Individual improvement via intense daily practice battles the hidden benefit of strong depth for Chesterton boys basketball team that opened the season with a big win over No. 4 South Bend St. Joseph

Tom Keegan
Onwardtrojans.com

Count the ways that a deep bench helps a basketball team.
It’s a great motivator for a coach to use. If a starter isn’t giving maximum effort, a coach will see how he likes the view from the bench as a teammate takes his place without the team suffering too big a talent dropoff.
The starters don’t have to pace themselves knowing that a teammate can give them breathers whenever necessary, which enables them to play at a fast pace and defend with intensity.
Foul trouble isn’t as devastating when talented reserves make it easier to give starters a rest so that the best lineup can be on the floor at the end of the game.
And then there is the hidden depth factor that just might bring the greatest value to a team with a strong bench. It ensures that all the players in the rotation are at their sharpest in practice or they’ll look bad because they are facing other talented players, guarding them and being guarded by them, battling them for rebounds, and trying to beat them up and down the court.
Facing inferior talent in practice is a prescription for complacency. That’s not an option for the Trojans.
Chesterton used an eight-man rotation at home in a season-opening 73-55 win over No. 4 South Bend St. Joseph: Perimeter starters Tobias Ray, Jaylon Watts, Logan Pokorney and reserves Malachi Ransom and Cooper Huwig, and big man starters Bradly Basila and Caden Schneider and reserve Gunner Ello.
But more players than those eight had an indirect, invaluable hand in the victory. Big man Tommy Kostbade and wing Ethan Virgil weren’t needed Friday but will be in other games.
And the contribution of the bench extended well beyond the combined seven points from Ransom and Huwig.
“We’re 10 guys deep and some of our bottom guys would be able to play at other schools and even start, so it’s like we’ve got players who can always go at each other,” Ray said, explaining the big individual improvement from players up and down the roster. “I’ve got someone like Malachi, where he presses up on me and kind of rattles me a little bit, but then it gets me ready for games. You can see Logan and Jaylon going at it every day and it makes them both so much better.”
Pokorney and Watts both looked stronger, faster, more physical, their handles tighter. To a large extent, they have each other to thank for that.
“Jaylon works hard every day,” Pokorney said. “He and I go at each other hard every day and we try to make each other better.”
Added Ray: “Tommy, he goes at Bradly and Bradly goes at him and everyone just goes at each other,” Ray said. “It’s like iron sharpens iron. It helps us.”
Nobody looked more improved than Basila, who demonstrated so much more polish to his game and made such good decisions and showed such impressive stamina.
The three big men Basila has to guard at various times in practice have such different body types, athleticism and skill sets that it prepares him for a variety of opponents.
Schneider must be guarded out to beyond the 3-point line. That’s true with Kostbade as well and the sophomore has the leaping ability to soar above the rim with Basila.
Teams will throw beefy, strong defenders at Basila to try to wear him down and Basila will know what to do to try to beat them, which is whatever he does when junior Gunner Ello battles him in practice.
When an opponent tries to slow down Pokorney and shifts a quick player three inches taller onto him, it won’t be anything Pokorney hasn’t seen in practice when Basila guards him.
Early in the opener, St. Joseph’s quick, strong defenders did a good job of keeping Chesterton from running their offense, but the Trojans didn’t panic. They stayed the course and figured it out.
“It was hard to get into stuff at times but I felt our guys were just basketball players,” 10th-year head coach Marc Urban said. “You can X and O but sometimes you just have to be able to pass and catch and make the right play. And I felt that we did that for the most part tonight.”
Again, facing talented, intense teammates in practice means players either become resourceful, figure out how to get better, or they fall behind.