By T. Scott Boatright

Change is in the air for Simsboro High School basketball.

That’s the one sure thing for the SHS boys and girls hoops squads heading into the 2022-23 basketball season.

Simsboro basketball will feature two new head coaches as Randy Carlisle takes over the Tigers and Matt Herring takes the helm for the Lady Tigers.

Another change for SHS will be district opponents. Choudrant remains a district foe, but this season Simsboro will be facing Downsville and Forest as district opponents.

The SHS hoops teams will open the season on Nov. 1 when they take on Avoylles Charter at St. Mary’s High School in Natchitoches. They hosted a scrimmage against Atlanta High School on Saturday and are preparing for the Doyline Jamboree on Thursday.

Following are season previews for Simsboro’s basketball teams:

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TIGERS

After winning four state titles over the past five years, the Tigers are in full rebuild mode after losing its top four players from last year’s squad.

Former head coach Josh Brown has moved on to Claiborne Christian School in West Monroe. Jordan Crawford, Nick Maryland and Lee Abney and all moved to to the collegiate ranks, with Crawford will take his skills to Dawson Community College in Glendive, Montana, Maryland taking his taking his basketball prowess to Redlands Community College in El Reno, Oklahoma, and Abney playing at Northland Community College in Minnesota.

Carlisle thought when he accepted the SHS coaching position last spring that he would have Chilaydrien “CBo” Newton, a 2022 second-team All-State selection, to be a focal point to build his first Simsboro around. But Newton has moved on to Wasatch Academy, a boarding school in Mt. Pleasant, Utah, a national basketball powerhouse that earned a No.5 seeding in GEICO High School Basketball National Championships last spring.

When he took over last spring, Carlisle focused on conditioning, using a self-developed program that has seen coaches from all over the region send players to work with Carlisle on that aspect of their games.

“It’s a tire program, but it’s not about flipping them, or dragging them, or anything like that,” Carlisle said. “It transforms the body fast and gets those little muscles firing fast – those fast twitch muscles that are so important for athletes.

“I’ve been using it for 10 or 11 years now. The athletes work out three times a week and it’s good for all sports. I’ve used it to train athletes headed to LSU and to the NFL. It’s been very successful for me as far as strength and conditioning goes.”

But especially after losing Newton in addition to the graduated SHS standouts, Carlile finds himself back to the basics as he prepares to lead the Tigers into a new season.

“We’re starting from scratch,” Carlisle said. “So right now it’s all about fundamentals and especially learning how to read. We’re all still working to get used to each other. We’re just going to build this thing step by step, starting with the foundation. And that’s all about fundamentals.”

Carlisle admitted that the Tigers still have a long way to go after scrimmaging against Atlanta.

“In all honesty we just didn’t look all that good,” Carlisle said. “We’ll get there, but we’ve still got a lot of work to do.”

While Carlisle unexpectedly doesn’t have Newton around, he does have a returning starter in senior Kalep Wright to build around.

“We’ve got a good group of guys to build on – but that’s just it … it’s going to take a little patience to give us time to build,” Carlisle said. “We’ve got a tough early-season schedule and we’ll be facing some big challenges with that.

“But hopefully that will get us prepared to be a pretty good team once the season gets here. I’m excited to be here and excited about this team. But it’s not all going to happen right off. We’re going to be a work in progress, and hopefully that progress will show once the district season rolls around.”

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LADY TIGERS

While the basketball focus at SHS has been on the boys squad in recent years, the Lady Tigers feel they can be strong contenders this season.

And that’s largely in part to the return of seniors Ikeia Brown and Armani Dean.

Brown averaged 32.8 points per game last season as a junior and also earned first-team honors on the All District 2-B squad. The speedy Brown also averaged 8.2 rebounds, 4.0 assists, 6.0 steals and two blocked shots per game.

Simsboro’s Amani Dean was a second-team all-district selection after averaging 9.5 points and 7.0 rebounds on the season.

“Ikeia is a special guard,” Herring said “With her athletic ability and skill, and the way she works so hard at the game is hopefully setting up what will be an awesome senior year.

Having Dean back with her is going to help, too. That’s as good a post-guard combination as most teams out there in Class B.

Senior VaShanti Sproulls, sophomore Kayla Abney and sophomore Jakeri Abney will be the other three starters for the Lady Tigers.

Abney, the youngest sister of former SHS boys standout Jakemine Abney, who graduated in 2020, adds to a long bloodline of basketball standouts at Simsboro.

“Her brother was a pretty good one a few years back and she’s very athletic like him,” Herring said. “She’s very athletic – very strong.”

Herring said that because of the talent and size of his team, he’s making a change to standard defensive philosophy.

“I’m usually a man-to-man coach, but because of the size and strength we have on this team, we’re going to play a zone defense,” Herring said. “We’re going to have some size that I think not many teams are going to be able to match.

“And on offense, we’re going to get into transition as fast as we can because of size and rebounding, and then push it out to our quick guards and push it down people’s throats.”

Herring said he liked what he saw in the recent scrimmage against Atlanta.

“I really liked the way we looked the other day in our scrimmage against Atlanta,” said Herring, who came to Simsboro from Kilbourne High School. “We won pretty soundly. They split with Simsboro last year, so to beat them the way we did made me feel good.

“The girls played really hard and played together as a team really well. It was fun to watch.”