without their “big three” in departed Division I signees Hannah White, Kaylee Reinbeau, and Eden Gainer. It’s also Central’s first year bumping up to the new Class AAA in the four-classification format the WVSSAC is experimenting with the next two seasons.
A bit south, traditional rivals Magnolia and Tyler Consolidated will battle at the Silver Knights’ Kidwell facility.
Tyler returns a number of experience players from last season’s team, led by Calleigh Phillips. Magnolia, meanwhile, will counter with the return of two-time all-W.Va. forward Mady Winters. Winters missed the entirety of her junior season because of a knee injury, but show now signs of slippage during volleyball season.
The Wheeling Park girls return a ton of talent and were rewarded with a No. 2 spot in the preseason Associated Press girls’ basketball poll. The Park will be led by seniors Bella Abernathy, Lindsey Garrison, and Asia Roby.
George Washington and returning state player of the year Kalissa Lacy earned the No. 1 preseason ranking. Cabell Midland, meanwhile, returns its entire roster from last season’s quarterfinal qualifying team and was only voted sixth, a fact many fans and a few players bemoaned on social media.
The Knights face George Washington next week on Thursday before a traveling to Wheeling to face Park on Saturday, March 20. The result of the Cabell-GW game may be a precursor to what type of game head coach Ryan Young’s Patriots will be in for come the 20th.
Wheeling Strong
Two of the three boys’ team have their sites set on a return trip to Charleston. For Central, it’s old hat. But for Wheeling Park, the sting of missing out of taking the Civic Center last winter after qualifying for the tournament for the first time since 2012 is real.
The Patriots return two starters and their sixth man, but first must find an identity without first-team all-W.Va. performer Adam Vargo, along with Travis Zimmerman and Xavier Morris. The second is that the sectional tournament just got a lot more difficult with usual regional-round rival Morgantown joining Park, Brooke, and JM in the section.
This now becomes senior point guard D.J. Saunders team, and the Wheeling University signee’s leadership role will be expanded to match his talents with the ball in his hands. Park also returns Shaheed Jackson and sixth man from 2020, Beau Heller. Fellow guard Avery Lee, who transferred in from Wheeling Central, gives Park another dangerous backcourt weapon.
What the Pats don’t have is experienced size, as its tallest player, 6-4 Caleb Francis, is a sophomore.
Central, meanwhile, will join its girls’ team counterparts in making the jump from Class AAA to A. It’s a good year to return two of the more dynamic players in senior J.C. Maxwell and junior Ryan Reasbeck.
Maxwell was recently nominated for the McDonald’s All-American game and is a returning first-team all-W.Va. performer. Reasbeck, meanwhile, a second-team all-stater, saw his future stock rise tremendously with an impressive offseason on the AAU circuit.
The Maroon Knights open with Weir, then head across town two days later for the first matchup with rival Linsly. The game many are circling is the Saturday, April 17 home contest against Charleston Catholic.
The Fighting Irish led by senior (Aidan Satterfield), a 6-6 scoring machine who was named captain of the Class A all-state team as a junior and is headed to West Liberty next fall to play for Coach Ben Howlett’s Hilltoppers.
