Roth tackles the task of retooling boys team

Joel Roth enters his first season as the Perryville boys' coach with plenty of excitement but also plenty of apprehension.

Roth, a 1989 Perryville graduate, is directing a varsity program for the first time. He knows the Pirates have their work cut out for them as they try to bounce back from last year's 5-20 record.

"We've got a lot of work to do," Roth said.

Roth was an assistant coach at Perryville from 1993 to '97, and he spent five seasons as an assistant coach at De Soto before returning to Perryville last year as the middle school assistant principal. He did not coach last year but is elated to be back on the bench as he also continues in the role of middle school assistant principal.

"It takes a lot of planning and organization to do both jobs, but the people I work with have been very cooperative with me," Roth said.

Roth likes the attitude and work ethic of the Pirates, but he knows they'll have to overcome one major flaw -- a serious lack of height.

"I'm pretty sure we're the smallest Class 4 team in the state," Roth said, laughing. "The first game, we'll probably start four kids under six feet. That's not good in Class 4.

"But they're hard workers, and we have several kids who can shoot. We'll be undersized, but we do have some things to work with. Hopefully we can make up for our lack of height."

Although the Pirates graduated most of their leading scorers from last year, they return two players who saw starting action: 6-foot-3 senior forward Kyle Dobbelare and 5-8 senior guard Jared Oberndorfer. Dobbelare is the leading scorer among the returnees.

"Kyle is a really good athlete," Roth said. "Night in and night out he might be best athlete on the floor for either team."

Other returning seniors are 6-foot guard Chad Stelling, 6-2 forward Nick Hayden and 6-foot forward Tyson Schilling.

Roth is also counting on three juniors: 5-10 guard Phillip Buerck, 5-11 guard Andrew Norman and 6-4 center Scott Ozark, the squad's tallest player. But Ozark suffered a dislocated shoulder in open gym prior to the start of practice and will be out until at least January, if not longer.

Rounding out the roster are 5-10 senior guard Andrew Bachmann, who was not on the team last year, and 6-4 junior center Dan Schuebel, a German exchange student.