Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...

By ANDREW SIMONSON | Sports Editor

The Pelham Panthers are motivated to build off last season’s results and continue moving in the right direction in the 2024-25 boys basketball season.

“We had a solid season,” Dickinson said of the 2023-24 campaign. “Didn’t end on the best note that we wanted to end on, lost in the sub-regionals to Paul Bryant. We bring back a good core group from that season and we got some young pieces to go along with them this year that I think could make a big difference.”

The Panthers will be without four seniors from that team though, including Joe Wimberly, who dominated on the ball last year and became one of the county’s top point guards.

Dickinson believes that this team will cope with his loss well because they now have multiple players who are good with the ball in their hands, allowing them to play with an uptempo style and press more frequently.

“This year, I think we have more guards that can handle the ball better than we did last year,” Dickinson said. “Last year, we relied a lot on Joe Wimberly, but this year, we have some young guards that can handle the ball very well, and then our other guards that were first-time varsity players last year, their confidence in handling the ball and dribbling through pressure and all of that is a lot higher than it was last year. So, we have a lot more ball handlers this year than we did last year.”

Pelham will have a combination of returning and new playmakers to fill out a deep roster this season.

Eli Lewis and Sam Tolbert are two of the team’s three seniors, and they’ll be expected to lead the way along with new starting point guard Kendall Smith, returning big man Jayden Robinson and 6-foot-6 shooting guard Egypt Daniel.

As for the newer additions, Greyson Childress and Marlon Scarborough will get their chances on the varsity squad after featuring for JV last year, Andy Olds will slot right in after transferring from Thompson and Trey Pittman will be a scoring threat despite being just a freshman.

In addition, senior Kobe Hearon will serve as key backup for Lewis, sophomore Marcus Arnold brings scoring potential from each level and Jacob Gibbs is ready to break through as a sophomore after football injuries derailed his campaign last year.

With a good deal of younger faces this year, Lewis and Tolbert have stepped up as more vocal leaders, showing the underclassmen how varsity players are supposed to act.

Luckily for the Panthers, Lewis said that this year’s group is a mature bunch that is willing to listen and learn.

“I agree that the freshman and sophomores that we do have that are coming up, they do listen well and they pay attention to us and they don’t just joke around all the time,” Lewis said. “They’re very mature for their age.”

Bringing the younger players along will be crucial in keeping up with a new-look Class 6A, Area 8 as the Spain Park Jaguars and Chelsea Hornets replaced the Briarwood Christian Lions while a 2024 Final Four side in rival Helena stayed in the area.

All three of those programs have a solid number of returning veterans in their core, and while Pelham definitely has some experience to its name, deepening the rotation with trusted players who work well together will go a long way to ensuring another top-two finish.

In fact, Dickinson said team chemistry is one of the things this group needs to have, especially with a bunch of individual playmakers.

“With us having so many guys that can score and can handle the ball, we have to gel together,” Dickinson said. “We have to understand that we have to share the ball a lot more. We have to get everybody involved and not one guy trying to do it all himself, and I think that’s going to be our biggest thing trying to control this year is trusting each other, because like I said, we have a lot of guys that can go and create for themselves.”

The good news for Pelham is that familial bond is already there. Tolbert spoke at media days about how the team accepted him when he first came to the school, and that has translated into a tighter bond on the court ready to take on any challenge.

“The family. Family is everything,” Tolbert said about what he loved most about playing for Pelham. “When I came to Pelham, we were cool and then you just hang around with them all the time, cause you going to be with them more than actual family at home, and just gel together.”