by: Adison Poole  

 GS lions’ basketball is in full swing.  

It’s officially basketball season and the 2023-2024 players are excited about upcoming games.  

“I have high expectations for this season,” junior Blessing Gantt said. “At our tip off tournament we went 1-1; we wiped out Ringgold 71-12, but lost to Blackhawk 40-35.”  

Gantt is a member of the girls’ varsity basketball team. Both the boys’ and girls’ regular season started on the first of December and will continue all the way into February.  

“We do a lot of preseason work,” Gantt said. “This year we have been putting in a lot of work to hopefully help us get further than last year.” 

Players on both the girls’ and boys’ teams talked highly of their coaches. Freshman AJ Tarpley claimed he quite liked his coach and said, “he knows what he’s talking about.”  

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The GS boys’ basketball team plays against Derry Area.

Photo by: Adison Poole

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“Our players are truly amazing,” girls’ varsity basketball Head Coach Mr. Rick Klimchock said.  

Klimchock explained how excited he is for this year’s season.   

“We have high expectations for this season,” he said. “I’m looking forward to a lot of exciting games.”  

Klimchock has had years of experience with the sport. He’s coached basketball since 1978 and has coached at GS since 2017.  

Boys’ varsity basketball Head Coach Mr. Cameron Auld has coached for two years at GS. He was also assistant coach for a year at Waynesburg University, his former college, and another year as Head Coach of the freshman boys at Norwin.  

“I am always looking forward to this time of year,” Auld said. “We have a good group of guys, a group I have really started to form relationships with.” 

Basketball season tends to bring out fans at each of the games. The students and coaches have said they enjoy seeing people there and are excited to see the turnout for future games. 

“I encourage our guys to go watch all their classmates compete,” Auld said. “My hope is that if we participate in making other teams’ home environment a fun place to be, then those kids will come make ours one as well.”  

The girls’ team hopes their turnout will increase as the season goes on.  

“We’ve had decent turnout with parents,” Gantt said. “We’ve only had two games at home at pretty random times, so we never expected a crowd.”  

Players of both teams are just glad to be back out on the court playing their sport.  

“I think the team could make it to playoffs this year,” Tarpley said. “I am looking forward to making it far this season.”  

Auld expressed that the practice the team put in wasn’t just physical practice.  

“Being only on year two, for as much time as we have been together, we are still learning about one another,” Auld explained. “That’s the thing about sports that I think gets overlooked, the relationship piece.” 

As a Coach, Auld hopes that all his players can form some sort of bond and hopes that whatever bond they form shows out on the court.  

 “If you don’t have good relationships, you don’t have trust,” he said. “If you don’t have trust you struggle to win.” 

Many players have been able to form close bonds with many of their teammates and are excited to be back on the court with one another.  

“I’m looking forward to playing with the seniors one last time,” Gantt said.   

Coaches are just as involved with the players and have spoken highly of the entire team.  

“Our players are truly amazing,” Klimchock said. “We have seniors and juniors who show our underclassmen the culture that is GS Lady Lion Basketball.”  

Both the boys’ and girls’ teams have set different goals for themselves this year. The teams have expectations they hope to meet by the end of the season.  

“I think our main goal is to improve,” Gantt said. “We want to finish higher in our section and possibly even be section champs.”  

Throughout the off-season coaches and students have put work into improving to play better this season. Practices will continue throughout the season to hopefully improve gameplay as the year goes on.  

This year the girls’ basketball team kicked off their regular season with a trip to Disney World to participate in a tournament.  

“Disney is really fun,” Gantt said. “We got to see the parks before the tournament.” 

The players left for the trip on the 16^th of December for a tournament that will take place over the course of three days.   

While the season has already started, there is much more to come, and players and coaches hope that students at GS will come out and support the teams this year. 

“I think a student section would be great,” Gantt said. “But our main goal is winning.”