Summer games help Hawks develop players

Behind first-year head coach Noel Trimmer, Kelly Hawks basketball is coming off one of their best seasons in recent memory. The team finished with a 21-6 record and reached the Class 3 District 2 semifinal where they fell to a well-shooting Notre Dame team, led by former head coach Jeremy Brinkmeyer.

Kelly graduated eight seniors, including Michael Dollins, Dalton Forck and Reece Eftink, all of who finished in the top 25 scorers in the Sikeston Standard Democrat’s coverage area. The Hawks leading scorer, Ross Peters at 17.7 points per game, will be back this season but have even more responsibility in leading the team.

Losing seniors is hard on every team but Trimmer said there are guys who can step up and be key contributors.

“Skyler Still was our sixth man last year, obviously he has to be a starter now but there were games last year where he scored 18-20 points coming off the bench and had 9-10 rebounds,” Trimmer said. “So Skyler has great potential, if he comes out and doesn't get hurt during football and is healthy through the season, he will probably be one of the main contributors besides Ross.”

Other than Peters and Still, there are very few Kelly players with varsity experience so everyone will have a new role to fill. Another player Trimmer spoke about is Truman White who will have the tough task of replacing Michael Dollins.

“Truman White has big shoes to fill because he has to replace Michael. I hope people don't judge him based on that because that’s a hard individual to follow, Michael was very good,” Trimmer said. “All we're hoping for Truman to replace Michael is for him to use his ball control and intelligence from the point guard position to distribute the basketball and to take shot opportunities when they arise.”

White got a lot of playing time in their summer league game at the Cape Girardeau Sportsplex in the absence of Peters and Still who had prior commitments to summer baseball. Sunburnt to a crisp from working construction all day, White ran point as the Hawks cycled in just about every player on their roster in a losing effort to Fredericktown.

White said he is confident in his abilities to replace Dollins but also acknowledged the difficulty of doing so.

“One thing for sure I’ve improved is my confidence, it was very low last year. My ball handling has also gotten better, and so has my penetration, but I still need to work on my passing,” White said. “I just have to do the best I can and hope my teammates help me out a little bit, it's very hard to replace Michael Dollins. Defense is the main point of my game but on offense, I need to work on trying to get everyone involved”

Although Kelly did not start in the win column, Trimmer said he is not focused on the wins and losses as long as his players continue to develop.

“These games are important for us. Two-thirds of our varsity has gone, and the only guys with significant varsity playing time are Ross and Skylar coming back. We missed them tonight but that's okay it allowed us to have more playing time for everyone else. I know when the season rolls around. Ross could be the Conference Player of the Year and both guys could be All-District,” Trimmer said. “We played about 14 guys on varsity last year but this year, we'll probably get that down to about 12. We're looking at adding six new varsity players, and that's gonna be tough because we'll probably have to ask some freshmen and sophomores to be big contributors.”