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December 14, 2005Cherryland Conference race should be wide openEditor's Note: This is the second in a series of conference basketball previews. Today: The Cherryland. TRAVERSE CITY - Last Monday, Leland beat Glen Lake by 28 points.On Friday, Glen Lake beat Northport by 16. So what happens Saturday? Northport beats Leland by three. Confused? So are some of the basketball coaches in the Cherryland Conference. Then again, conference teams were unpredictable a year ago, too. Leland won the league, then lost to Lake Leelanau St. Mary in the Class D district. St. Mary then lost to Northport in the district final. On paper, Buckley, Leland and Northport loom as the early favorites this season. But stay tuned. "It's wide open," Buckley coach Steve Prissel insisted. "I don't think there is a favorite." LELAND suffered heavy graduation losses. The Comets' top seven players departed. But coach Jason Stowe has some good young talent to develop. He's starting three underclassmen, including two sophomores. Stowe likes the potential. "There's so much room for growth," he said. Stowe has three letterwinners back - 6-foot-3 Adam Houdek, 5-10 Ben Schaub and 6-foot Dean Schaub. They're joined in the mix by junior shooting guard Matt Lichty and sophomores Adam Nedow and Jordan Gibson. Nedow at 6-2 is one of Leland's tallest players. Stowe believes the Comets will be solid defensively and balanced offensively. "We've already had five different players score in double figures," said Stowe, whose team took a 1-2 record into Tuesday's game with Frankfort. Gibson leads the team with a 12-point per game average. Houdek is at 11 a game. BUCKLEY returns one of the premier players in the league in 5-11 Justin Weaver, a three-year varsity veteran. Weaver averaged 22 points a game last season. "Justin's growing into more of a point guard," Prissel said. "People have a tendency to look at Justin and think he's just a scorer. But he has the best vision of any kid I've seen since I've been at Buckley. Now we just have to get the guys to catch his passes." Buckley suffered a loss when Josh Eckstein moved to Wisconsin. He averaged about 10 a game a year ago. But Prissel has had two pleasant surprises - guard Charles Wagner and center Shawn Weir. Wagner, up off the JV, hit six 3-pointers in a win over McBain Northern Christian. He had 13 against Mount Pleasant Sacred Heart. Weir, a lean 6-4, added 10 in the Sacred Heart game. Weir is playing basketball for the first time. "This is the first year he's had coaching at any level in any sport," Prissel said. Like Buckley, NORTHPORT has a player to build around in 6-4 Drew Mitchell. The junior came on strong last season, helping the Wildcats win the district. Northport lost Jimmy Stannard and Joey Thomas to graduation. They were the floor leaders of last year's team. Stannard is playing soccer at Cleveland State. The Wildcats will also be without coach Chris Stannard until after the holidays for medical reasons. Dan Stowe is filling in for Stannard. "We're going to go with what's been successful here in the past," Stowe said. That, he said, means pushing the ball up the floor on offense and playing tough man-to-man defense. Guard Joe Roman is another returning starter for the Wildcats. TRAVERSE CITY CHRISTIAN has one of the more experienced teams in the league, but the Sabres drew two tough squads the first week of the season - Bear Lake and Central Lake. Coach Jason Meriwether will mold this team around a nucleus that includes Matt Beemer, Matt Yeiter, Eric Pardini and Gannon O'Brien. LAKE LEELANAU ST. MARY coach Stan Pasch has just one senior on his roster. The Eagles are 0-2 after losing to St. Francis and Suttons Bay in week one. Junior Adam Konieczka had 15 in the loss to Suttons Bay. LEELANAU SCHOOL boasts perhaps the most exciting player in the conference in 6-2 sophomore George Wilkinson. He's scored 64 points in the Thunderbirds (1-1) two games. He had three dunks in the win over the Traverse City Bulldogs. "He's a talent," coach Bob Sonnenberg said. "I think he could play community college ball right now - he's that good." Wilkinson, who hails from the Bronx, is following in the footsteps of his older brother, who also attended the Leelanau County boarding school. The Thunderbirds are the youngest team in the league. The team's top six players include five sophomores and one junior. Besides Wilkinson, the other sophomore contributors include Chris Omerza, Travis Dickinson, Zack Stanz and Jordan Marks. Junior Jon Lee is in the mix, too. Leelanau School is idle until January. Students are taking final exams this week and will depart for the holidays Friday or Saturday. "They'll go home for three weeks, come back, we'll have two practices and then play our next game," Sonnenberg said.
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