The Broadneck boys basketball team has made waves outside of county play in the 2024-2025 season. In-county has been a separate question so far, but the Bruins are optimistic about the stretch run with the pieces they’re putting together.
Broadneck took on a different opportunity than in previous years for their holiday games, tripping to Cape Henlopen, Delaware, where they won a tournament title by beating Oakland Mills and the hosts, Cape Henlopen.
It was a successful team-bonding trip that head coach Jeff Starr hopes will pay dividends down the road.
“We got a chance to go to Delaware and stay overnight, so I thought that was a good team-building, camaraderie thing,” Starr said. “I told them this was kind of like a college experience, going to stay overnight, stay in the hotel, playing a game, and then possibly playing the next day. I try to give my teams a different experience every year, whether it’s playing a different opponent or traveling somewhere else.”
The Bruins are now 6-3, 5-0 out of county, but 1-3 in the county. That’s in part down to a team finding itself after graduating a large chunk of their offense, but also in part to playing some quality opposition.
After the season-opening win over Severna Park, Broadneck has lost in-county to South River, Glen Burnie, and most recently Meade, 58-54 on January 10.
“I thought we played a good game, had too many turnovers for a close game like that against a quality opponent,” Starr said. “In spite of more turnovers than we wanted, we hit some clutch shots and had some really good moments.”
Out of county, the Bruins cruised against the Park School, La Plata and North Caroline, in addition to the two wins in Cape Henlopen.
With steady senior leadership, the team has turned to a trio of younger heads to fill the scoring void. Junior Kamari Williams leads the team in scoring at nearly 12 points a game, while freshman Liam Sabo averages 10.5 points and almost nine rebounds a night. Junior Ashton Sellman has contributed with scoring bursts here and there in a complementary role.
There is plenty of room for growth for Broadneck, as they hit a challenging back half of the schedule: in addition to Meade, they play Chesapeake, Northeast, Annapolis, and Arundel in the space of two weeks.
“We’re still a work in progress,” Starr said. “I think we’re starting to figure out as a group what we’re good at and what we need to work on. But I like the direction that we’re going. I like the cohesiveness of our team, and these guys like playing basketball with each other. They try to push each other in practice, and I like that for a team that’s growing and a lot of guys are figuring out new roles from last year.
“Our second half of the season, we’ve got a pretty tough stretch in front of us, but everyone’s going to end up playing everybody. We’re just hoping to grow and get better as the second half of the season goes on. That helped us win a couple of playoff games last year, and if we can get that same energy and growth as the season goes on, you never know what could happen.”
Comments
No comments on this item Please log in to comment by clicking here